The word summer calls up scores of savory associations. Elke Sommer. Suzanne
Somers. Donna Summer. Playboy's Girls of Summer. The qualities that draw us
to all the above, beyond the alluring alliteratives—photogenic physiognomy,
sultry sensuality, exquisite, explicit exhibition—are really more thermal
than visual. The beauties of 20 or 30 years ago—Hitchcock's icy-blonde
love goddesses, say—were fine for the onset of the Cold War and the cool
of the Beat Generation, but the women we fancy today are attuned to the opposite
end of the thermometer. They always seem to vanish during the colder months,
but in summer they dominate the beach the way the sun rules the sky, attracting
admirers like moths to a flame. They'll blister your eyes if you forget to blink.
Playmates from the pages of PLAYBOY are among today's hottest. They have their
own lives, occupations and zodiac signs, but in the volume at hand, they represent
a modern archetype in all its forms—the Girl of Summer, who gives rise
to that legend we've all heard about the summer that never ends. So slap a Beach
.Boys cassette into the Walkman, dig out your most fluorescent Hawaiian shirt,
get yourself a pitcher of cool lemonade and join us on the beach with Playboy's
Girls of Summer.
