I found this copy of Envoy to New Worlds by Keith Laumer at a used bookstore. Though I haven’t read it, I love this book. Here’s why:

1. The Cover

Look at this!

Look at it again because you need to really take a moment to appreciate what’s happening in this work of art. Just as you wouldn’t gulp a fine wine, you shouldn’t just glance at this book cover.

Here is a man dressed like future-Dracula and sporting an amazing space blaster and cape! He has a jeweled collar and another fancy gem/award on his sport coat! And what’s that lurking in his cape? Monsters!

Oh, and there’s a spaceship in the background.

Put a ticket to Jurassic Park in his hand and this would be the most perfect work of art of them all.

Plus, his face is so boring and his haircut so wonderfully senatorial that I assume he’s a future-Dracula by night and a 9th grade social studies teacher by day! Maybe the award on his chest is for Teacher of the Year?

But wait…there’s more.

2. The cigarette ad
If the copyright date is to be trusted, this was published in 1963, and obviously in the 1960s it wasn’t a big deal to put a full-color, full-page glossy cigarette ad in the middle of a sci-fi book that’s clearly aimed at the younger crowd.

Go ahead and check your copy of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. You won’t finish that book with a strong thirst for tarry smoke.

I’m not a smoker. I’m not a fan of cigarettes. But this ad makes me happy because it’s so very, very stupid. Sadly, while photographing the ad, it ripped out of the book’s binding…possibly because it didn’t want to be shown to the world.

3. The price
I got this book for $2. I just read the first chapter and judging by the words alone, it’s not a very good book, so I probably will never finish it. Sadly, no words could possibly live up to this cover.

That said, I got my two bucks worth.

I’ll keep this book in my car in case I’m ever trapped and want something to read. Or maybe I’ll just frame the cover and sell it to the museum for a thousand dollars.

For those who are interested in the actual story of the book, here’s the synopsis from GoodReads.com (which shows a much less stellar cover):

The adventures of CDC (Corps Diplomatique Terra) diplomat Jame Retief loom large in six highly classified missions where brain and brawn save land and lives despite red-tape bound superiors amid conspiracy and conflct across alien planets – guaranteed astounding, amazing, startling, galactic, weird, and thrillingly wonderful.

Eh…whatever. Let’s all look at the cover again!!!!