Friday, February 3, 2023

Another Look: “The Future Mister Dolan”

Warning: Artistic inspiration drawn from book titles may vary.



Left: The Future Mister Dolan, by Charles Gorham (Signet, 1949), with a cover illustration credited to James Avati. Right: The Future Mister Dolan, by Charles Gorham (Pyramid, 1959); cover art by Ernest Chiriacka, aka Darcy.

Charles Orson Gorham (1911-1975) saw his first novel, The Gilded Hearse, published in 1948 (and later reissued as Make Me an Offer). He quickly followed that up with The Future Mister Dolan, a tale that has been variously praised as brutal and uncompromising, and damned (by Kirkus Reviews) as “unprintable,” “unforgivable,” and “censor bait.” Gorham went on to pen the no-less-controversial McCaffery (1961), an early gay-themed novel.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Gorham sounds like a trail blazer. I've ordered a copy of this one.