Re: RARA-AVIS: rara-avis: re L.A. Noir

dspurlock@humana.com
Fri, 29 May 1998 09:25:01 -0400 <<L. A. Noir which is already published in England by Arrow is indeed a
compilation of the Looyd Hopkins novels: Blood on the Moon, Because the
Night and Suicide Hill.>>

In a Dublin bookshop during a trip to Ireland last fall, I noticed many
omnibuses (omnibusses?) for authors whose backlist titles are sold here in
the States as individual volumes. Chandler, Hammet, James Lee Burke, Jim
Thompson were some of the writers I noticed who had various titles combined
into a single bound package.

Such combo volumes are fairly rare in the States -- except for instant
hardbound remainders you'll find on the bargain tables. The only ones that
come to mind immediately are Penguin's Berlin Noir package by Philip Kerr
and the new Cornell Woolrich omnibus.

I suppose such omnibuses are more economical to publish than individual
novels, and probably are cheaper for readers to buy. However, I suspect
that sales would be lower for a combo volume here because a thicker book
like that might not appeal to beach readers. But this is a vaguely
materialized opinion based on no sales information.

Personally, I'd like to see omnibus volumes of works by writers who seem to
fall out of print frequently -- Woolrich is an obvious example, and I'm
sure other pulp-related crime writers would be "usual suspects" for a short
list. Any other recommended candidates for omnibus volumes? -- Duane

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