Recently Shelved
THE FINGER MAN: AND OTHER STORIES.
New York: Avon Book Company, [1946]. Octavo, pictorial wrappers. First edition. Avon Murder Mystery Monthly #43. Digest size format. Collects three stories, The Finger Man, The Bronze Door, Smart-Aleck Kill, and the essay The Simple Art of Murder. Hubin, p. 152. Item #23454
FIVE SINISTER CHARACTERS.
New York: Avon Book Company, [1945]. Octavo, pictorial wrappers. First edition. Avon Murder Mystery Monthly #28. Digest size format. Collects five stories, I’ll Be Waiting, The King in Yellow, Pearls Are a Nuisance, Red Wind, and Trouble Is My Business. Hubin, p. 152. Item #23453
![FIVE [5] MURDERERS. Raymond Chandler.](/pictures/thumb/23452.jpg?v=1547928109)
FIVE [5] MURDERERS.
New York: Avon Book Company, 1944. Octavo, pictorial wrappers. First edition. Avon Murder Mystery Monthly #19. Digest size format. Collection of mystery stories which first appeared in Black Mask. Contents: Blackmailers Don’t Shoot, Goldfish,Guns at Cyrano’s, Nevada Gas, and Spanish Blood. Hubin, p. 152. Queen's Quorum 99. Item #23452
SOMEWHERE IN THE HOUSE.
New York, Toronto: Rinehart & Company, Inc., [1946]. Octavo, pp. [1-6] [1-2] 3-186, original dark gray cloth, spine stamped in orange, top edge stained orange, fore edge uncut. First edition. The tenth Henry Gamadge novel. "The murder is done in an enclosed rose garden, by means of a rifle shot. The reasons for this act and its locale are excellent and the tale stands rereading, even though a little wordy at the outset." - Barzun & Taylor, A Catalogue of Crime (1989), 1028. Hubin, p. 211. Penzler, Bibliomysteries, p. 35. Item #23451
THE GOLDEN SPIDERS.
New York: The Viking Press, 1953. Octavo, cloth backed boards. First edition. A Nero Wolfe mystery novel. "That open (but often shut) private eye, Nero Wolfe ignores police assumptions when he links three unrelated deaths and, with his meager force against N.Y.'s finest, ties in extortion with the murders. Inspector Cramer is redder-faced; Archie Goodwin lands in a rough mix-up; Wolfe expounds on the science and art of detection and his grumbles and snooperies prove out. Calculating." - Kirkus Review, 1 October, 1953. Hubin, pp. 777-778. Townsend, Rex Stout: An Annotated and Secondary Bibliography, A34a. Item #23450
AND BE A VILLAIN.
New York: The Viking Press, 1948. Octavo, boards. First edition. The thirteenth Nero Wolfe mystery. The first of three novels that feature Nero's criminal nemesis Zeck. "Zeck is a modern 'Napolean of Crime,' and his confrontation with Wolfe can be compared to Sherlock Holmes versus Professor Moriarty." - Pronzini and Muller, 1001 Midnights, The Aficionado's Guide to Mystery and Detective Fiction, pp. 758-759. "A first-rate sample of the author's art, this tale brings us face to face with the radio advertising of a beverage which the lady who promotes it cannot abide. Hence hanky-panky with the bottle of substitute liquid and resulting doubt as to whom the dose was intended for. Archie is spectacular in word and deed." - Barzun & Taylor, A Catalogue of Crime (1989), 3061. Hubin, pp. 777-778. Townsend, Rex Stout: An Annotated and Secondary Bibliography, A29a. Item #23449
CURTAINS FOR THREE: A NERO WOLFE THREESOME.
New York: The Viking Press, 1951. Octavo, cloth. First edition. Collects three Nero Wolfe mystery stories. "The Gun With Wings," "Bullet For One," and "Disguise for Murder." All first published in The American Magazine. Hubin, pp. 777-778. Townsend, Rex Stout: An Annotated and Secondary Bibliography, C5a. Item #23448
THE SILENT SPEAKER.
New York: The Viking Press, 1946. Octavo, original blue green cloth, front and spine stamped in yellow and pink, top edge stained pink. First edition. The eleventh Nero Wolfe mystery and first novel after WW II. "...about the murder of a dedicated Washington civil servant and one of his aides. The least likely suspect is well hidden, Wolfe does some thinking, and Archie is Archie. Not too much wrangling with the police, and in truth one of Rex Stout's best in the semi-demi form."- Barzun & Taylor, A Catalogue of Crime (1989), 3090. Hubin, pp. 777-778. Townsend, Rex Stout: An Annotated and Secondary Bibliography, A27a. Item #23447
A STATE OF DENMARK: OR A WARNING TO THE INCURIOUS.
London: Hutchinson, [1970]. Octavo, boards. First edition. Signed by Cook on the front free end paper. A Dystopian novel. "Well before 1984 five national governments have been succeeded by a 'socialist' administration which proves an extremely shabby and brutal dictatorship." - Gerber, Utopian Fantasy (1973), p. 162. "Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland having gone their own way, England has sleepwalked into dictatorship. Non-white immigrants have been deported, the Times is the only newspaper and internment camps, one of which will soon be Watt’s new home, are everywhere. (Even more sinisterly, for those who believe nothing bad could ever happen to John Lewis, Peter Jones is now a military HQ.) Raymond’s occasionally implausible plot sometimes struggles under the weight of its own ambition and his narrative is, be warned, unrelievedly bleak." - article in The Guardian online by Rachel Cooke, 26 July, 2016. The author wrote a series of crime novels using the pseudonym Derek Raymond. Item #23446
SIX DAYS OF THE CONDOR.
New York: W. W. Norton & Company, Inc., [1974]. Octavo, cloth backed boards. First edition. "This is a harrowing novel, with unsettling and far-reaching implications. No one who reads it can fail to be disturbed one way or another." - Pronzini and Muller, 1001 Midnights, The Aficionado's Guide to Mystery and Detective Fiction, pp. 310-311. Filmed as "Three Days of the Condor" a fine thriller starring Robert Redford. Hubin, p. 340. Item #23445
DARKER THAN AMBER.
Philadelphia, New York: J.B. Lippincott, Company, 1970. Octavo, boards. First U. S. hardcover edition. A Travis McGee mystery in which he gets involved with high priced call girls and murder. "...is among the best in this entertaining series." - Pronzini and Muller, 1001 Midnights, The Aficionado's Guide to Mystery and Detective Fiction, pp. 516-517. Filmed in 1970 with Rod Taylor as Travis McGee. Hubin, p. 526. Item #23444
PHANTOM LADY.
Philadelphia and New York: J.B. Lippincott Company, [1942]. Octavo, pp. [1-8] 9-291 [292], cloth. First edition. "This is the kind of waking nightmare that is the essence of noir fiction, and in his fourth suspense novel Cornell Woolrich writing under the pseudonym William Irish, captures superbly the emotional torment and terror of the situation" Pronzini and Muller: 1001 Midnights, pp. 398-99. A Haycraft-Queen cornerstone title. Made into a film noir directed by Robert Siodmak in 1944. Johnson, The Dark Page pp. 290-291. Item #23443
DEATH AND LETTERS.
New York, Toronto: Rinehart & Company, Inc., [1950]. Octavo, boards. First edition. The fifteenth Henry Gamadge novel. "This is a well organized and appropriately atmospheric novel about a woman kept under drugs and restraint in a big Hudson River family mansion. Gamadge does a good job of work, and there are no embarrassing episodes of spiritualism or bibliomania to spoil the plot" - Barzun & Taylor, A Catalogue of Crime (1989), 1030. Hubin, p. 211. Penzler, Bibliomysteries, p. 36. Item #23441
THE WRONG WAY DOWN.
New York, Toronto: Rinehart & Company, Inc., [1946]. Octavo, pp. [1-6] [1-2] 3-211 [212-218: blank], original dark gray cloth, spine stamped in orange, top edge stained orange, fore edge uncut. First edition. The eleventh Henry Gamadge novel. "The murder is done in an enclosed rose garden, by means of a rifle shot. The reasons for this act and its locale are excellent and the tale stands rereading, even though a little wordy at the outset." - Barzun & Taylor, A Catalogue of Crime (1989), 1028. Hubin, p. 211. Penzler, Bibliomysteries, p. 35. Item #23437
ANY SHAPE OR FORM.
New York, Toronto: Farrar & Rinehart, Inc., [1945]. Octavo, pp. [1-6] [1-2] 3-186, original gray-green cloth, front and spine stamped in green. Fore edge uncut, bottom edge rough cut. First edition. The ninth Henry Gamadge novel. "The murder is done in an enclosed rose garden, by means of a rifle shot. The reasons for this act and its locale are excellent and the tale stands rereading, even though a little wordy at the outset." - Barzun & Taylor, A Catalogue of Crime (1989), 1028. Hubin, p. 211. Penzler, Bibliomysteries, p. 35. Item #23435
ARROW POINTING NOWHERE.
New York, Toronto: Farrar & Rinehart, Inc., [1944]. Octavo, pp. [1-6] [1-2] 3-250, original greenish-yellow cloth, front and spine stamped in black. Fore edge uncut, bottom edge rough cut. First edition. The seventh Henry Gamadge novel. Murder and a plate missing from a rare book. Hubin, p. 211. Penzler, Bibliomysteries, p. 35. Item #23433
EVIDENCE OF THINGS SEEN.
New York, Toronto: Farrar & Rinehart, Inc., [1943]. Octavo, pp. [1-6] [1-2] 3-279 [280: blank] 281 [282: blank], original beige cloth, front and spine stamped in purple. Fore edge and bottom edge rough cut. First edition. Review slip laid in. The sixth Henry Gamadge novel. "Attractive country setting in the Berkshires, where the newly married Clara awaits Gamadge's return from war work for a vacation. When the owner of their cottage is murdered on their hands it looks as though various seemingly supernatural phenomena of the week past had come to a focus. But Gamadge debunks everything very nicely, and the rather old dodge by which the strangling was done seems fresh enough." - Barzun & Taylor, A Catalogue of Crime (1989), 1031. Hubin, p. 211. Penzler, Bibliomysteries, p. 34. Item #23431
DEADLY NIGHTSHADE.
New York, Toronto: Farrar & Rinehart, Inc., [1940]. Octavo, pp. [1-6] [1-2] 3-301 [302-306: blank], original red cloth, front and spine stamped in black. Top edge stained yellow, fore edge uncut, bottom edge rough cut. First edition. The second Henry Gamadge novel. "Gamadge is at work attempting to establish the authenticity of a manuscript when he is asked to return to Maine to solve another murder involving and old legend, gypsies and a poisonous nightshade." - Penzler, Bibliomysteries, p. 33. Hubin, p. 211. Item #23427
DEADLY NIGHTSHADE.
New York, Toronto: Farrar & Rinehart, Inc., [1940]. Octavo, pp. [1-6] [1-2] 3-301 [302-306: blank], original red cloth, front and spine stamped in black. Top edge stained yellow, fore edge uncut, bottom edge rough cut. First edition. The second Henry Gamadge novel. "Gamadge is at work attempting to establish the authenticity of a manuscript when he is asked to return to Maine to solve another murder involving and old legend, gypsies and a poisonous nightshade." - Penzler, Bibliomysteries, p. 33. Hubin, p. 211. Item #23426
THE SIMPLE ART OF MURDER.
Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1950. Octavo, jacket art by Boris Artzybasheff, cloth. First edition. Collects twelve stories and the essay "The Simple Art of Murder." "Eleven of the twelve stories in this collection are those that Chandler considered the best of his output for the pulps..." - Pronzini and Muller, 1001 Midnights, The Aficionado's Guide to Mystery and Detective Fiction, pp. 125-126. In several of the stories the original character of Johnny Dalmas is changed to Marlowe. Bruccoli, Raymond Chandler: A Bibliography A.9.1.a. Hubin, p. 153. A Haycraft-Queen cornerstone. Item #23424
ROYAL FLUSH: THE FOURTH NERO WOLFE OMNIBUS.
New York: The Viking Press, [1965]. Octavo, cloth. First edition. Omnibus volume contains two novels, FER-DE-LANCE, MURDER BY THE BOOK and the contents of the story collection THREE WITNESSES. Hubin, pp. 777-778. Townsend, Rex Stout: An Annotated and Secondary Bibliography, D5a. Item #23423
FIVE OF A KIND: THE THIRD NERO WOLFE OMNIBUS.
New York: The Viking Press, 1961. Octavo, boards. First edition. Omnibus volume contains two novels, THE RUBBER BAND and IN THE BEST FAMILIES and the contents of the story collection THREE DOORS TO DEATH. Hubin, pp. 777-778. Townsend, Rex Stout: An Annotated and Secondary Bibliography, D4a. Item #23422
CHILDREN OF THE NIGHT.
London: Jonathan Cape, [1966]. Octavo, boards. First edition. "This book recounts the strange happenings in a northeastern British town that presage the end of the world ... The final discovery is among the author's more inspired creations, and the climax ranks among his best." - Sullivan (ed), The Penguin Encyclopedia of Horror and the Supernatural, p. 37. Barron (ed), Horror Literature 4-38. Tymn (ed), Horror Literature 4-22. Item #23371
THE POISONED MOUNTAIN.
Philadelphia, London: J. B. Lippincott Company, 1936. Octavo, cloth. First U. S. edition. The third Colin Gray novel. Major Colin Gray and his wife are captured in the Himalayas and brought to a mysterious city. Item #23370
AN EYE FOR AN EYE.
Garden City, New York: Published For The Crime Club By Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1957. Octavo, boards. First edition. Psychological thriller in which a lawyers wife is kidnapped by the violent ex-husband of a woman who was his client in a divorce case. This book became the basis for the television series Markham. Hubin, p. 93. Item #23369