DUTTON TO RE-LAUNCH GUILT-EDGED MYSTERIES AS DEDICATED DIGITAL PROGRAM

NEW YORK, NY – February 15, 2012 –Brian Tart, President and Publisher of Dutton, a division of Penguin Group (USA), announced today the re-launch of Dutton Guilt-Edged Mysteries as a digital imprint under the direction of Dutton Editor-in-Chief Ben Sevier. From 1947 to 1956, Dutton Guilt-Edged Mysteries was a pulp noir publisher that specialized in hardboiled detective fiction, including the work of noir icon Mickey Spillane, whose first seven Mike Hammer novels were published under the Guilt-Edged logo. The new program will be dedicated to publishing original crime short stories and novellas as Penguin eSpecials. The imprint will launch in Summer 2012 to coincide with the 65th anniversary of the Guilt-Edged publication of Spillane’s first Mike Hammer novel, I, the Jury.

The inaugural title in the program will be NPR news editor Krishnadev Calamur’s debut novella Murder in Mumbai. New York Times bestselling author John Lescroart (The Hunter, Damage, etc.) has also committed an original Dismas Hardy story to the program. Dutton Guilt-Edged Mysteries aims to discover new writers, showcase new short works from today’s bestselling authors, and reissue classic mysteries from the original Guilt-Edged imprint.

Sevier says: “The re-launch of Dutton Guilt-Edged Mysteries is a fitting tribute to Mickey Spillane, one of the 20th century’s bestselling and most beloved novelists. The new imprint is built to find fresh voices in crime fiction and publish them using distinctly 21st century techniques.”

Dutton Guilt-Edged Mysteries will accept submissions from literary agents as well as individual writers. The imprint will also partner with Book Country (www.bookcountry.com) to publish at least one writer from the online fiction workshop community each year.

Dutton Guilt-Edged Mysteries will be available wherever ebooks are sold, in a variety of formats compatible with all major e-readers and devices. More information, including submission guidelines, is available at www.penguin.com/DuttonGuiltEdged