The latest batch of covers Bill Pronzini and I have uploaded to Bill Deeck’s Murder at 3 Cents a Day website are those for three of the smallest publishers of lending library mysteries.

   These three are: Alliance Press (one mystery, 1935); Alliance Book Corporation (four mysteries, 1941-1942); and Jonathan Swift Publishers (also four mysteries, 1941-1942).

   The books they published were intended almost solely for the lending library market, and copies with dust jackets are quite scarce today. Of the nine mysteries these three companies published between them, we’re pleased to be able to show you six of them. Of these, perhaps the most noteworthy is Hell on Friday by William Bogart, and unless you’re a long-time collector of the detective pulps, maybe not even he’s an author you’ll recognize. The rest are even less known, but in my opinion, at least, the covers still worth a peek.