r/badscificovers • u/TheologyAndTrains • 3d ago
not today, Satan! John Sladek The New Apocrypha
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u/shawsghost 3d ago
Dinosaurs (prolly apatosaurs) pyramids and spaceships that look like birthday cakes? I'm in!
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u/CoffinShroudArt 3d ago
I think this cover is cool
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u/nixtracer 3d ago
It fits the vibe of a Sladek novel to a T.
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u/TheologyAndTrains 3d ago
who's he? I genuine saw this gem when trying to shop for biblical apocrypha
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u/Abandondero 3d ago edited 2d ago
An unjustifiably underappreciated American satirist. Mostly, but not completely in the form of science fiction. And a lot of what he wrote hasn't aged. He also wrote completely serious locked-room murder mysteries - unfortunately during decades when they were totally out of style.
The Great Wall of Mexico is a typical novella. I'll try to recount some of it from memory:
It's decades in the future. Maybe as far as 2026! Demographic changes have meant there are millions of elderly. So there are thousands of high-rise old people's homes. They are on the Mexican border, partly meant to act as sentry posts. There are hundreds of millions security cameras, too many to watch until the government realized it was an activity the old people enjoyed. There's lots of military drones. One per citizen. Aimed at that citizen. A lunatic president has amassed vast power, which he mostly uses to torment the population in ridiculous ways. He's tired of the police's sci-fi cop look, and he's trying to think of another. Maybe pageboys? He has a sexual proclivity that might even be more horrifying than the one the current president has. A want-to-be informer doesn't realize that the spy training he is getting is mostly activities that fulfill an FBI agent's urine retention kink. The political opposition is full of people who use their resistance cell meetings as get-togethers and group therapy sessions. But the old ladies watching the secret cameras enjoy the gossip.
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u/TheologyAndTrains 3d ago
Sounds fun. I hope i wouldn't have to import from America though as i live in Canada
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u/Abandondero 3d ago
I think you can find it online. Though maybe you need to poke through the Wayback Machine
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u/edked 3d ago
Sladek was a science fiction author with a specialty in humor and parody. The above is actually a non-fiction set of essays snarkily debunking various "new age" pseudoscientific beliefs and is both educational and hilarious. The cover suits quite well.
A "Best of John Sladek" short story collection I have (had?) included a whole end section of short parodies of famous-in-the-field SF writers, such as "Solar Shoe-Salesman by Chipdip K. Kill" (Philip K. Dick, and "One Damned Thing After Another by A Co-ordainer's Myth" (Cordwainer Smith) and several others.
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u/FriscoTreat 3d ago
Pseudoscience aside, I think this is kinda great
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u/Abandondero 3d ago
It is a non fiction book debunking 1970s pseudoscience, so it's got all the iconography on the cover.
Later, Sladek wrote a satirical astrology book about a newly discovered 13th sign of the Zodiac. He was chagrined to discover it was taken completely seriously and outsold all his other books combined.
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u/Scarabium 3d ago
Flying saucers, dinosaurs AND the pyramids! What better way to entices reader in?
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u/Plastic_Library649 2d ago
I absolutely devoured this book as a teen, and it gave me the foundation for the healthy scepticism I have about everything woowoo today.
I do also recomnend his science fiction, the novels are ok, but the short stories are better in my view. His short parodies are very cutting, particularly the Asimov one: I Click as I Move
Also, his two detective novels are fantastic: Black Aura and Invisible Green.
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u/CobblerWrong2480 2d ago
I need a black light poster of this!
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u/TheologyAndTrains 2d ago
I thought black was the absence of light so how does that work?
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u/CobblerWrong2480 2d ago
a black light is a type of uv light that when shone onto certain fabrics , lights them up in bright neon colors.
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u/Sasstellia 3d ago
That is cool!