It's the stated August 1976 first Signet printing of Stephen King's 'Salem's Lot in paperback.
This was only Stephen King's second novel, after Carrie. His name doesn't even appear on the cover. As Ron Gabriel notes in a blog post: "The all-black cover was unusual in that there was no title on the front, only an embossed illustration of a girl with a tiny red drop in the corner of her mouth. The title was on the spine and back cover, and the blurb was cryptic: 'The town knew darkness ... but no one dared talk about the high, sweet, evil laughter of a child ... and the sucking sounds...'"
Gabriel adds: "I salute the daring cover art director and marketing team for offering a novel with no title on the front, and delicious, high-level taste and restraint."
I'm sure this embossed cover looked amazing when new and shiny 50 years ago. It's extremely hard to find a copy in such condition. Time and readers — many, many, many readers — have led to soiling, creases, tears, pricetag residue and other blemishes for these first paperbacks. And I think that now gives them a different kind of terrifying beauty. It's a thinning membrane over half-century-old scares. The deterioration, the rot, has only made the warning more ominous. Would you pick it up and read it in the dark of night, while alone, while the autumn wind — or is it wind? — rattles the windows?
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