HANK JANSON UNDER COVER A Visual History

In this full-color coffee-table art book, noted researcher Stephen James Walker presents a complete visual history of the Hank Janson crime fiction series, from its inception in 1946 through to the last of the original novels in 1971, and beyond. Reproductions of every single cover -- including, in full-page size and in better quality than ever seen before, all of the classic Reginald Heade painted covers of the 1940s and 1950s, including his foreign editions. Good girls, bad girls...it's all about racy themes and sex appeal on these vintage covers: nudity, bondage, violence, cleavage... The equivalent U.S. series might be Mike Hammer or Michael Shayne -- except Janson was far longer-lived! Also illustrated, amongst a wealth of other Hank Janson ephemera, are the Hilary Brand spin-off titles,  North American editions, and plentiful examples of their many foreign-language translations, many with their own special artwork. There's even some photographed covers, that look like men's skin mags with carefully unclad ladies. Janson is not as well known in the U.S. as in England. His hard-boiled fiction, filled with beautiful femme fatales and damsels in distress, were giant sellers in the U.K. for decades. We handled several of his titles a few years ago, done in new trade paperback editions, with the original Reginald Head covers. If you like two-fisted, fast paced and sexy crime fiction in the tradition of Mickey Spillane's Mike Hammer and Brett Halliday's Michael Shayne, you need to know about Hank Janson's work! This is being produced by Telos, the specialty British publisher responsible for the two very fine art books on artist Reginald Heade. Their other books include Cover Me: The Vintage Art of Pan Books, and just arrived, The Who Adventures: The Art and History of Virgin Publishing's Dr. Who, and The Art of Louis Shabner. We have a direct arrangement with them and are one of the very few sources for these in the U.S. as well as first to have them, shipped direct to us from England.