Tag: pocket paperback

1948 Pocket reissue ~ cover art by Roswell Keller

pseudonym of Hugh Callingham Wheeler, who also wrote as Q.Patrick and Jonathan Stagge, and collaborated with Richard Wilson Webb under all three names.

4th in his series with Peter Duluth series, originally published by Simon & Schuster in 1945 as Puzzle for Wantons. This is the 1948 Pocket edition, re-titled.

cover art by Roswell Keller

better image than previously posted

The Moving Target x 3

March 1950 Pocket paperback, first printing

cover painting by Harvey Kidder

first in the long-running and deservedly respected Lew Archer series by Kenneth Millar, aka Ross Macdonald. After using his father’s name as the pen name for this novel, he was forced by John D. MacDonald to alter it for future novels, and Ross Macdonald was born.

1959, third printing

cover art by Jerry Allison

September 18, 2013

1990 Warner edition

cover art by Gary Kelley

[updated 9/6/25 ~ all copies mine]

Killer in the Rain x 2

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

July 1977 Ballantine mass market, 3rd print

cover art by Whistlin’ Dixie

August 25, 2013

[post reworked 7/4/25]

Pickup on Noon Street x 7

1952 Pocket reissue

cover art by Tom Dunn

better image than previously posted

1956 Pocket reissue

cover art by Robert Maguire

1960 Ace edition from the UK

1965 Pocket reissue (7th printing, October of ’65)

better image than previously posted

June 1973 Ballantine reissue*

cover art by Tom Adams

1977 Ballantine mass market, 3rd print*

cover art by Whistlin’ Dixie

1980 Ballantine reissue

cover art credited to Richard Waldrep

“Pickup On Noon Street” (Detective Fiction Weekly, May 1936, originally titled “Noon Street Nemesis”)

“Smart-Aleck Kill” (Black Mask Magazine, July 1934)

“Guns at Cyrano’s” (Black Mask Magazine, Jan. 1936)

“Nevada Gas” (Black Mask Magazine, June 1936)

these stories were first gathered into a book in 1950, Houghton Mifflin’s The Simple Art of Murder

August 25, 2013

[*covers from owner’s own copies]

[updated 6/6/25]