Queen Remembers Forgotten Book

Much ado this morning over Suzanna, a yellow Labrador retriever the Queen has given the RCMP. According to the Globe and Mail, Elizabeth II was inspired to name the dog after Muriel Denison's children's book Susannah of the Mounties. No explanation for the spelling discrepancy. I'm willing to wager a small sum that no one at Buckingham Palace thought to check.

That our monarch was familiar with the novel is not surprising, Muriel Denison (1885-1954) was hugely popular in her youth. Susannah of the Mounties – first published in 1936, the year of Elizabeth's tenth birthday – went through numerous editions, and was translated into French, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, Norwegian and Swedish. In 1939, Shirley Temple and Randolph Scott starred in a screen adaptation. As might be expected, the book spawned several sequels: Susannah of the Yukon (1937), Susannah at Boarding School (1938) and Susannah Rides Again (1940). Not one is currently in print. The most recent edition of any Denison title – predictably, Susannah of the Mounties – was published in 1976 by Collins.

The Queen is not alone in remembering Denison's writing fondly. Timothy Findley wrote that as a boy he 'feasted' on Denison, Ernest Thompson Seton and Charles G.D. Roberts. Can't say I shared the same taste, though I do recall watching Susannah of the Mounties on television one snowy Saturday afternoon. I leave you with this small appetizer:

News Stand Library Cover Cavalcade

As patrons flock to SoHo's Openhouse Gallery to take in cutting edge art commissioned by Harlequin Enterprises, thoughts turn to News Stand Library. The publisher's early rival, New Stand was much more willing to use sex and scandal to sell its wares. In nearly every way, their books were cheaper, nastier and inferior. It makes perfect sense that Harlequin published Brian Moore's first book, while Hugh Garner's second, the pseudonymous Waste No Tears, came from News Stand. And yet, the two competitors did share a few writers, including prolific pulpist Thomas P. Kelley.

The most valuable of all New Stand titles, Kelley's The Gorilla's Daughter – ' OFFSPRING of MAID and MONSTER' – cannot be had in any condition for under C$400. Its cover is more polished than most; a typical example of the publisher's look would be that found on the author's Jesse James: His Life and Death.

The type is ugly and in places difficult to read. Note that the author's name is misspelt, an error found time and again on News Stand covers. Here we have Bentz Plagemann , author of Each Night a Black Desire, identified as Bentz Plageman.

By my count, a dozen covers suffer similar mistakes. Niel H. Perrin is Neil H. Perrin, Murry Leinster is Murray Leinster and Ursula Parrot is good time gal Ursula Parrott. The cover of Alan Marston's Strange Desire reads 'Strange Desires by Alan Malston'.

Other blunders are more curious, and may reveal the true names behind pseudonyms. Just who wrote Private Performance – the Glen Watkins on the cover or the Eliot Brewster credited on the title page? Perhaps the most amusing error is found on the cover of Terry Lindsay's Queen of Tarts, which has the title as 'Quean of Tarts'.

In keeping with the previous post, here are my three all-time favourite News Stand covers. A couple appear to use work produced in a high school art class, but what I find most appealing are the pitch lines above each title. 'Never Will HELL Admit a Gayer Sinner than Laura Warren' reads the first – printed on the cover of a book written by... Laura Warren. An unforgiving editor, perhaps?

Related posts:

About Those Ugly NCL Covers

About Those Awful PaperJacks Covers

Harlequin's Romantic View of the Past

Harlequin's sixtieth anniversary celebrations continue this weekend with the opening of an exhibit devoted to its cover illustrations. Look not in Winnipeg, the city of its birth, or Toronto, home of parent corporation Torstar, the showing is being held at SoHo's Openhouse Gallery.

Since it was announced a few months back, I've been wondering how the publisher would handle its first twelve or so years. As noted previously, Harlequin hasn't been much interested in having attention drawn to its early history. What to do? The answer is found in the exhibition's title: The Heart of a Woman: Harlequin Cover Art 1949-2009. Little place here for Joe Barry's Fall Guy, never mind the vast majority of books from the publisher's first decade. I expect James Hadley Chase's Twelve Chinks and a Woman was particularly unwelcome.

I don't deny that there's interest to be had in viewing sixty years of romance novel cover art; witnessing the rise and fall of the nurse, the rise and fall of the mini-skirt, and the rise and shine of 'inspirational' romances targeted toward born-again Christians. That said, aside from Doctor in Bondage, I find each individual title so very lackluster. True, the artists are technically competent, but like Harlequin's writers they follow formulae. The same notes are struck repeatedly, the same themes are followed, evolution is slow, change is subtle and at times microscopic. The parade of covers is the visual equivalent of Kraftwerk's 'Trans-Europe Express' – except that the latter doesn't go on for six decades. And it's beautiful.

So, I join the publisher's sixtieth anniversary celebrations by presenting, in order, my three all-time favourite Harlequin covers.

Related posts:

Harlequin's Change of Heart

Covering Up the Past

Hard Lessons in Publishing

Not Only Chic, but Well-read

A photograph of Yves Thériault, André Langevin and Jean-Charles Harvey, stumbled upon early this week in the 28 November 1954 edition of Chic, Montreal's 'Journal de la Femme'. The weekly devoted a two-page spread, 'LES ECRIVANS CANADIENS FONT FACE LEUR CHER PUBLIC', to a 14 November gathering of 'romanciers et quelques romancières du Canada français' at the Windsor Hotel's Rose Room. Judging by the photographs, our romancières were severely outnumbered; not one features a female novelist. Here's Thériault again, looking a touch less shifty, standing between Robert Élie and Roger Viau:


Other photos capture Eugène Cloutier, Bertrand Vac, Guy Boulizon and Jean Bruchési. In short, a lot of men who appear happy to be surrounded by the stylish women of the Société d'étude et de conférences, including vice-president Miss Louise McNichols and president Mrs Redmond Roche, shown here with the dowdy Father Marie-Ceslas Forest.

Father Forest served as professor at the Dominican College of Ottawa and the Université de Montréal, was an early supporter of women's suffrage and wrote Le divorce (1920). His papers are held at the Université of Montréal. Much less can be said about Chic. Quebec's Bibliotèque et Archives nationales holds only eleven issues, the final being the edition in which these photographs appeared. Though the newspaper states otherwise, the BAN claims that it was published by Merlin, the company best known for Allô police.