Paperback 209: The Opening Door / Helen Reilly (Dell 917)

Paperback 209: Dell 917 (1st ptg, 1956)
Title: The Opening Door
Author: Helen Reilly
Cover artist: Victor Kalin

Yours for: $7


Best things about this cover:

• Given how it's cut and hung, I'm surprised the door opens at all
• That lady makes for a very nice-looking corpse. Normally, I go for women who are more than 3 ft. tall, but in her case, I'll make an exception.
• I change my vote. The expression on her face says not "dead" but "drunk and happy about it."

Best things about this back cover:

• Whoa. What the ... see, I almost like this. Dramatic meltdown, in slo-motion. That, or she's doing her best Elvis/James Brown song-ending pose. The one big difference: I think both those guys had more than three fingers on their right hands.
• "Taint of murder" - oh, man, that's the worst kind of taint
• "The Knob Is Turning" - a. that should have been the title of this book, b. that's what she said.

Page 123~

Gerald was talking to Cicely Thwaight near a clump of palms. How he had - dwindled, Eve thought dispassionately.

But Thwaight! There's more!

~RP