Paperback 92: The Bowstring Murders / Carter Dickson (Berkley G-214)

Paperback 92: Berkley G-214 (1st ptg, 1959)

Title: The Bowstring Murders
Author: Carter Dickson
Cover artist: Robert Maguire

Yours for: $7

"Oh, crossbow, I'm sorry. I love you but ... it can never work out between us..."

Best things about this cover:

• Man is it red.
• Her hair is the color of pink lemonade.
• "Do you like my outfit? I call it 'The Reverse Bumblebee!'" (My other bumblebee joke involved her being a referee at a bumblebee football game)
• Her left ankle is absurdly, grotesquely thick.
• Are those ... pants? Tights? Jodhpurs?
• As with all Robert Maguire women, this one has exquisite, detailed, realistic, emotionally evocative facial features. Why she's writhing around in Mao's basement dressed like a bee, I'll never know.
• Carter Dickson is a terrible name, in that Dickson Carter really makes far more sense. Much more believable as a name, I think.

Best things about this back cover:

• Gauntlets cannot be efficient handwear for strangling.
• "... the great criminologist John Gaunt" - laziest naming ever. John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, was a prominent nobleman in 14th-century England - the uncle of Richard II.
• This book description reeks of Englishness. It's clear that the Maguire cover is a total fake-out; I'm quite sure this book contains no mod, crossbow-loving bumble-ladies. Quite sure.

PAGE 123~

"Lady Rayle has been murdered," said John Gaunt, rising from the breakfast table.

~RP