la spalla di Orion

la tela di peccato

la rosa velenosa

la stella vuota

la fabbrica di sogno

This is my proposal for a new cover for Ugo Litorina’s The Dream Factory, if and when anyone ever gets around to taking it off the shelf and printing a few million brand new copies. Of course, I have to admit it’s been a while since I last read this one, so I might have misremembered the color of the skies of Peregrine, homeworld of the Oneiromancers. Anyway, Factory’s the middle book of a trilogy which is itself the middle trilogy of a cycle of nine books about the Selenite space adventurer Esteban Volapuk (who had blue skin, by the way, ten years before the Draags of Le Planète sauvage). I should point out that this book shouldn’t be confused with the The Dream Factory: Alessi Since 1921 by Alberto Alessi, which is also a very good book, but is mostly about teapots, clocks, and collanders instead of spaceships, androids, and weird-shaped warps in spacetime.

un viaggio interrotto

A failed book cover drawing for the novel An Interrupted Journey. It was fun to do anyway, so what the hell.

una vacanza su Aldebaran

Sketch for a new cover for Ugo Litorina’s 1966 novel, A Holiday on Aldebaran. The spaceman, of course, is Lev Podor, who also appeared in The Automatic Giraffe, Hoxa’s Planet, and The Trojan Dragon. The monster, meanwhile, isn’t really a monster, but is instead Rhino, Podor’s trusty Venusian companion. Anyway, I guess you can still find this title, though it’s been out of print since 1970…I last saw a pretty decent copy in a used bookstore in Scottsdale about three years ago. Bet it’s still there, in fact…although now I can’t remember the name of the store. I just sort of remember it’s kind of near the “Sphinx Date Ranch,” whatever the heck that is.

Fiasco 2

Fiasco

A sketch for a new paperback cover for Stanislaw Lem’s 1987 novel, Fiasco. Although, of course, I love the cover it already has on it. Anyway, this is just for practice, I guess. Meanwhile, I have another, different idea for this one, so maybe I’ll work on that tomorrow, if there’s time.

List 08.14.09

1. Il vigliacco artificiale (The Artificial Coward)
2. Il cielo inizia ai suoi piedi (The Sky Begins at Your Feet)
3. La favola della figlia della suora (The Nun’s Daughter’s Tale)
4. Il pianeta in una bottiglia (Planet in a Bottle)
5. L’albero di petardo (The Firecracker Tree)
6. Le catacombe di Umbriel (The Catacombs of Umbriel)
7. La nostra casa nell’oceano (Our House in the Ocean)
8. A nord della costellazione dell’Unicorno (North of Monoceros)
9. La città dentro la città (The City Within the City)
10. Nello stesso luogo, allo stesso tempo (In the Same Place,
At the Same Time)