FRANKENSTEIN '69 by Ed Martin (Olympia 1969)

Oh what a disappointment!! First of all, this thing was ridiculously expensive. In hard copy, that is--it's downloadable in various formats (including pdf) for $1 from Olympia Press. Even at that price, I'd highly recommend you stay away from this shit.

So why did I go for the book instead of the download? Well, you knows how I likes to supply my own cover scans at Groovy Age, and I thought I'd be getting the somewhat interesting photo cover pictured in the Trash Fiction review. Instead, as you can plainly see (pun intended), I got the plain green cover of the Traveller's Companion Series.

Oh well!

So how does it read? I couldn't finish it. It was so bad, I started to wonder if Ed Martin is another of Michael Avallone's gazillion pseudonyms (I've awarded Avallone the Groovy Age "Suckiest of the Seventies" lifetime achievement award).

What I wanted was something more like Hammer's Dracula A.D. 1972 (due to hit stores today in dvd for the first time, if I'm not mistaken!), only for Frankenstein. I wanted to see the Monster come to life in the swinging late-sixties, and shamble around having groovy adventures and sleazy sex.

Boy oh boy, that isn't what I got. There's no Monster here. What you have is some guy named Ygor conducting sex experiments in his castle and building three nymphomaniac robots. Perhaps you're thinking, "Hm, that doesn't sound so bad." Oh, but it is. There are two atrocious running gags that aren't even funny the first time they're introduced, and then they recur on every other page (think I'm exaggerating?). One is the door knocker that sends sonic booms reverberating through the castle, always prompting one character to curse in Yiddish and complain about her headache. Then there's Lassie, the dog that howls like a wolf and then runs up and licks everyone's genitals the moment they start having sex.

If that isn't ridiculous enough, Triton--yes, the Greek god of the sea--sends mermaids to interfere in the castle shenanigans when one of the sex-experiment participants immaculately conceives (don't ask) a mutant that, if born, would start a new breed of human mer-creatures.

The sex is unreadably stupid and boring, so don't think for one moment that at least you'll get your money's worth on that score. Bottom line--this book is unmitigated crap. There's nothing to recommend it whatsoever, and everything to recommend staying away. Save your dollar, save your time, and spend them much, much better on something--anything--else.