Jack Gaughan was one of my favorite SF artists. His covers for Jack Vance’s The Dragon Masters and The Last Castle as well as Harlan Ellison’s Paingod and Other Delusions and Philip K. Dick’s Dr. Bloodmoney are classics. Luis Ortiz gathers those wonderful artworks with hundreds of sketches in Outermost. This book captures Jack Gaughan’s life with its successes and failures. The slow collapse of science fiction magazines, the changing tastes of paperback editors, and the new markets for artwork on children’s books mirror Gaughan’s career. Sadly, Gaughan died of cancer in 1985. But his marvelous work lives on. Outermost crystallizes Gaughan’s work and life. GRADE: A
Lovely artwork, George.
Jack Gaughan had a distinctive style, Patti. During the 1970s, he seemingly was drawing the covers of every other SF paperback. His early death was a tragic loss.
Those old Ace covers really take me back. Great stuff!
Donald Wollheim brought Gaughan with him when he left ACE BOOKS and founded DAW BOOKS, Bill. Plenty of those early DAWs had Gaughan covers.
Gaughan was one of my favorites also, George
Emsh was my all-time favorite SF artist, Scott. Then, Richard Powers. But after that, I’d have to put Gaughan at the top of my list.
Huge fan of Emsh and Powers, but I never warmed to Gaughan. Will definitely track Outermost down, though. I enjoy a good book that involves sf history.
I always saw Jack Gaughan as a bridge between Emsh’s realism and Power’s surrealism, Drongo. OUTERMOST is a wonderful history of science fiction magazines and paperback houses with Gaughan’s life story intertwined. You’ll really enjoy this book!
Nice, very nice. I’d add Kelly Freas to that list, he may be my favorite of them all, but I do love the work of Gaughan a lot. I’ll have to keep an eye out for this one, perhaps remaindered…
I think you should ask Santa to buy you a copy of OUTERMOST before they completely sell out, Rick.
There’s an idea… do you think Santa delivers to Portland, OR? I know he has warehouses in L.A., but far in the piney woods, I don’t know if he could find me.
Santa will find you, Rick, as long as you’re not naughty but nice.