Oculus Presents: This 'Exorcist' cover is metal as hell

I mean, seriously. Look at it! It's more like something you'd expect from a Books of Blood cover than Blatty, but the design is absolutely fantastic. The work of one Dan Alexandru Ionescu, this is the cover of the first of the two Romanian editions of The Exorcist, from the publishing house Nemira. This edition appeared in 1994 as part of Nemira's horror collection, translated by Vasile Stoica. I usually try to avoid reading translated works if I can read them in the original, but I'm also trying to read more in Romanian, and I just couldn't resist this epic cover when I saw it. Whether the contents will hold up to my fond (if a little squicked) memories of this book and the movie adaptation remain to be seen, though.

Oculus Presents: The eighth passenger is Death

Hi, folks, welcome to Oculus Presents.

I'll be honest with y'all: the Hungarian title for Alien is mad dumb. A nyolcadik utas: a Halál (see the title of this post for the translation) is eye-catching, sure, but it doesn't represent the sheer dread in this movie nearly as much as the enigmatic original title - hell, it sounds more like the title of an Ingmar Bergman vehicle than 70's sci-fi horror. On the other hand, the first Hungarian cover for Alan Dean Foster's novelization might be one of my favorite book covers ever.

This edition is a 1987 release from the prolific speculative fiction publishing house Kozmosz Könyvek, translated by Piroska F. Nagy. I'll confess I haven't read it all the way through - I usually try to read books in their original language if I speak it - but the first few chapters had exactly the sort of moody, dreamlike tone you could expect from a cover like that. The work of artist Pál Varga, this cover evokes more the mood of vintage "cold" sci-fi flicks like Solaris or THX 1138, but at the same time it's actually faithful to the story, which is always welcome on a genre fiction book cover. The novelization has been released twice more in Hungarian with deeply "meh" covers (although hopefully better translations: as much as I liked the atmosphere of this version, it drove me nuts that both Ripley and Lambert were referred to as "girl" rather than "woman" by the narration, ugh), but the first edition of it is a real gem of Hungarian sci-fi publishing.

Oculus Presents: Three rare vintage book covers

Hey, folks, this is Oculus Presents. Again.

I'm not exactly a book collector, my occasional eBay and Thriftbooks browsing aside - as much as I love forgotten and underrated genre fiction, I'm usually content to just long from afar for the truly rare out-of-print editions that go for huge prices on the collectors' market. One of the reasons I admire Valancourt Books so much (I urge y'all specfic fans to check out their catalog and throw a few bucks their way if you can - I'm not, like, affiliated with them or anything, I just think they're really neat) is the fact that they've brought back to life a whole lot of highly sought-after books that were either very rare or flat-out impossible to track down. But it does happen sometimes that I run into a real gem during my library and used bookshop trips - something that while not completely unavailable on the market, is enough of a curiosity to catch my eye. Hell, sometimes I won't even know they're rare until I check for them on the internet. I own three particular books that are really anything but rarities by themselves - but the editions in my library are very little known and very eye-catching, so I thought I'd share.

First off is this 1966 Pan Books Ltd. edition of Dead Man's Folly by Agatha Christie. I know Agatha Christie books are about as far from rarities as you can get - can't throw a stone in a bookshop or a library without hitting one - but this particular edition by London publisher Pan Books has pretty much vanished from consciousness, and I've seen copies of it go for 16 dollars and above. Not too shabby for a bestselling novel. Still, it's a shame, because I really dig the colors and the general layout of this cover - simple, but eye-catching with a real classy vintage flair. The book itself I've read and loved; I really think every single fan of crime fiction owes it to themselves to read at least one Agatha Christie book in their lives.

Mary Higgins Clark was a bestselling thriller and mystery writer, so also not what you'd call a rarity on the speculative fiction market; but this 1981 edition of one of her novels, published by Fontana Press, caught my eye with the absolutely gorgeous cover art at a used bookshop enough that I'd bought it on the spot. It's not a rare printing, per se, but it's definitely one of the harder-to-find ones; for a while I couldn't even track down a good-quality cover photo, which is a bit surprising given the gazillion editions of this book out there. I tried reading the book a while back and found the writing unbearably stuffy and one-dimensional, but I'll definitely be giving it another chance. I mean, I can't just not read a book I own with a cover this pretty.

Last, but not least, the 1973 New English Library version of Frank Herbert's The Green Brain is one of my favorite book covers ever printed. The colors, the composition, the rich detailing - an all-around masterpiece by cover artist Bruce Pennington. I've heard good things and bad things about the book itself, but the first few pages I'd read a bit back piqued my curiosity. I'll definitely feature this book in more detail on the blog, once the sci-fi mood strikes me again. And for extra charm, look at this inscription on the title page of my copy of this book:

I suppose we shall see if this book will also make me understand that insects are friends...

Oculus Presents: The story of my favorite Hungarian horror cover

Hey, everyone, this is Oculus Reviews. It's uh. Been a while, hasn't it.

IRL stuff has kind of eaten up my time and energies in the past year or so, hence me heinously neglecting this blog, but honestly, the more time goes on, the more I miss being able to talk in-depth about genre fiction that I love. I have found some true underrated gems in the year that has passed since my last post on this blog, as well as some true duds - stuff that has embroidered itself into my brain for whatever reason, but also stuff that relatively few people have heard about in the grand scheme of things. I mean, I probably won't surprise anyone by saying that Frank Herbert's Dune books are masterpieces, but how many of you folks have heard about his novel The Green Brain?

Bottom line: we're back with a vengeance, baby. And to kick off things, let me present my favorite Hungarian edition of the one and only Dracula by Bram Stoker:

I still recall the surprised euphoria I'd felt years and years ago (I don't think I was older than 14) when I found this book in my favorite used bookshop, although back then I was too excited to read it to really stop and savor this fantastic cover art. I really dig the sharp, surprising color scheme as well as the ghastly imagery that evokes old tapestries or perhaps woodcut art; the ship episode is by far my favorite and most remembered of the book, so I'm extra into the fact that the cover artist chose that particular bit to illustrate.

At first glance, the book doesn't name the person who drew this - even with some dedicated Google-fu, all I could dig up is that my copy is a 1989 edition by the publishing house/literary society Jókai Irodalmi Egyesület, and is the reprint of a 1925 Hungarian edition translated by Ferencz Tar. (Amazingly enough, the 1925 one was the fourth Hungarian edition of this book - looks like the readers really ate up this one.) Some more research, however, finally netted me the cover artist's name: this same cover art, only in green instead of red, adorned the cover of the 1925 edition, and was drawn by acclaimed Hungarian artist Tibor Gönczi-Gebhardt. Not sure who in particular is interested in this bit of Hungarian literary history, but I find it really neat to have discovered a bit of lore behind one of my favorite covers ever made for a horror novel. As for whether the contents of the book hold up to my fond memories - only a reread will answer me that question, am I right?

Oculus Presents: My favorite Hungarian sci-fi cover

I don't suppose I'll be reviewing this short story collection on the blog, since it's a Hungarian-only edition, but this cover was pretty much love at first sight.

The work of artists Gábor Szikszai and Zoltán Boros, I really dig that sweet retro cyberpunk goodness with just a hint of Terminator. And the title too: The Death of Lies. Badass. I do wonder if any of the short stories inside will live up to this image.