Frances (Stephen D.) One Man in His Time

£395

London, Pendulum Publications, 1946.

First edition. 8vo. Original brown cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.

The semi-autobiographical first book by Frances, who would go on to great success with hardboiled US-style thrillers written under the pseudonym Hank Janson. These books were phenomenally successful in their time, opening the way for a variety of copycat British authors writing in a similar vein, but they did also court controversy when a murder supposedly inspired by one of the Hank Janson titles led to the publishers being taken to court and successfully prosecuted for obscenity (the author managed to avoid a similar fate on it seems a technicality). The publisher Pendulum was set up by Frances, with a doctor friend of his.

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