London: Secker & Warburg, 1980

8vo, pp. 186. Original orange boards, lettered in gilt to spine. Illustrated dust jacket. Top edge a little dusty, otherwise a near fine copy in a fine dust jacket.

First edition, INSCRIBED BY BARNETT TO HIS EDITOR JOHN BLACKWELL: 'John Blackwell, thanks for everything, Jim Barrett'. The second title (of five) in the Owen Jones crime series.

John Blackwell [1937-1997] joined Secker and Warburg in the late 1960s, when the imprint was still an independent company run by Fredric Warburg himself. He was a constant presence through the company's innumerable corporate takeovers, mergers and changes of managing director. He was Tom Sharpe's editor, and was literary midwife to J. M. Coetzee, Michael Moorcock, John Banville, Tom McGuane, Malcolm Bradbury and Louis de Bernieres, among many others.