Category: hardcover

Nightmare Alley x 4

Nightmare Alley. William Lindsay Gresham. New York: Rinehart and Company, Inc. 1946. First edition. Original dust jacket; art by A. F. Arnold.

Scarce macabre carnival themed thriller. “Loneliness came over him, like an avalanche of snow. He was alone. Where he had always wanted to be. You can only trust yourself. There’s a rat buried deep in everybody and they’ll rat on you if they get pushed far enough.”

1949 Signet reissue

cover art by James Avati

first film adaptation in 1947

second in 2021

Brass Cupcake x 3

John D. MacDonald’s first novel

1950 Gold Medal paperback original

cover art by Barye Phillips

better image than previously posted

1960 Gold Medal reissue

cover art by Barye Phillips

1974 UK hardcover from Robert Hale

Homicide for Hannah x 4

1941 Knopf hardcover, 1945 Avon reissue

cover art by Paul Stahr

published by Hale in the UK as Murder for Hannah

better image than previously posted

1951 Avon reissue

1943 Avon Murder Mystery Monthly digest

cover art by William Frost (William Forrest)

1941 Knopf hardcover, first edition

“The second appearance of the character Hanna Van Doren, considered the first female hard-boiled detective in American literature.”

Killer in the Rain x 6

London: Hamish Hamilton, 1964. First UK Edition, preceding all others. The first collection of these stories.

“Killer in the Rain” (Black Mask Magazine, Jan. 1935)

“The Man Who Liked Dogs” (Black Mask Magazine, Mar. 1936)

“The Curtain” (Black Mask Magazine, Sept. 1936)

“Try the Girl” (Black Mask Magazine, Jan. 1937)

“Mandarin’s Jade” (Dime Detective Magazine, Nov. 1937)

“Bay City Blues” (Dime Detective Magazine, June 1938)

“The Lady in the Lake” (Dime Detective Magazine, Jan. 1939)

“No Crime in the Mountains”(Detective Story Magazine, Sept. 1941)

introduction by Philip Durham

1st Pocket edition, December 1965

June 1973 Bantam reissue

cover art by Tom Adams

2011 Penguin UK reissue

July 1977 Ballantine mass market, 3rd print

cover art by Whistlin’ Dixie

August 25, 2013

1979 Pan/Macmillan reissue – cover photo by Robert Golden

[post reworked 7/4/25, 3/1/26]