No artistic credit given to this subtle piece used for a cover of Hickory Dickory Death by Agatha Christie. Like how the two are turned to each other and the abstract doorway look in the background.

The folks at the Florida Bibliophile Society were too kind to take up an entire page of their publication with a story about me and the talk I gave about how I construct the Swampy’s Florida coloring books this past February 19th. That’s way too many pictures of me!

A couple corrections are that I’m not currently a member of the caricature group and that I’m Florida Chapter Chairman of the NCS. Something not shown were the stack of personal books I brought to explain was my extensive use of books to research for each of the Swampy’s Florida coloring books.

Good thing a group about physically published books puts out a physically published magazine! – and it’s extremely well done, too!

Here’s a cover by Harvey Kidder from Murder in the Cardais Coach (later named Murder on the Orient Express).

The Last Jihad by Joel C. Rosenberg

My rating: 2 of 5 stars

This book was heavily recommended to me. As I started the book and read about a civilian in a mid-eastern country and then his high powered connections, I began to think the book was more science fiction/ fantasy than political thriller. I finished the book with the same feeling.

This book couldn’t be more disconnected from reality. The very idea that a president could attach himself to a civilian so easily (with the exception of a way, way, way over written challenge) is pure insanity.

The sick part, to me, is the complete disregard of the feelings and faith of the Palestinians/Muslims/Arabs. The idea that they could be paid off – bribed – and thus set aside their religious views for “Peace” is beyond poor plotting. It’s irresponsible. To write that the president of the United States would condone a bribe to such a degree as is proposed in the book has to have one wonder just what the writer really thinks of America. I kept thinking of Paul Douglas and his role in ‘The Americanization of Emily’ where he goes crazy and starts making insane orders. I guess that explains the smaller publisher. A big publisher would’ve kicked this back and have it severely edited.

Otherwise, the writing is sub-par and the conclusion is really not one, making the rest of the reading excursion feel like a wasted one. The idea is to force you to the next volume. Not sure if I will make that trek.



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This version of Agatha Christie’s Three Blind Mice has a Mike Ludlow cover. The wiping away of the film on the pane is amazing painting work.

Here’s a simple piece from Harold Robbins’ ’79 Park Avenue’. Love the rendering of the telephone. Very simple, yet dead on. That and the contrast of the mechanical phone and the feathery what-ever the girl is wearing.

I’ve acquired some great new paperback covers and thought I’d share them over the next few days. The one above is by Willaim Teasen.Love the use of black to frame the addition of a new element to a carafe of fluid.

I only did a minor digital check for background of Teasen and came up empty. Feel free to add thoughts below.  Click here for a collection of other covers I found.

Had to get a flurry of artwork done today! Here’s a montage of some of it!

The Case of the Empty Tin by Erle Stanley Gardner

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

Perry Mason at his best! Lots of curves and turns. The mystery starts as one thing and turns into something all together different. Mason’s efforts to solve the puzzle are a bit over the top. It’s all a little too incredible as he masquerades as something that would put anyone else in reality in jail. But it is fiction and maybe things were that different in the 1930s, when this was written.And the book is well written and good characters. Though a seemingly short book, best to read carefully as the story gets more and more complex and stay in that trajectory.



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The Case Of The Fabulous Fake by Erle Stanley Gardner

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is my first Perry Mason book and if this is any indication of the rest of the series I’ll dive into the 30 or so other novels I have. I’ve been collecting them for years, mostly due to the Robert McGinnis paintings used for the covers. Guess I’ll be reading more!



This was a very engaging and fun book to read. it was also well written. It moved very fast and yet the characters were well presented. The backdrop was more than a little sketchy and often it was hard to imagine the area the characters were in.



There is a part at the end that was a real fling of the imagination and I don’t believe would happen in real life. That part involves getting characters to fly some place.



Still this was a good book and I do like the Mason character and see why so many have for 70+ years.



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e_BouThe Bourne Identity by Robert Ludlum

My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This is a very enthralling and involved story of an amnesiac who finds out he is an assassin and wants to know why. Author Robert Ludlum created a very thorough story that, though a little wordy in dialogue, is otherwise concise in a long narrative way.

Unlike so many of today’s super spies who are out to kill, the main character, Jason Bourne, turns pacifist as an amnesiac. Though there is violence, it is far less than in current similar themed novels by Vince Flynn or Brad Thor. This is more of a study of a person trying to find themselves.

I love the series by folks like Flynn because they are so much fun to read. But, in light of Ludlum, they are missing the important parts of the story that makes the Ludlum book so much better in it’s writing and plotting.

About the movie: It might as well been named the Schwartz Identity. It’s a separate world than the one Ludlum created and made for the financial purposes of the film industry.



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