Time to take a look at the reprint editions of some of the most popular thriller novels of the 1960s by Alistair MacLean..

The Companion Book Club editions of some of Alistair MacLean’s most popular novels are amongst my favourite books in my collection. I must confess to having a ‘thing’ for the Companion Book Club editions and these wonderful copies hopefully explain why.

Most of the MacLean novels were reprinted by the Book Club Associates in the 1970s and 80s but the Companion Book Club editions were the first and by far the most attractive. The covers were designed by some of the leading book cover artists of the day from Mike Charlton to Roger Payne, Michael Heslop and Eric Rowe.

The publishers and most especially the artists brilliantly captured the essence of the book and drew the potential reader in with some remarkable artwork and whilst Penguin Modern Classics have revived the format somewhat I do believe the publishers miss a trick, especially with those awful generic modern crime novels which are impossible to tell apart.

Alistair MacLean sold books in vast numbers, an estimated 150 million copies sold to date, many of them adapted for film, indeed he actively wrote screenplays alongside the novel to accompany it. For someone who commanded our cinema and television screens as well as our bookshelves he sadly died relatively young at the age of sixty four of a heart attack following years of struggle with alcoholism.

For those of us of a certain age his books and the film tie-ins were easy on the eye, often unremarkable but always entertaining and very often with some of the leading actors of the time. As a boy, these screamed of adventure and excitement and my Father owned a few first editions which I now own some of.

So this is the complete set of the MacLean novels published by the Companion Book Club. The later Book Club Associates editions lack the quality of these but are worthwhile additions to the collector. Hope you enjoy these!