American/British Update: Quirky Corner: Undiscovered Smut! Antonio Ghura’s ‘Truly Amazing Love Stories’ #3, Previously Unpublished
*Undergrounds: It’s been a while since we’ve taken a stroll down to Quirky Corner, but – bless my soul – when we do, we come across something very unique! Antonio Ghura was one of the unsung heroes of the British underground scene in the 1970s. Creator of Raw Purple, Bogey, Hot Nads, The Laid Back Adventures of Suzie and Jonnie and a plethora of illustrations for counter-culture magazines, his best-remembered title was Truly Amazing Love Stories, a pastiche of 1950s romance comics, with sentimental plots embellished by explicitly filthy illustrations. While Ghura’s decorative style is pleasing to look at, the content means that this, more than even many other Underground Comix, is most definitely for adults only. Truly Amazing Love Stories #1 was published in 1977 and was a sell-out, but by the time Ghura found the capital to print #2 in 1983, unreliable distributions and increasingly censorious zeitgeist meant that #2 failed, and, disheartened, Ghura moved to Rome and became a street artist, never publishing the completed issue #3. In recent years, however, an enterprising publisher put together the previously-unpublished #3: yesterday’s undiscovered filth is on sale – today! Issue #3 of Truly Amazing Love Stories is brand new, Mint at £10; don’t let the relatively innocuous cover fool you…