Visions of the Damned by Jacqueline Marten

Nightmare in Red (1981): The Strange Case of Jacqu.Sleep by Lynn Biederstadt (1986): For I Will Walk.Satan Whispers 'Evil' with The Devil's Breath.Children of the Night by Margaret Bingley (1989).Blackwater I: The Flood by Michael McDowell (1983).

The Year's Best Horror Stories Series: The 1970s.

Blackwater II: The Levee by Michael McDowell (1983.

'.the most poetical topic in the world.'.

This List Goes to 11: Best Vintage Horror Reads of.

Oh, Playboy: so very very naughty! And not in the hot way. Fortunately these two novels got good reviews in the romance genre, even with their utterly inappropriate cover art, which ensured their republication by more reputable publishers. Both Nightmare and Visions are considered precursors of that whole 'paranormal romance' sub-sub-subgenre. It too was reprinted by in '88 Pocket as Forevermore. Fortunately for her, Pocket Books reprinted it in 1988 under the title Bryarly with a more accurate romance-y cover.Īnd that wasn't the first time! In 1979 Playboy had published her novel Visions of the Damned and presented it in the same manner, although this one isn't quite as tacky - but it does name-check the bestselling Reincarnation of Peter Proud. It was such a crude marketing ploy that Marten literally cried when she saw the paperback for the first time.

Who could resist such an aggressive cover image?! (Very Alucarda if you ask me). but Playboy of course wanted to cash in on the occult craze of the day, so they gave the paperback a garish horror-themed cover and retitled it Nightmare in Red. Well, I just found out about Nightmare in Red, and pity poor Jacqueline Marten: originally her title for this romance novel was Let the Men Stay Home, then it was Bryarly. Boring behind-the-scenes stuff, yes, but one thing Playboy had done at its height was publish many titles that were basically historical romances with some darker, perhaps supernatural aspects to them, and present them as horror/occult paperbacks. Here's a true tale of woe and horror in the publishing world: Playboy Press published dozens of paperbacks throughout the '60s, '70s, and '80s, till its line was bought by Putnam and became part of their Berkley list.

Visions of the Damned by Jacqueline Marten