Jim Lamb covers Charles Williams

A boxed set of novels published by Eerdmans in 1981. Not something I own, unfortunately. A couple of years ago I decided to read in order all seven of Charles Williams’ supernatural thrillers: War in Heaven (1930), Many Dimensions (1930), The Place of the Lion (1931), The Greater Trumps (1932), Shadows of Ecstasy (1933), Descent into Hell (1937) and All Hallows’ Eve (1945). The plan foundered at the end of Shadows of Ecstasy when I felt in need of a break from Williams’ fiction but this week I’m reading Descent into Hell and feeling the opposite, happy to be back in Williams’ world. This in turn gives me an opportunity to draw attention to Jim Lamb’s covers for the books, created in the late 1970s when they were reprinted in the USA by Eerdmans as a set of matching paperback editions. Charles Williams occupies a curious position today, often referred to as “the third Inkling” along with JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis while being utterly eclipsed by the celebrity which has accrued to his…