Saints Be Praised

Had it not been for this post in a blog kept by graphic designer David Drummond, the founder of Quebec-based Salamander Hill Design, I might not have noticed that handsome new editions of Leslie Charteris’ classic Simon Templar (aka “The Saint”) novels are now being released by Thomas & Mercer, an Amazon paperback imprint. Drummond, of course, was responsible for the fronts of the University of Chicago Press’ Richard Stark reprints of a few years ago, so you know his covers for these Saint stories are worth collecting.

I don’t see a listing on the Amazon Web site for Charteris’ first, 1928 Saint outing, Meet the Tiger. However, his second one, Enter the Saint (1930), can be had in paperback here, with many additional titles carrying Drummond fronts to be found here.

Better yet, order any or all of these reprints from your nearest independent bookstore.

Knock-Outs

Many readers are familiar with the work of David Drummond, the Canadian designer behind the elegant covers of the University of Chicago Press’ recent reissues of Donald E. Westlake’s Parker novels--books he wrote under the pseudonym Richard Stark. However, The Casual Optimist’s Dan Wagstaff points out that Drummond has now created fronts for another series of UCP books, the four novels Westlake/Stark composed about Parker’s sometime partner, thief and actor Alan Grofield: The Damsel (1967), The Dame (1969), The Blackbird (1969), and Lemons Never Lie (1971, which was also re-released by Hard Case in 2006).

In the same way as Drummond built his Parker novel covers around the imposing shadow of a gun, he uses the shapely outline of a woman as the consistent element on his Grofield fronts. Wagstaff has posted all four of those covers here. And the designer talks a bit about his work on the books here.

The four Grofield novels are due out in paperback next spring, with a blanket introduction by critic Sarah Weinman.