Black Lizard was an American book

publisher Publishing is the activity of making information, literature, music, software and other content available to the public for sale or for free. Traditionally, the term refers to the creation and distribution of printed works, such as books, newsp ...

. A division of the

Creative Arts Book Company Creative may refer to: *Creativity, phenomenon whereby something new and valuable is created * "Creative" (song), a 2008 song by Leon Jackson * Creative class, a proposed socioeconomic class * Creative destruction, an economic term * Creative dir ...

Berkeley, California Berkeley ( ) is a city on the eastern shore of San Francisco Bay in northern Alameda County, California, United States. It is named after the 18th-century Irish bishop and philosopher George Berkeley. It borders the cities of Oakland and E ...

, Black Lizard specialized in reprinting forgotten

crime fiction Crime fiction, detective story, murder mystery, mystery novel, and police novel are terms used to describe narratives that centre on criminal acts and especially on the investigation, either by an amateur or a professional detective, of a crime, ...

and

noir fiction Noir fiction (or roman noir) is a subgenre of crime fiction. Definition In its modern form, noir has come to denote a marked darkness in theme and subject matter, generally featuring a disturbing mixture of sex and violence and death in some ...

writers and novels originally released between the 1930s and the 1960s, many of which are now acknowledged as classics of their genres.

History

Founded and edited by writer Barry Gifford in 1984, Black Lizard released over ninety books between 1984 and 1990, including reprints of classic novels by Charles Willeford,

David Goodis David Loeb Goodis (March 2, 1917 – January 7, 1967) was an American writer of crime fiction noted for his output of short stories and novels in the noir fiction genre. Born in Philadelphia, Goodis alternately resided there and in New York Cit ...

Peter Rabe Peter Rabe (born Peter Rabinowitsch, November 3, 1921 – May 20, 1990) was a German American writer who also wrote under the names Marco Malaponte and J. T. MacCargo (though not all of the latter's books were by him). Rabe was the author of ove ...

, Harry Whittington,

Dan J. Marlowe Dan J. Marlowe (1917 – 1986) was an American writer of crime fiction. ''Gunshots in Another Room: The Forgotten Life of Dan J. Marlowe'' (2012) by Charles Kelly, tells the story of Marlowe, his amnesia, his involvements with bank robber Alb ...

, Charles Williams, and

Lionel White Lionel White (9 July 1905 – 26 December 1985) was an American journalist and crime novelist, several of whose dark, noirish stories were made into films. His books include ''The Snatchers'' (made into a film as ''The Night of the Follow ...

, as well as original novels by Barry Gifford and

Jim Nisbet Jim Nisbet (January 20, 1947 – September 28, 2022) was an American author. Biography Nisbet received a degree in literature from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill before settling in San Francisco, California, where he wrote poetr ...

. Lizard is single-handedly responsible for renewing the interest in Jim Thompson in the late 1980s, which resulted in several film adaptations of his novels. The original series were

mass-market paperback A paperback (softcover, softback) book is one with a thick paper or paperboard cover, and often held together with glue rather than stitches or staples. In contrast, hardcover (hardback) books are bound with cardboard covered with cloth, lea ...

s with covers drawn by Jim Kirwan. Barry Gifford's relationship with Black Lizard is also sometimes credited with having first applied the term

to a certain subgenre of

hardboiled Hardboiled (or hard-boiled) fiction is a literary genre that shares some of its characters and settings with crime fiction (especially detective fiction and noir fiction). The genre's typical protagonist is a detective who battles the violence o ...

fiction. Thus, in an introduction written by Gifford to the Black Lizard editions of Jim Thompson's novels in 1984, Gifford writes: "The French seem to appreciate best Thompson's brand of terror. Roman noir, literally 'black novel,' is a term reserved especially for novelists such as Thompson,

Cornell Woolrich Cornell George Hopley Woolrich ( ; December 4, 1903 – September 25, 1968) was an American novelist and short story writer. He sometimes used the pseudonyms William Irish and George Hopley. His biographer, Francis Nevins Jr., rated Woolrich th ...

and David Goodis. Only Thompson, however, fulfills the French notion of both ''noir'' and ''maudit'', the accursed and self-destructive. It is an unholy picture that Thompson presents. As the British critic

Nick Kimberley Nick may refer to: * Nick (given name) * A cricket term for a slight deviation of the ball off the edge of the bat * British slang for being arrested * British slang for a police station * British slang for stealing * Short for nickname Pla ...

has written, 'This is a godless world,' populated by persons 'for whom murder is a casual chore.'" Gifford's use of the term noir in this context resulted in a term that is narrower in scope than that used by the French roman noir as applied to fiction. In 2021, Willy Vlautin wrote: "Those Black Lizard books were about psychologically damaged people trying to navigate a cruel, cutthroat world that didn't want them in the first place."

Random House Random House is an American book publisher and the largest general-interest paperback publisher in the world. The company has several independently managed subsidiaries around the world. It is part of Penguin Random House, which is owned by Germ ...

bought the rights to the Black Lizard name in June 1990 and merged it with Vintage Crime:

Vintage Crime/Black Lizard Vintage Crime/Black Lizard is the corporate amalgamation of Random House's Vintage Crime, and Random House's 1990 acquisition, Black Lizard, a major publisher of classic crime fiction. History Vintage Crime/Black Lizard was founded in June 1 ...

was the result. Many of Black Lizards' earlier releases were replaced by mainstream-friendly writers such as

Dashiell Hammett Samuel Dashiell Hammett (; May 27, 1894 – January 10, 1961) was an American writer of hard-boiled detective novels and short stories. He was also a screenwriter and political activist. Among the enduring characters he created are Sam Spade ('' ...

, Raymond Chandler, James M. Cain, as well as numerous contemporary authors. The

s were replaced by trade paperbacks with

black-and-white Black-and-white (B&W or B/W) images combine black and white in a continuous spectrum, producing a range of shades of grey. Media The history of various visual media began with black and white, and as technology improved, altered to color. ...

photographs on the covers. Most of the series was reprinted in this new format, but practically all of the books published by Lizard before the merge, with the notable exception of books by Jim Thompson, have since been allowed to fall out of print and have remained so since the early 1990s.

References

External links

Vintage Crime/Black Lizard

Covers by Kirwan
{{Authority control Book publishing companies based in Berkeley, California Publishing companies established in 1984 1984 establishments in California Book publishing companies of the United States Defunct book publishing companies of the United States