I picked up the above painting by John R Keay which I was told comes from his estate. He painted it for ‘Look and Learn’ and strikes me a being a little odd. Why is there a stove, table and bed but no roof and where is the snow? John Keay, not to be confused with Jack Keay, painted at least 15 covers for PAN from 1951 with ‘Sorry You’ve Been Troubled’ through to 1958 with ‘A Gun For Inspector West’
Having mentioned last week the optimistic seller of a cover of ‘Seven Years in Tibet’ on eBay made me have a look at mine again and I noticed I had two copies of GP40 from 1956 on the shelf. Looking at them side by side I think I kept both as one has the price and the other has a PAN sticker covering it up. This was often done when UK priced copies were sent abroad and they didn’t have appropriate price stickers for that particular country.
Tom Lilley is a name I’m not familiar with although I do have two of his titles published by PAN. They are ‘The Projects Section’ and ‘The K Section’ and both feature Ralph Carter. I’ve tried to find out more about Lilley but not had much success. I think he published another two titles featuring Carter but I’m not sure of the specific order as two of them claim to be his first book. Were they the same but with different titles in different countries? I’ve put all four on a page HERE.