When my friend Jill Blocker and I started talking about publishing my crime novel SEVEN ANGELS through the Constellate Publishing imprint, I knew how I wanted the cover to look:
Like the covers of novels by Robert B. Parker, a grandmaster of crime and mystery writing and one of my greatest influences.
I would never compare myself favorably to Parker, whose books about Spenser and Hawk, Sunny Randall, Jesse Stone and other heroes protecting people and confronting crime are still my favorite novels. (Perhaps tied with Dennie Lehane’s Patrick and Angie books.)
But I was thinking about Parker when I wrote SEVEN ANGELS in 2019. Like Parker’s protagonists at times, Gloria Shepherd isn’t so much a detective as a bulldozer. I always thrilled at Spenser and his inclination to push the bad guys until they crack and make a mistake or overplay their hand.
Part of what appealed to me about Parker’s characters’ direct approach is that it was reflected in the best covers of his books: Spare and vivid imagery that matched the spare and relentless push to resolution of Parker’s characters.
There’s a scene in SEVEN ANGELS when Gloria, the coroner of Crockett County, Tennessee, pushes into the private office of a local corrupt businessman and confronts him and the Russian trafficker he’s working with. I was channeling Spenser the day I wrote that, for sure. Not sure if I was successful, but that’s what I was aiming for.
I told Jill what I wanted and she designed a cover that I loved immediately. This cover above will be modified some and authors’ blurbs will be added before SEVEN ANGELS is published this spring.
I can’t match Parker at his peak. Never will. But I can pay tribute to him.
Curious about Constellate Publishing, our company that’ll publish SEVEN ANGELS?
keithroysdon 