Playboy Press Romances: The Rise and Fall of a Bodice Ripper Publishing Empire

How about something for the ladies?In the 1970s, Playboy Press Paperbacks, a division of the popular magazine, entered the romance publishing field with blockbuster bodice rippers. However, their success in the genre was short-lived.

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Playboy Press, Publishers of Romance Novels

More Than Naked Women

Playboy was more than a magazine featuring naked women that (depending on your age) your father, grandfather, or great-grandfather got for—ahem—reading the articles. Under one of their subsidiaries called Playboy Press, the company published tawdry pulp fiction.

In their heyday, Playboy Press released some genuinely good Western, horror, science fiction, and fantasy novels from the 1960s to the 1980s.

And then there were the romances.

Begun, the Bodice Ripper Wars, Have

In the 1970s, Avon‘s overwhelming success with sexually explicit historical romances like Sweet Savage Love, motivated other publishers to do the same.

Playboy Press Paperbacks was quick to cash in on the market as well. While Avon was selective in choosing which author to publish, Playboy Press couldn’t churn the books out fast enough, regardless of quality.

In 1976, author Barbara Bonham’s first bodice ripper, Proud Passion, sold over half a million copies in its first six months alone. The book was a major triumph for Playboy Press.

playboy press paperback proud passion playboy press

If you’ve read Proud Passion, you realize how hard up readers in the 1970s were for romances that featured any eroticism. Because that book was a snoozer, punctuated with a few scenes of violence and quasi-sexual encounters.

Playboy, A Player in Romance

While many of their writers soared high only to fall long and hard, Playboy Press Paperback books also introduced authors like Susan Johnson, Sheila Holland (aka Mills and Boon and Harlequin superstar Charlotte Lamb), Stephanie Blake, and Barbara (Alan) Riefe.

The latter author sold millions of books, beginning with This Ravaged Heart in 1977. H. Tom Hall’s cover of Kathleen Woodiwiss’ Shanna for Avon would precede This Ravaged Heart by a few months. Both books featured the first full-color wrap-around covers for a romance novel in the modern era.

playboy press romance book THIS RAVAGED HEART — This Ravaged Heart, Playboy Press 1977, Betty Maxey cover art

Playboy Press also published Roberta Gellis‘s romances. who see historical romance novels put the H in history. Her books with Playboy were quite successful as well. Gellis’s medievals, including her Roselynde Chronicles series, are seriously fine works of historical fiction

Playboy also published Gothics, family sagas, and a series of Regency romances. While the Gothic novel trend had mostly faded away by the mid-1970s, the traditional “sweet” Regencies continued to be widely enjoyed.

Regency romances published by Playboy Press did not have the same level of quality as other publishers like Fawcett, Signet, Harlequin, Warner, Avon, or even Zebra.

Nonetheless, certain Playboy Press romances distinguished themselves by showcasing previously unconventional characters, such as a Regency-era heroine with Asian ancestry, in Fandora’s Story by Betty Hale Hyatt in 1981.

gross fandoras story — ***Fandora’s Story***, Betty Hale Hyatt, Playboy Press, 1981, George Gross cover art

If There Was One Thing Playboy Publishers Knew Well, It Was Erotic Images

Playboy Press upped the ante in raunchy content and colorful, bosomy clinch covers. Competing with Avon, they decided to spend big bucks for cover art illustrators. Some prominent artists included Jordi Penalva, Sanjulian, Ron Lesser, Betty Maxey, Gino D’Achille, and most notably, Elaine Duillo.

Duillo’s full-stretch clinch cover for Rachel Cosgrove Payes’ 1979 Bride of Fury was a game-changer. It was a gorgeous cover that drew mass attention to a mediocre book.

Many publishers would follow that audience eye-catching formula to huge sales.