Giving Ross Macdonald His Due

This last week was a big one for me at CrimeReads, the Literary Hub-connected site to which I have been contributing for the last year.

First off, I celebrated the 70th anniversary of the release of Ross Macdonald’s first private-eye novel, The Moving Target, by collecting 25 of the best and worst covers that book has worn around the world. My gallery does not include all the Moving Target fronts, but it’s certainly a representative—and very diverse—sampling.

A day later, I posted my latest interview with Tom Nolan, the author of Ross Macdonald: A Biography. I had previously spoken with that Los Angeles-area writer on behalf of Kirkus Reviews and The Rap Sheet, and two decades ago as part of a project for January Magazine that celebrated the then-50th birthday of The Moving Target.

Macdonald has long numbered among my favorite crime novelists, and it was a real joy to again celebrate his 30-year career and, I hope, incite a new generation of readers to pick up his novels.