Okay, I've finished the issues of Falling in Love that I own, so now it's on to the next of DC's titles, Girls' Love Stories. That also means a jump back to the Silver Age. So, goodbye, relevancy, and welcome back ennui, existential despair, and a series of swift kicks to the junk. Buckle up, because you are about to get your heart smashed to hell:

Girls' Love Stories #83

December, 1961




Story One: Stacy and Ellen are getting married. Stacy is a guy, so it's not that progressive. It's 1961, guys. Ellen decides to invite an old school friend to the wedding, a big magazine editor named Regina. Regina arrives with an offer: let her do a big feature on their wedding for her magazine, in exchange for some greenbacks. Stacy and Ellen agree, but it turns out Regina isn't interested in the story - she's really interested in Stacy. She turns on her feminine charms to woo Stacy. And it works, he falls for her.

One problem - actually, several, but let's start here - Regina doesn't give a crap about Stacy after all, she was just doing it for the fun of winning him and destroying Ellen. She then gleefully crushes Stacy's heart and leaves. Stacy and Ellen's relationship is in ruins and they go their separate ways, each cursing the day they ever let Regina into their lives:



 
My god, what a bleak ending! THE END!!

Story Two: You want a pick me up after that downer? Well, guess what: NO! Instead, we go deeper down the rabbit hole of misery with Pat and Leila. See, they are best friends, but when Pat introduces her new fiance Dan to Leila, Leila recognizes him right away as one of her exes named Bill - a no good, two timer who broke her heart and who runs around with other women all the time. Leila waits until she has some alone time with Dan and then confronts him, but he claims to actually be some totally different guy. Leila must be mistaken! As if that's even possible.

As with all comic book people, however, Leila doubts her own sanity, and decides she must be wrong. That lasts until they end up at a party later. Leila is off by herself when Dan swoops in, grabs her, and plants a massive kiss on her. She knows right away - she was right, this is Bill, not "Dan." She confronts him again and he comes clean with a ridiculous b.s. story, claiming that he really, truly loves Pat, but he knew Leila would rat him out, so he decided to play dumb. He begs her not to say anything to Pat, guilt tripping Leila into thinking she'll destroy Pat's only chance at real happiness.

Of course, this overlooks the fact that a) he was already going under the fake name of Dan when he started dating Pat, and b) he ditched Pat at the first chance in order to get some of Leila's sugar. But Leila can't bear to hurt Pat, so she agrees to keep her silence, and Pat heads into the wedding with no idea that Dan is a cheating, lying philanderer. THE END!!!



Hold on, I need some spoiler tags here, not for spoilers, but because I have to let out some curses and I don't want the kids to see it.



Story Three: Estelle is a girl with dreams of the big city. So she moves to the big city. The day she arrives, she sees another young woman, in tears, leaving on an outbound bus. She ruminates that once, that girl was in the same posinition she is now. Estelle vows to never be that other girl, leaving in tears. And things go well at first, she finds friends, a job, an apartment. And then she finds true love: a swell dude named Gary. Everything's great, right up until Gary's fiancee shows up at Estelle's door! Yes, Gary is a cheating loser. Heartbroken, Estelle packs her bags and leaves the city. But at the train station, she sees a new girl, just arriving in town, full of hope and excitement. Remembering her pledge, Estelle turns around and heads back to her apartment, filled with resolve to stick it out. THE END!! You go Estelle! Thank Jesus! Kick ass!

Story Four: Jerry and Tess are madly in love. But Tess is an innocent little flower of a girl. Jerry can't bear to tell her that once upon a time, he was in love with someone else, a stewardess named Vicky. Which is too bad, because Vicky turns out to be on their flight back home for the wedding. Jerry is cooling his heels at his hotel when Vicky shows up. Jerry can't resist her, and they have a wild night of abandon. Devastated at his own weakness, Jerry returns to Tess, who has sussed out the truth and waits for him with a broken heart. Which gives Jerry a chance to think this amazing word balloon:



But Tess is made of sterner stuff than the patronizing Jerry imagined. She shrugs off the whole Vicky thing and is like, eff her, I'm about to be your damn wife. So tough noogies for Vicky! Jerry realizes he's got something cool here and they do it! THE END!!


Notes: Okay, so we're a few issues into this and I'm starting to be able to identify some creators. The first and third stories are clearly drawn by Mike Sekowsky, and the last one is by John Romita, as is the cover. GCD attributes the second story to Tony Abruzzo. I love the look on the guy's face on the cover. Priceless.

The advice column in this issue is not by Carol Andrews, but rather Barbara Miles. The letters seem to be from slightly younger girls, with correspondingly gentler advice. Which is fine, because seriously, I'm pretty iffy on Carol Andrews at this point.

This issue has no advertisements! The only ads are on the back cover and inside back cover, and those are both house ads for other romance comics. Odd. But the house ads are great:




My Grade: A-. What a bleak descent into despair this was!

I have exactly two romance comics. One is the Millennium reprint of Simon and Kirby's Young Romance #1 (which is wonderful and hilarious and looks great) and the other is Love Romances #42, which I got for $2 back when I picked up a lot of Atlas westerns, war and horror comics if I could get them for low prices. (And I also have one issue of Millie the Model but that's not a romance comic.)

If I have time later today, I'll read Love Romances #42 and comment on it. There's two very nice Vince Colletta stories!

One thing I noticed from this 1954 comic book is that the ads are very different from what you'd see on a super-hero comic or a war comic or a western.

For example, the back cover is this:



I bet Kid Colt, Outlaw and Journey into Mystery didn't run that on the back cover that month. Or ever.

Love Romances lasted from #6 in 1948 to #106 in 1963. So it survived the Atlas Implosion. And it was probably replaced by Avengers or X-Men or something like that on the limited distribution schedule that Marvel was allowed at that point.

OK, I did some additional--er--digging  and I found that the image is from a story called "Ghoul For A Day", which is indeed one of the stories in the aformentioned Voodoo #5. And according to GCD, it's been reprinted.

Here is the link www.comics.org/issue/223212/  .


This is where I found the quote attribution barebonesez.blogspot.com/2015/07/the-dungeons-of-doom-pre-code-horror.html  .

That is FANTASTIC!
Thank you sooooo much, Farrar!!
Now I can actually get the book!   I mean, provided I can find a copy.

I JUST emailed IDW about it being collected in one of their books.
*fingers crossed*

I am not spending that much for a reader copy.