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[June 24, 1970] In love with "Ishmael in Love" (July Fantasy and Science Fiction)

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photo of a man with glasses and curly, long, brown hair, and a beard and mustache
by Gideon Marcus

Mazel tov!

This article is going to be short on news as the Marcus family has been occupied this past week.  The Journey has had its first inter-staff wedding!  The Young Traveler and Trek Correspondent Elijah broke the glass under the chupah on the 19th.  Sadly, the pictures aren't back from the Fotomat, so in lieu of that, here is a shot from my nephew David's wedding to Ada Argov in Israel from 1962.

Very blurry black-and-white photograph of a couple at their wedding. The bride is wearing a translucent veil and a slim, sleeveless, unadorned white dress. The groom is wearing a plain white shirt, black pants, and a conic hat.

The issue at hand

Between last-minute dress alterations and sifting through RSVPs, I managed to snatch time to read the stories of this month's Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction.  Unlike the marriage of Lorelei and Elijah, it is not a flawless affair, but it is also not without its charms.  Let's take a look:

Cover for The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction for July 1970. It announces stories by Isaac Asimov, Robert Silverberg, L. Sprague de Camp, Joanna Russ, Barry Malzberg, and Sterling Lanier. The cover illustration shows two men in long robes, one with a wizard hat and the other with a horned helmet. At the center of the illustration is a human face with mechanical eyes.
by Ronald Walotsky

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[June 18th, 1970] A Case of Déjà Vu (Vision of Tomorrow #10)

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Black & White Photo of writer of piece Kris Vyas-Mall
By Mx Kris Vyas-Myall

As I am writing this, voting in the UK General Election is taking place. However, we will have to wait until tomorrow for the results. As such, I want to address one of the biggest perpetual issues in Britain, the housing crisis.

It has become a kind of a dark joke over the last 50 years. At election time, every party leader will say how much they feel for the plight of the homeless and pledge to end the crisis. Then, as soon as voting is over, they will go back to ignoring the issue. Therefore, I feel, it is worth listing off the endemic problems causing this.

For a start, there is the obvious matter of money and organization. The UK spends a smaller share of GDP than the rest of Western Europe on housing and leaves decisions in the hands of local councils, which have a patchwork of plans. On top of that, housing building largely relies on the private sector who are more interested in high-priced luxury developments than on those for the poorest families.

Colour photo of the Ronan Point tower block, post-disaster where one corner has collapsed with ceilings hanging like loose tiles
Ronan Point, post-disaster

With this combination of political short-terminism, lack of investment and reliance on the private sector, it has led to a lot of poor-quality housing stock. An infamous example was the Ronan Point Disaster, where a gas explosion collapsed the corner of a tower block.

Black and White Advertisements for Homeless Charity Shelter. On the Left is one with a knife. The text reads: Sentenced the day he was born. He was born in a crumbling tenement, grew up in a room his family shared with rats and cockroaches. With no hope of escapee. He lived like a wild animal and was put away when he reacted like one. Over a million people live in conditions that are breeding grounds for delinquency, mental and physical illness, illiteracy, broken marriages. Shelter helps re-house some of the most badly off, and fights to get something going for the others. Our crying need is money. Give to shelter and you help give him a decent chance. The advert on the right has a razor blade. The text says: If Mrs. F. kills herself, it'll be third time lucky. For Mrs. F. death would be a happy release from the stinking hole she and her family live in. Twice she's tried suicide. To escape the stench, the damp, the flying insects, the peeling walls. At least a million people live in conditions that are breeding grounds that spawn mental and physical illness, crime, illiteracy, broken marriages. Shelter helps rescue some of the worst-hit and campaigns vigorously to get something done for the rest. But it's a big job. It takes big money. Please give all you can.
Some of Shelter’s recent advertisements

With this lack of a political solution, it is unsurprising that several groups in the voluntary sector have been trying to fill the gap. The biggest of these is Shelter and, whilst all major parties praise their work, they seem to be getting sick of the situation. They are now withholding funds from local authorities that don’t help the poorest in their communities and running advertisements blaming the current biggest social ills on the housing crisis.

There are also other groups taking more direct action. Running in the election in London is a loose party grouping called “Homes Before Roads”, opposing the plans to try to deal with London’s congestion by building a series of ring roads through current residential districts. In a different way there is also the Squatters’ Movement, who are taking control of empty housing stock and trying to get official recognition for their use by those who cannot afford to go anywhere else.

However, I am not hopeful of even direct action resulting in a solution. Whether Wilson or Heath are Prime Minister next week, I suspect the situation will still be much the same in the mid-70s: homelessness and poor-quality housing are endemic; the political parties say what a scandal this is; make vague promises at a solution; promptly ignore it again.

I am also getting a sense of déjà vu from the latest issue of Vision of Tomorrow, with an expansion of articles on the history of SF and the writers retreading old ground:

Vision of Tomorrow #10

Painted Colour cover for Vision of Tomorrow #10 (July 1970). Cover illustrating Echoes of Armageddon by Lee Harding. It shows the close up of the face of a man of ambiguous ethnicity in an environmental suit looking scared. In front of him are two people in environmental suits running along a path way dodging laser fire from futuristic flying drones. Behind this all is shadowy ruined Earth.
Cover by Stanley Pitt

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Book, Magazine/Anthology, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Serial

[June 12, 1970] Something Good! and Nothing Terrible (July 1970 Amazing)

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by John Boston

The July Amazing is fronted by John Pederson, Jr.’s second cover, an agreeable Martian-ish scene, reminiscent of nothing so much as . . . Johnny Bruck on a good day.  So maybe the new commitment to domestic artists isn’t quite the boon I thought it was.  We’ll see.

Cover for Amazing magazine, July 1970. The illustration shows a small space colony on a desert planet. In the foreground, two men in astronaut suits ride a futuristic car. Text on the cover announces stories by Piers Anthony, Bob Shaw, and Robert Silverberg.
by John Pederson, Jr.

The non-fiction this month is a bit less gripping than usual.  White’s editorial recounts his unsatisfactory encounter with a woman who wanted to write an article about SF fandom, but apparently never did (or it never got published).  He then segues to a discussion of Dr. Frederic Wertham and his campaign against comic books which culminated in his book The Seduction of the Innocent.  Then, finally, to the point: Wertham is now saying he too will write about SF fandom and White doesn’t think it will be any good.  He’s probably right, but until we see what Wertham produces, discussing it is a little pointless. 

The letter column remains contentious but is getting a little repetitive; at this point it’s hard for anyone to say anything new about New Wave vs. Old Farts, and no more inviting topic has emerged.  The fanzine reviews are as usual, and the book reviews . . . are missing, damn it!  To my taste they have been about the liveliest part of the magazine.  I hope the lapse is momentary.

But speaking of SF fandom, I’ll take this lack of much to talk about as an occasion to mention something fairly striking about the magazine’s contents under Ted White’s editorship: there is an unusually large representation of Fans Turned Pro, authors who have—like White—been heavily involved in organized SF fandom.  This issue features Bob Shaw, a leading light of Irish fandom and heavy contributor to the celebrated fanzines Slant and Hyphen, who later won two Hugo Awards as best fanwriter among other distinctions; he also had a story in the second (7/69) White-edited issue.  Greg Benford (once a co-editor with White of the also-celebrated fanzine Void) has one of his co-authored “Science in Science Fiction” articles (the fifth) in this issue, and three stories to boot in White’s eight issues, as well as regular appearances in the book review column.  Robert Silverberg, who published a slightly earlier well-known fanzine Spaceship, supplied an impressive serial novel and has a story in this issue.  Terry Carr, another renowned fan editor, had a story in the last issue.  Alexei Panshin is not to my knowledge a fan publisher but has won the Best Fan Writer Hugo for his prolific contributions to others’ fanzines.  Harlan Ellison (short story in 9/69 issue) published the legendary Dimensions in the 1950s.  Joe L. Hensley (same) is a member of First Fandom and published a fanzine in the 1940s. 

And what does it all mean?  The floor is open for sober analysis and wild speculation.

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[June 10, 1970] I will fear I Will Fear No Evil (July 1970 Galaxy)

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photo of a man with glasses and curly, long, brown hair, and a beard and mustache
by Gideon Marcus

Tired of it all

Antiwar protesting isn't just for civilians anymore.

About 25 junior officers, mostly Navy personnel based in Washington, have formed the "Concerned Officers Movement".  Created in response to the growing disillusionment with the Indochina war, its purpose is (per the premiere issue of its newsletter) to "serve notice to the military and the nation that the officer corps is not part of the silent majority, that it is not going to let its thought be fashioned by the Pentagon."

Reportedly, C.O.M. came about because an officer participated as a marshal at the November 15, 1969 Moratorium anti-Vietnam War march, got featured in the Washington Post, and later received an unsatisfactory notation for loyalty in his fitness report.  The newsletter and movement are how other officers rallied in his support.

Copy of a Concerned Officers Movement newsletter dated April, 1970.

Because C.O.M. work is being done off duty and uses non-government materials, it is a completely lawful dissent.  According to Lt. j.g. Phil Lehman, one of the group's leaders, there has been no harassment from on high as yet.

We'll see how long this remains the case.

Really tired of it all

After reading this month's issue of Galaxy, I'm about ready to start my own Concerned Travelers Movement.  Truly, what a stinker.  Read on and see why:

Cover of July 1970's Galaxy Science Fiction, featuring a red cover depicting the bald head of a man held by electrodes floating in the background while a short haired woman stands in front. The cover depicts the titles, 'Robert A. Heinlein's Latest and Greatest Novel I WILL FEAR NO EVIL THE ALL-AT ONCE-MAN R.A. Lafferty THE THROWBACKS Robert Silverberg
cover by Jack Gaughan

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[June 4, 1970] Something old, something new (July-August 1970 IF)

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A white man with short gray hair poses in front of a wooden wall. He is wearing a gray blazer, yellow shirt, and black necktie, and is smiling toward the left of the viewer.
by David Levinson

Voyages into the known

Readers over 30 may remember Thor Heyerdahl and his Kon-Tiki expedition of 1947. He hoped to prove that the Pacific islands had been reached from South America before Polynesians got there from the west. The balsa log raft he built eventually ran aground in the Tuamotu archipelago in French Polynesia, demonstrating that such a voyage was at least possible. However, most archaeologists and anthropologists consider it far more likely that any contact between Polynesia and the Americas (there is some highly inconclusive evidence) was initiated by the Polynesian people, who have a proven track record of crossing vast distances into the unknown.

In any case, Heyerdahl has inspired a number of imitators hoping to travel farther, including some attempts to travel west to east. On May 29th, Spanish sailor Vital Alsar Ramirez started his second attempt to sail from Ecuador to Australia. The first attempt in 1966 failed after 143 days when the raft was rendered no longer seaworthy by teredo worms.

The new raft, dubbed La Balsa, has one major improvement over the Kon-Tiki: a moving keelboard. This will allow the raft to be steered toward more favorable currents, where Kon-Tiki could only drift with assistance from the simple square sail. Such keelboards are known to Ecuadoran natives and so are a perfectly reasonable addition. Best of luck to the four men aboard.

A black and white photo of a wooden raft on the water against a foggy background.  It has a square sail on a tall mast near the center.  On the left, a person is standing holding a line attached to the sail.  Under the sail three people are sitting.  To the right of the mast there is a small shelter with a grass roof, containing boxes and barrels. La Balsa puts to sea.

Speaking of Thor Heyerdahl, his current interest is in demonstrating that ancient Egyptians could have reached the Americas in reed boats. His first attempt last year aboard the Ra got within about 100 miles of the islands of the Caribbean before it became so waterlogged it began to break apart. Now he’s giving it another go.

The Ra II features a tether to keep the stern high, which should help keep the boat from suffering the fate of its predecessor. This is something the original ought to have had; such tethers are clearly visible in ancient Egyptian depictions of reed boats. The crew also plan to take marine samples along the way to study ocean pollution. The Ra II set out from Morocco on May 17th.

Of course, as with the Kon-Tiki, proving that such a voyage could have been made won’t prove that it was. The Egyptians were never great sailors, generally contracting ocean navigation out to more maritime cultures of the eastern Mediterranean. Still, best of luck to Heyerdahl and his crew as well.

A color photograph of a modern reconstruction of an ancient Egyptian reed boat on the water, against a clear blue sky.  It has a black sail at the prow supported by a tall mast made up of two timbers leaned together in a triangle.Oars are sticking out horizontally from the main deck. One person is standing at the prow and another at the stern, where a rudder extends into the water.  Two people are standing on the upper deck near one of the mast timbers. The Ra II under way. Note the tether keeping the stern high.

Polishing the family silver

Science fiction has a lot of tried and true plots, some better than others. But good writing can occasionally make a hackneyed, sub-par plot something better, and bad writing can turn an intriguing concept into a slog. Fortunately, this month’s IF has a lot more of the former.

The front cover of Worlds of If science fiction magazine. The magazine title is in the upper left corner, and on the lower left the featured pieces are listed with titles in black and authors in red: Second-hand Stonehenge, by Ernest Taves; Time Piece, by Joe Haldeman; and The Fifth Planet, by Larry Eisenberg.  THe cover illustration is a painting of a white man's face shown half in shadow against an abstract background. The left of the background is blank white, extending in swirls into an abstract helmet surrounding the man's face.  A headset microphone extends down the right side of his face to his mouth. The right of the background is bright red with jagged yellow and black accents, which are reflected in the left side of the helmet. In front of the man's face tiny oval spaceships fly upward in an arc, surrounded by tiny blue planets and white stars, at which the man gazes intently.Suggested by “Time Piece”. Art by Gaughan

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Magazine/Anthology, Science / Space Race, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Serial

[May 31, 1970] A Compulsion to read (June 1970 Analog)

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photo of a man with glasses and curly, long, brown hair, and a beard and mustache
by Gideon Marcus

Monster-eyed bug

Last week, NASA released the news that the Apollo 12 astronauts brought back a fourth astronaut at the end of their flight last November.  A common human germ, Streptococcus mitis to be exact, was found to have hitched a ride back with Surveyor 3's camera, after surviving some 32 months in the harsh environment of the lunar surface.

Streptococcus mitis under a microscope.
Streptococcus mitis (c) Ansel Oommen

Frederick J. Mitchell, a scientist at the Lunar Receiving Laboratory, stated that it was "notable, but not unexpected" that a bacterium might make and survive the trip to the Moon as a stowaway on a terrestrial spacecraft.  Thanks to insufficient clean-room procedures, it was probably deposited on Surveyor's camera when the camera's shroud was removed for repairs and then replaced, and then launched with the soft-lander in 1967.  The high vacuum of space actually freeze-dried the bug, allowing it to remain viable indefinitely. 

The Surveyor 3 camera on a black background.
the Surveyor 3 camera

Given that we were unable to prevent terrestrial life forms from contaminating our nearest celestial companion, one has to wonder if we will taint Mars or Venus when we launch probes to the surfaces of those planets in the next decade.  It's a bit like Schrödinger's equations—just as you affect what you see by looking at it, you can't investigate a planet without risking an alteration of said planet.  It may well be that humans will land on Mars in the 1980s to find icy ponds rimed with Earth bacteria.

It's enough to make you want to leave well enough alone!

Bug-eyed caterpillars

Cover of analog Science Fiction, June 1970 featuring a futuristic barge on a craggy ocean shore. The featured title is 'STAR LIGHT' by Hal Clement
by Kelly Freas

On the other hand, this month's Analog is quite good, and well worth your time.  Let's take a look:

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[May 22, 1970] Back From The Dead (Summer 1970 Worlds of Tomorrow)

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black and white photo of a dark-haired white woman with vampiric eyebrows
by Victoria Silverwolf

Resurrection

Well, what do you know.  A magazine I thought as dead as a doornail has risen from its grave.  I've reviewed every issue of Worlds of Tomorrow from its birth in 1963 to its demise in 1967.  After three years of mouldering in the grave, like John Brown's body, it has returned.  Let's take a look at this revenant to see if it was worth digging up. 

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[May 18th, 1970] Rematch (Vision of Tomorrow #9)

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Black & White Photo of writer of piece Kris Vyas-Mall
By Mx Kris Vyas-Myall

As I am writing this, the news has come in confirming we will have a general election in one month’s time. This is not an entirely surprising move. Wilson would have been required to call one by March next year at the latest and, for the sake of parliamentary business, it is often seen as better to call one in May or June, in the lead up to the summer recess but before international conferences, like Britain’s negotiation for the common market (so the country’s leadership doesn’t change midway through as in Potsdam).

Harold Wilson out campaigning

However, it is also hard not notice this has occurred at the same time as a massive shift in fortunes of opinion polling for the government. In January, Marplan polling gave Labour a 13 point deficit to the Conservatives, their most recent figures give them a 3 point lead. This is matched by figures from NOP and Gallup, whilst Harris polling gives them a two point lead. The main reason for this turn around is seen as economic fundamentals turning in Wilson’s favour. Wages are rising faster than inflation, the balance of payments crisis seems to be easing, EEC entry is finally on the horizon, and more houses are being built than ever before.

However, there are a number of reasons for us not to assume this is a done deal. Most obviously, if the polls can swing 16 points one way in a few months, there is no reason they could not shift a few points back by election day. In fact Labour’s support has been so rocky over the past 6 years, not because their voters are switching to the Conservatives and back, but they are just saying they will try the liberals or not vote for anyone. The thing about floating voters is one rough current means they are carried miles away.

Secondly, this will be the first nationwide election held under the new Representation of the People Act, giving those aged 18-20 the right to vote for the first time. As such it is new territory for pollsters to try to guess how many will vote and if they are indeed talking to the right kind of young person. Who is more representative of the voter who will turn up, the firebrand on campus or the working-class single mother?

Edward Heath left and Enoch Powell right

Finally, there is the Powell factor. In spite of his removal from the Conservative frontbenches, Enoch Powell’s brand of populism has continued to cause a stir around the country. His bombastic statements on the immigrant birth rates, the need to cut the government budget and condemning American involvement in Vietnam, sometimes seem to get as much coverage as a speech from Mr. Wilson or Mr. Heath. Whether more scrutiny will draw in or push away from voters to the Tory cause is something that is very hard to predict.

Vision of Tomorrow #9
Cover for Vision of Tomorrow #9 illustrating Rebel Planet, with a man looking at a rocket passing a planet.
Cover and all internal illustrations by Eddie Jones

On the other hand, Vision of Tomorrow is as predictable as always. It has got into a groove of quiet competence of late and much of it sticks to well-trodden paths.

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[May 16, 1970) The Tocsin and The Believing Child (June 1970 Fantasy and Science Fiction)

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photo of a man with glasses and curly, long, brown hair, and a beard and mustache
by Gideon Marcus

Rime of the Recent Mariner

I always cast about the news for tidbits to head my articles.  After all, when people read my writings, say, a half-century hence, I want them to be appreciated in the context in which they were created.  Creations, and critique of those creations, cannot stand in isolation (or so I believe).

But, wow, how many times can I talk about the latest protest/riot (six killed in Atlanta last week), or Cambodia (Admiral Moorer recently assured us that the reason we can't destroy the mobile NVA base is…because it's mobile; but we did liberate 387 tons of ammunition, 125 tons of prophylactics, and 83 tons of Communist finger puppets so the Search & Destroy mission was absolutely a success), or the Warm War going on in the Middle East (2 Egyptian Mig-21s shot down the other day, 2 Syrian Mig-17s the day before, but the Israelis absolutely did not lose an F-4 over Lebanon) before it all sounds the same?  Even Governor Reagan's latest escapades into cost effectiveness and court stacking are old hat.

Photograph of a middle-aged white man in a military uniform.
This iteration of Bull Wright instills less confidence than Dan Rowan's…

To heck with it.  Today, I'm going to stick with news in my bailiwick, and nifty news to boot.

You folks surely remember Mariners 6 and 7, twin probes sent past Mars last year, returning unprecedented information and photos from The Red Planet.  Well, even now, both probes are contributing to science, long past their original mission.

JPL astronomer Dr. John D. Anderson and Cal Tech astronomer Dr. Duane O. Muhleman are using the two spacecraft to test the validity of Einstein's theory of relativity.  Per Einstein, the velocity of light slows in the presence of a gravitational field.  If that's the case, then the signals from the Mariners, as they pass the Sun, should decrease—slightly, but measurably. 

To measure this, the two scientists had to wait until Mariner 6 and Mariner 7 passed behind the Sun with respect to the Earth.  For the former, this happened on April 30; for the latter, May 10.  The precise distance-measuring system the two scientisits built in the Mohave Desert should register a slow-up of 200 millionths of a second in the spacecrafts' round trip signal.

This confirmation, should it be reported, will help put paid efforts by other scientists who say that Einstein's theories are wrong or inaccurate, by as much as 7% according to Princeton's Dr. Robert H. Dicke, who needs that to be the case for his theory of Mercury's curious orbital eccentricities.

Black-and-white photograph of a house-sized parabolic antenna. Text below the image says: The Mars Station of the Deep Space Network, with two-hundred-and-ten-foot reflector, high-power transmitter, and quick-change tri-cone feed, tracks Mariner six and Mariner seven through superior conjunction, beyond the Sun, at ranges up to two hundred and forty million miles.

In other Mariner news, New Mexico State Univ. astronomer and Mariner project scientist Bradford A. Smith has some neato news about Phobos, the larger of Mars' moons.  Mariner 7 snapped a picture of the little rock at a distance of 86,000 miles.  JPL photo-enhancement techniques indicated that Phobos was nonspherical and was larger and had a darker surface than previously thought.  It's just 11.2 by 13.7 miles in dimension, elongated along the orbital plane.  Its average visual geometric albedo is just 0.065, lower than that known for any other body in the solar system.

With its weird shape and composition, all signs point to Phobos not being a sister or daughter of its parent planet, but rather, probably a captured asteroid.

Very blurry black-and-white photograph of the Martian moon Phobos, visible only as a tiny smudge of irregular shape against a gray background.

The issue at hand

In a happy, elevated mood, now let us turn to the latest issue of Fantasy and Science Fiction—after all, it doesn't do to review stories on an empty soul.

Cover of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction for June 1970, announcing stories by Isaac Asimov, Ron Goulart, D. F. Jones, Harry Harrison, and Zenna Henderson. The illustration shows a man in a diving suit near a rift in the ocean floor.
cover by Jack Gaughan illustrating

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[May 12, 1970] War and Peace (June 1970 Fantastic)

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black and white photo of a dark-haired white woman with vampiric eyebrows
by Victoria Silverwolf

These are troubling times.

We are all still recovering from the shock of the killing of four students and the wounding of nine others by Ohio National Guard troops at Kent State University on May 4.  A mere four days later, construction workers and office workers clashed with anti-war protestors in New York City.

A black and white photograph of a group of white men marching down a city street.  Some are are chanting and/or holding poles.  The poles extend out of frame so we can't tell if they have signs or flags attached.  Some of the men are wearing construction outerwear and hard hats, others are wearing dress shirts and ties.
Due to the distinctive headgear worn by some of the construction workers, the incident has become known as the Hard Hat Riot.

In the chaos that ensued, with an estimated twenty thousand people in the streets near Federal Hall, the counter-protestors attacked the anti-war demonstrators while police did little to stop the violence. 

The pro-war crowd later marched up Broadway and threatened to attack City Hall.  They demanded that the building's flag, flown at half-mast in commemoration of the Kent State killings, be raised to full mast.  In an example of grim irony, the hard hats and their allies also attacked nearby Pace University, a conservative business school.

About one hundred people were injured, including seven police officers.  Six people were arrested.  Only one of them was a construction worker.

With all of this going on, it's tempting to escape from the real world and allow our imaginations to run wild.  As we'll see, however, the latest issue of Fantastic contains as much violent conflict as reality.

The cover of Fantastic magazine. The title appears near the top in yellow-green block capitals.  Above, Always the Black Knight: A new kind of Fantasy Novel by Lee Hoffman is written in orange serifed font.  Down the left of the cover are listed the short stories included, with authors in orange and titles in yellow: Into the Land of the Not-Unhappies, by David R Bunch; I of Newton, by Joe W. Haldeman; Communication by Bob Shaw; Psychivore, by Howard L. Myers; The Time, by David Mason; The Prince of New York, by Benford & Littenberg.  Underneath is written Beginning in this issue: Science Fiction in Dimension, a new column by Alexei Ranshin.  To the right of the short stories list is a picture of a the Black Knight against an orange background. He is wearing black armor and gauntlets and a face-concealing helmet that resembles an insect head with pincers at mouth level. The main part of the helmet is black. The face has red decorations in an X shape that crosses at the nose and ends in the pincers.  The eyes are also outlined in red and above the X there are two small red circles on the forehead. he is holding a sword out toward the viewer, held upward in salute. In the bottom right corner two much smaller people are looking up toward the Black Knight as though he is on a giant poster. One is a white woman with brown curly hair wearing a short burgundy tunic and belt.  Her legs are bare.  She is holding her right hand to her mouth in surprise.  Behind her, a brown-haired white man in a short yellow tunic is staggering in shock.  His right arm is against his forehead in a fainting pose, and his left hand is clutching the upper arm of the woman in front of him.
Cover art by Gray Morrow.

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