"Doctor Cockaigne" by N.E. Davies (Methuen, 1930)

Found on the "Vintage" table at the Lifeline Bookfair.  It appears to be a first (and only?) edition, and wonder of wonders, it has its dust jacket intact!

PROFESSOR SARQUE is found dead at his private laboratory at Berkeley College, killed by an overdose of a new alkaloid which he had recently discovered.  Is his death accident, suicide—or murder?  For those who seek thrills, here are thrills in plenty.  For those who would exercise their wits, here is a wonderful opportunity.

Just a quick note before I start: I left this blog dormant for a while because I wasn't sure what to do with it.  On the one hand, you're not supposed to judge a book by its cover.  On the other hand, I was buying these vintage books for their covers (or dust jackets in the case of hardbacks!)  So I decided I'd split my commentary into two parts: "Judging the Cover" and "Judging the Book".  Of course I'm going to add my usual snippets of random snark as I go along!

So to begin...

Judging the Cover

And my, what a fascinating cover we have to kick off with!  There's drama galore as a sinister man appears to be about to hurl an unconscious young woman off the parapets of a castle.  Is he a criminal mastermind?  A mad scientist?  The villain's hapless henchman?  Who is the young woman, and how did he get hold of her?  This dust jacket could easily double as a contemporary movie poster advertising a horror film.  From Universal Studios, maybe, and staring Boris Karloff...

Judging the Book

The "Methuen Clue Stories" series was set up to discover and publish new authors.  Dr Cockcaigne is therefore N.E. Davies' first—and possibly only—book.   It has the sort of faults a novice writer produces: improbable incident piled on improbable incident, and enough coincidences to supply the complete works of Dickens!  On the other hand, it moves at a fast and entertaining pace and there's an excellent surprise twist at the end.  I had to go through the book again once I'd read it to realise the clues had been there all along, and I'd missed them!

"The Case of the Smoking Chimney" by Erle Stanley Gardner (Horwitz, 1963)

Found at the Lifeline Bookfair. Where else?

Millions of readers throughout the world read the cases of wily lawyer-detective Perry Mason and follow his brilliant courtroom career on television.

Here is another fast-moving story of Erle Stanley Gardner's famous hero.

This blurb on the back cover literally says nothing but: Here is another Perry Mason adventure.  But what else do you need to say?

(Oh, and it ties it in nicely with the Perry Mason TV series by depicting our hero on the cover looking suspiciously like Raymond Burr!)

Murder by the Pack by Carl G. Hodges (Original Novels Foundation, 1960?)

Found in a dusty corner of the Green Shed:

They got to Cochran just outside the safety of his home.  And when Bob Ruff got there his pal was sprawled out on the sidewalk—dead with nine bullets in his body. 

The tough shamus owed his life to the murdered man and he vowed this was one gang-killing that was going to be avenged. 

Ruff figured he was going up against vicious opposition, but he didn't know just how vicious until he met a girl on the run. 

Cherry Morgan knew more about the rackets than was good for her health.  And when Ruff learned the score he knew that every moment they both lived from then on was on borrowed time!

Though a lot of these digest sized novellas were published in Australia in the 1950s and 1960s, not many of them have survived.  They appear to have been throwaway material—quick and easy reads for commuters on their journeys to and from work.  I read this on the bus this morning and it was just the thing for the journey: an absorbing page turner that was small enough to stuff into a bag or a pocket when I reached my stop!

The Saint and Scotland Yard by Leslie Charteris (Pan, 1951)

THE SAINT VERSUS SCOTLAND YARD (originally entitled The Holy Terror), tells how Simon Templar relieves crooks of their ill-gotten gains and, while thus helping Chief Inspector Teal of Scotland Yard, at the same time receives a fair proportion for himself and his girl assistant Patricia Holm.  Part I tells how he settles accounts with a professional blackmailer and murderer called the Scorpion and is thereby enabled to pay his income-tax.  In Part II he foils a giant currency swindle, but incidentally leaves a dead man and other casualties to be explained by the exasperated Teal.  In Part III he confronts two diamond-smuggling gangsters after a murder in a train ; Inspector Teal butts in and is fooled, while the Saint takes one of the gangsters on a wild car-ride ; Teal is finally checkmated on the great liner Berengaria and is left to open a strangely filled trunk labelled with his name.

The copy on the back cover of this book is so exhaustive it reads more like a synopsis than a blurb!  The Saint vs Scotland Yard is comprised of three loosely-connected novellas, in which Simon Templar foils the villains and the law, and escapes with the loot.  And his "girl assistant"?  Actually it's made clear that she is his live-in lover, an arrangement that is common today, but must have raised a few eyebrows back when this was written.

No wonder "The Saint" series became so popular.  The character must have been so much fun for respectable and law-abiding citizens to identify with!

The Case of the Sleepwalker's Niece by Erle Stanley Gardner (Cassell, 1945)

Another find from the Lifeline Bookfair vintage table!  This is the first Australian edition of this book.  It's a very early paperback and a wartime publication, so it's in an austere utility format.  No exciting covers here!

There's also no blurb on this book, but there's really no need.  It's a Perry Mason story so we all know how it goes—Perry's client is arrested for murder, Perry locks horns with the police, Perry exposes the real killer at his client's trial.  However, there is a fascinating advertisement on the back which explains how the advertiser's product contributed to the War Effort:

The Toff Goes Gay by John Creasey (Hodder and Stoughton, 1955)

All right, I bought this one solely for its title.  Childish, I know!

Why was a terrified French girl found wandering in London's East End?  Was she really frightened or was she pretending?  The Toff was called upon to answer both questions. . . .

      A man who knew the truth was murdered in the East End.  A Mayfair woman, afraid for her life, yielded up a part of the answer.  But the Toff had to go to Paris and be furiously gay in the face of death before he fitted the final piece into the grim puzzle.

Also: is it just me, or does the girl on the front cover only have one leg?

An Axe to Grind by Erle Stanley Gardner (Four Square, 1958)

In this hard-hitting, swift-moving murder mystery the author introduces that notable private eye, Donald Lam, confidential agent of Cool & Lam.  He has said goodbye to the Navy, and is looking for peace and quiet. 

But before he has time to say "Hello" to Bertha Cool, trouble walks into the office.

Within thirty minutes, Donald is off to the Rimley rendezvous, a place for lonely women with little to do and money to spend.  From then on it's a matter of corpses and cops, with a beautiful girl called Billy Prue who gets herself into trouble. 

A. A. Fair (now known to be Erle Stanley Gardner, world's record-seller in detective fiction) has written an original murder story, salty with American dialogue and wisecracks.

Wow!  Another Cool and Lam mystery, which is great.  (This is easily the best series Erle Stanley Gardner ever wrote.  Really.)  Not so great is the cover.  It looks like the artist fell asleep during anatomy drawing class.  Either that, or he had serious problems with perspective.  I know the dame opening the door in the picture is meant to be leaning forwards, but her top half is dangerously out of proportion with the rest of her!

Holiday for Inspector West by John Creasey (Hodder, 1959)

"Handsome" West of the Yard is enjoying a well-earned holiday at the seaside with his wife and young family when news breaks of the murder of an M.P.  In spite of Janet's protests, Roger hurries back to London "to take a look around", and contrives to be given official charge of the case.

Even a preliminary inquiry into Riddel's death opens up a vast number of complications to West.  The pursuit of a small package, for example, leads him into many dangers and strange places.  Slowly a pattern begins to emerge . . .

John Creasey gave his detective hero the nickname "Handsome", but in book after book also has him brawling and/or getting beaten up.  Maybe by this stage in the series he should be called "Cauliflower Ear" or "Broken Nose" West instead!

The Green Ribbon by Edgar Wallace (Arrow, 1957)

 

She inherited a fortune--& sinister misfortune...

Young, wealthy and beautiful Edna Gray suddenly found herself, like a fly, caught in a web of sinister intrigue.  New to the racing game, she found that one of her tenants, Elijah Goodie--the famous racing owner and trainer--was indulging in strange, nocturnal activities...

And alone in the dark Perrywig Caves--she awaited a horrible death.

Well might Our Heroine be afraid--she's being pursued by a floating man emerging out of what appears to be a pink radioactive cloud!

As Edgar Wallace thrillers go, this one isn't bad mainly because the plot is halfway believable.  Criminals have set up syndicates to cheat at the races.  However Edgar Wallace can't resist adding a few over-the-top flourishes to this basic story--his chief villain is slain by panthers!

The Case of the Fiery Fingers by Erle Stanley Gardner (Pan, 1959)

Another find from the Lifeline Bookfair!

 

ASPIRIN OR

ARSENIC?

Stake...

Half a million dollars 

Method...

Four pills in a phial

Result...

One dead wife

Proof...

The tell-tale effect of ultra-violet light!

The toughest, most complicated web of intrigue that PERRY MASON ever had to fight his way through!

A woman comes to Perry Mason to prevent a murder—naturally murder happens anyway.  If Perry Mason went around preventing murders, how would he get a chance to prove his client innocent in a dramatically contrived courtroom scene?

This Is Murder by Erle Stanley Gardner (WDL, 1960)

Sam Moraine, businessman, poker player and friend of the D.A. agreed as a lark to act as go-between in a kidnapping case.  Following instructions, he went to the boat, delivered $10,000 in old bills and received in exchange a bundle of blonde dynamite named Ann Hartwell.

As they reached the mooring float, they were met by the beam of a flashlight and a man's voice saying:

"You're under arrest, both of you.  Get your hands up in the air and keep them that way."

It was the Federal boys, and when they'd finished working him over, Sam thought the case was finished.

But it was only beginning.  What had started out as a simple adventure turned into a boiling mess of crooked politicians, double-crossing cops, ex-cons, a certain lady of elegant if easy virtue - and MURDER!

 Of course it did.

This is one of Gardner's earlier novels (first published in 1935 under the name of Charles J. Kenny) and not part of any of his series.   He'd been writing for nearly fifteen years before that, however, and he'd honed his craft publishing in magazines such as Black Mask and Detective Fiction Weekly.  In other words, he was already a slick and professional crime writer by the time this entertaining yarn was first released.

Alias the Saint by Leslie Charteris (Pan, 1953)

ALIAS THE SAINT tells of three adventures of Simon Templar.  In "The Story of a Dead Man' we find the Saint supervising an office in which many irregular things take place; there is a network of mystery about the firm of Vanney's Ltd. and Pamela Marlowe, who is employed there as a secretary, is very puzzled--as indeed she has a good reason to be, for she and the Saint are soon in a very dangerous situation, shared (curiously enough) by Chief Inspector Claud Eustace Teal of Scotland Yard.  "The Impossible Crime" displays the Saint pitting his wits against a gang of smuggling crooks; there is an amazing battle in a London square, where a night porter is shot dead.  "The National Debt" opens with the Saint making a trip to a quiet seaside village, hot on the track of three men who have kidnapped a girl analytical chemist whom they hope to compel to carry out a nefarious scheme.

Oh look!  It's The Saint.  Younger readers might not have heard of him, but older readers over a certain age will probably remember him well.  They might even have watched a young Roger Moore playing The Saint (aka Simon Templar) in the TV series of the same name.

The three novellas in this collection come from fairly early on in The Saint's career.  They were first published in the early 1930s, and people who recall Templar's smoother, newer, incarnations might be surprised at how much of a roughneck he is in this book.  He is not adverse to working on the wrong side of the law, and is quite prepared to use lethal violence if he feels it is necessary.  It is quite clear that it is only his own cunning that keeps him safe from the law--as well as the villains he tackles.  Because, criminal though he is, Templar is also one of the Good Guys, and someone you'd want on your side when the going gets tough.

(This is a fairly early Pan paperback.  I only have one older in my collection!)

The Toff Takes Shares by John Creasey (Hodder, 1965)

A local bookshop obtained a lot of vintage paperbacks by John Creasey, and all in near-mint condition!

 

An unexpected female passenger introduces the Toff to one of the most complicated and violent cases of his career.  The shares of a large London store are crashing, and amidst gripping excitement the Toff turns stockbroker to find out why.

And no wonder the shares in this "large London store" are crashing!  There are many and varied problems behind the scenes--including blackmail, embezzlement, kidnapping and murder.  In addition to all this--the book being originally published in the post-War austerity year of 1948--the owner is up to his neck in the black market.  How will the Toff manage to sort out the victims from the villains? 

Fool the Toff by John Creasey (Hodder & Stoughton, 1954)

 

Was "Love's Matrimonial Agency" a racket shop?  Jane Abbott met her husband there and he vanished--her money with him.  The Toff went to see Miss Love and found a most remarkable woman.  Then there was Jeremiah Matt, an equally remarkable man.  In fact the Toff met many new acquaintances and one of them made a fool of him.  Others... died.

This blurb is taken from the half-title page, as the back cover is filled with an advertisement:

 

Every once in a while I stumble across one of these on a secondhand bookstall.

As for the Toff--as the title of this book says, he is indeed fooled!  In the end, all the mysteries contained therein are  solved by his "man", Jolly--which is not what you expect of a story with a crime-fighting gentleman hero!

The Corpse Came C.O.D. by Jimmy Starr (J. Coker and Co., 1951)

Found at one of the Lifeline Bookfairs, complete with shabby dust-jacket:

Hector Ross, studio dress designer, disappears following  a tiff with glamorous movie star, Mona Harrison.  A few days later, Ross's body, dumped into a packing case, is delivered C.O.D. to Mona's house.  How her boyfriend Joe Medford, ace crime reporter, sets about the task of finding the murderer, provides a story packed with thrills and suspense.

What do you call a fictional character who likes to name-drop real people's names?

George Burns and Gracie Allen were across the way.  They waved at Mona, who returned the greeting.  Edgar Bergen, without Charlie McCarthy, sat in a corner booth.

(Page 43)

 As I strolled in, I noticed Fred Astaire over in a corner with his producer, David Hempstead.  Carole Landis was at the bar, telling stories of her army tour in Africa... Dorothy Lamour and Paulette Goddard, still in studio make-up, were gabbing about clothes in a far booth.

(Page 113)

I looked around the room.  Janet Gaynor and Adrian, the famous stylist, were sitting in the next booth.

(Page 115)

Jimmy Starr (his real name, evidently!) was a screenwriter and Hollywood gossip columnist in the 1930s and 1940s, so this novel really is a case of "writing what you know".   It was made into a movie starring George Brent and Joan Blondell in 1947.

Carson's Conspiracy by Michael Innes (Penguin, 1986)

CARL CARSON'S CRIME WOULD HAVE BEEN PERFECT--IN A DIFFERENT NEIGHBORHOOD

Carl Carson has a prosperous business, a dotty wife, and a fictitious son. When financial ruin threatens, he puts all these resources to use: he simply stages an elaborate "kidnapping" and liquidates his assets to pay the ransom. It might have worked, if Sir John Appleby hadn't been his neighbor. Appleby, lately retired from the Metropolitan Police, is intrigued by the rumors spreading through the neighborhood. But even he can't stop the conspiracy from turning into murder...

This is a bit newer than the books I usually blog about, but I couldn't resist simply because of the way the author describes Carson's favourite toy:

Of this particular telephone he was rather proud.  It didn't trail a cord.  (In this it was probably like the red one habitually toted around by the President of the United States.)  He could carry it, or it could be brought to him anywhere in the house, or even within the nearer reaches of the garden, and put into operation straight away.

--Page 37

Sometimes even the relatively recent past seems a strange and primitive place!

Corpse at the Carnival by George Bellairs (Thriller Bookclub, 1958)

Another Lifeline Bookfair treasure!

 

In his latest thriller, George Bellairs takes us back to the lovely and haunting Isle of Man.

It is holiday time in Douglas, and a carnival crowd engulfs a solitary, elderly man, who is peacefully gazing out to sea.  When the procession passes, the old man quietly dies.  He is found to have a knife wound in his back.  He is, at first, merely an anonymous victim, known casually to a few locals as Uncle Fred.  Superintendent Littlejohn, called to visit his old friend the Rev. Caesar Kinrade, Archdeacon of Man, on his way home from a police conference in Dublin, is asked by his comrade Inspector Knell, of the Manx C.I.D., to give him a hand in the case, unofficially.

As the inquiry progresses, Uncle Fred is virtually brought to life again by Littlejohn.  The lost years of his past are found again, his friends and his foes appear, the events leading up to his strange death fall in line and, gradually, the picture of the murderer appears.

Murder on the Orient Express by Agatha Christie (Fontana, 1959)

Found on a stall at Fishermen's Wharf Markets in Port Adelaide:

 

Thundering along on its three days' journey across Europe, the famous Orient Express suddenly comes to a stop in the night.

Snowdrifts block the line somewhere in the Balkans.  Everything is quiet and passengers quickly settle down for the night, including Hercule Poirot.

In the morning an American millionaire is found stabbed, many times--Poirot is very much wanted.  The untrodden snow seems to prove that the murderer is still on board.  Poirot begins to think--and a brilliantly ingenious solution is found...

 And without a doubt, the solution is brilliant ingenious.  (No, I'm not going to tell you what it is.  This blog is a Spoiler Free Zone!  If you haven't already read Murder on the Orient Express--one of Christie's best known books--do so and find out the solution for yourself.)

This is the sort of plotting that earned Agatha Christie the sobriquet "the Queen of Crime".  At times her prose was merely functional, her characters two-dimensional, her attitudes snobbish and old-fashioned.  She was never adverse to using stereotypes, particularly when depicting foreigners or members of the lower classes.  However, she knew how to weave together the real clues and red herrings to create a mystery that kept the reader guessing right to the end.

Three Act Tragedy by Agatha Christie (Fontana, 1962)

One more from the Lifeline Bookfair!

 

Sir Charles Cartwright, the distinguished actor, had invited the local vicar and his wife to a house-warming party  at his new country cottage.  The Reverend Stephen Babbington unaccustomed as he was to strong liquor, nervously sipped his cocktail with a slightly wry expression on his face.  The other guests continued to chatter.  Suddenly Mr Babbington's hand clutched at his throat, and, in a moment, he collapsed--dead.

This was only the first act in the drama--a three-act tragedy, with a mysterious death in every act.  It is Hercule Poirot, the indomitable Belgian detective, who moves behind the scenes of this play and who finally rings down the curtain.

 The man on the cover of this book is either dead drunk--or just dead!  Since the author is Agatha Christie, I'm guessing the latter.

(See also my post on the 1964 Pan edition of the same title.)

The Case of the Hesitant Hostess by Erle Stanley Gardner (Pan, 1959)

 

Frame-up!

She looked cool and innocent on the witness stand--a formidable challenge for Perry Mason.

She held the jury spellbound--for she had all the trumps to convict an innocent man.

And when Perry sprang his bomb-shell, the hoped-for explosion never came...

That was 5 p.m. Friday, leaving Mason three nights, two days, to break the case against his client...  Tense, action-packed hours, with the chips mounting steadily against him.

Hostess as in "nightclub hostess", that is.

This is actually a good Perry Mason mystery.  Perry defends a man framed for an armed robbery, and finds himself in the middle of a case involving illegal gambling, impersonation, drug smuggling--and murder.  Murder goes without saying of course!  Also needless to say, Perry gets his man off all the charges and the real criminals behind bars.