2nd book with Gramps Wiggins
cover art by Wayne Blickenstaff
1961 Pocket reissue – cover art by Charles Binger
better image than previously posted
1963 Horwitz edition from Australia
1963 British edition from Penguin
cover art by Sheila Perry
1958 Cassell hardcover, this the later Penguin softcover
his first novel, first with Col. Charles Russell of the Security Executive
1971 Knopf hardcover, first edition – cover design by Hal Seigel
London: Collins Crime Club, 1971. First UK Edition. The 16th novel in the Lew Archer series.
1979 Bantam reissue – cover art by Mitchell Hooks
1992 Warner reissue – cover art by Gary Kelley
1996 Vintage/Black Lizard reissue
first published as a hardcover in 1938 by Knopf, his third novel
1951 Signet reissue – cover art by Ray Pease
[post updated 4/10/26]
edited by Sarah Weinman, an historical survey of the “Stories from the Trailblazers of Domestic Suspense”.
authors include Shirley Jackson, Dorothy Salisbury Davis, Elizabeth Sanxay Holding, Helen Neilsen, Patricia Highsmith, Margaret Millar and Vera Caspary.
[last cover updated 4/13/25]
June 1973 Ballantine reissue
cover art by Tom Adams
1977 Ballantine mass market, 3rd printing
includes:
introduction by Raymond Chandler, originally from The Simple Art of Murder (Houghton Mifflin, 1950)
“Trouble is My Business” (Dime Detective Magazine, Aug. 1939)
“Finger Man” (Black Mask Magazine, Oct. 1934)
“Goldfish” (Black Mask Magazine, June 1936)
“Red Wind” (Dime Detective Magazine, Jan. 1938)
cover art by Whistlin’ Dixie
[covers from owner’s own copies]
[updated 3/3/26]
1944 Dell mapback reissue
better image than previously posted
selection of two connected Continental Op stories, “The Big Knockover” and “$106,000 Blood Money”:
“The Big Knock-over”, Black Mask Magazine, February 1927
“$106,000 Blood Money”, Black Mask Magazine, March 1927
1942 Avon digest, Murder Mystery Monthly No.7, first softcover release of this American classic, first softcover release of this American classic
1940 Hammish Hamilton UK first edition
1943 Pocket reissue – cover art by H. L. Hoffman
1964 Pocket reissue, 14th printing – cover art by Harvey Kidder (owner’s copy)
cover art by James Neil Boyle
1951 Pocket reissue, 10th print – cover art by Paul Kresse (owner’s copy)
1950 Penguin UK reissue, 3rd print
1966 Penguin reissue – cover design by Bob Brooks
1973 Penguin reissue – cover design by James Tormey
1973 Ballantine reissue – cover art by Tom Adams (owner’s copy)
1976 Vintage reissue – cover art by Richard Waldrep (owner’s copy)
1976 Ballantine movie tie-in
1976 Penguin movie tie-in
1988 Vintage/Black Lizard reissue
1994 Vintage/Black Lizard reissue
2009 Penguin Classics UK reissue
[updated 3/3/26, 3/8/26]
SMB Noir 
