One Final Treat from Orbik

After a very busy holiday season, I’m finding it somewhat difficult to get back into the usual swing of editorial commitments. Surely, by next week or so, this stumbling along will be at an end, and Killer Covers can return to its regularly scheduled postings. Meanwhile, let me at least present what I understand is the last book-cover illustration Glen Orbik created before he passed away in May 2015.



Quarry in the Black is the 12th installment in Max Allan Collins’ long-running series about a single-monikered killer-for-hire, Quarry, following last year’s Quarry’s Choice. Due for release in October from Hard Case Crime, this novel boasts some particularly timely elements. Here’s the plot brief from Hard Case’s Web site:

WHERE DOES A HIT MAN DRAW THE LINE?

With a controversial presidential election just weeks away, Quarry is hired to carry out a rare political assignment: kill the Reverend Raymond Wesley Lloyd, a passionate Civil Rights crusader and campaigner for the underdog candidate. But when a hate group out of Ferguson, Missouri, turns out to be gunning for the same target, Quarry starts to wonder just who it is he’s working for.

Given how fond I was of Quarry’s Choice (it wound up on my top-10 list of crime novels for Kirkus Reviews), I’m looking forward to seeing what moral and criminal complications Collins can throw at his protagonist next. At the same time, I’m sorry this book will mark the end of Orbik’s splendid contributions to the genre.