Paperbacks from Hell: The Twisted History of '70s and '80s Horror Fiction

by Grady Hendrix

Rosemary’s Baby was a spark to the heart for horror fiction, but the corpse really began to boogie in June 1971, when Thomas Tryon’s The Other and William Peter Blatty’s The Exorcist simultaneously made the New York Times Best-Seller List. Fueled by amphetamines and written during a feverish ten-month spree, Blatty’s book was dead on arrival in bookstores until a last-minute guest cancellation earned him a sudden appearance on The Dick Cavett Show. A blockbuster was born. For eleven weeks, The Exorcist and The Other held the #1 and #3 marks on the New York Times Best-Seller List. The Other slipped off after twenty-four weeks; The Exorcist would hold on for a whopping fifty-five. Four million copies of The Exorcist were sold before William Friedkin’s motion picture adaptation debuted in December 1973