Thursday, June 08, 2017

Thrift Shop Book Covers: "Owls Don't Blink"

Owl’s Don’t Blink is the sixth mystery Erle Stanley Gardner published as by A.A. Fair and featuring private eyes Bertha Cool and Donald Lam. Its original release was as a hardcover by William Morrow & Co. in 1942, but the edition that caught my eye is a mass market published by Dell in 1970. An old school photographic cover isn’t my usual bag, but something about this one works. The artist: Unknown (to me, at least).


The opening paragraph:

“I was awakened at three o’clock in the morning by the sound of a garbage-pail cover being kicked across the sidewalk. A moment later, a woman’s voice, harsh and shrill, shouted, ‘I am not going with you! Do you understand?’”

2 comments:

Prashant C. Trikannad said...

I didn't read A.A. Fair as much as I devoured Gardner in my teens. I'm glad his novels still hold up for me.

Ben Boulden said...

I'm the opposite Prashant. I've read more of his A.A. Fair than his Erle Stanley Gardner. A comfort in my life is the idea of all those Perry Mason novels still waiting for me to read them.