Paperback 1097: A Holiday for Murder / Agatha Christie (Bantam 20968-X)

 Paperback 1097: Bantam 20968-X (28th ptg, 1980)

Title: A Holiday for Murder

Author: Agatha Christie

Cover artist: Tom Adams

Condition: 8/10

Value: $8

[Little Free Library outside the cafe I go to on Sundays]

Best things about this cover: 

• Look at this freak show. God I love weird covers. "What if the screaming head of Ebenezer Scrooge were flying through the air just bleeding holly berries, his voice shattering a wine glass that happens to be nearby for some reason?" "... That's it?" "Uh, no, no ... there's ... there's also a chair!" "Hmmm..." "And a statue!" "OK, sold!" 
• The great thing about Christie (well, one of them) is that she was such a guaranteed seller, such a book-moving juggernaut, that you could collect *only* Christie paperbacks and have no hope of ever "completing" your collection. And her career traverses all of paperback cover styles. She's a design universe unto herself.
• Murder for Christmas is better, not sure what they think they're doing on the retitle here.
• I pulled four Christies from the LFL (Little Free Library) outside Batch Coffee in Binghamton—that's the other great thing about Christie: like Gardner, her books are Everywhere. I read an early one, The Secret of Chimneys (1925), which featured not Poirot or Marple but someone named Superintendent Battle. He was a recurring character, appearing in five (!) of her novels between '25 and '44. The book was genuinely hilarious, closer to slapstick than most conventional  detective fiction. I honestly don't remember Christie being that funny. In fact, I recently read the much later At Bertram's Hotel, and it wasn't that funny. Funnyish, but nothing like the whizbang near-goofiness of The Secret of Chimneys.

Best things about this back cover: 

• "Violent Night, Holey Night" ('cause you're full of holes ... from all the bullets or stab wounds ... OK, OK, I'll work on it)
• Cannot believe they're just wasting all this valuable space. Why not make the font big and stupid, or add some of the old man's dumb kids? Something, anything. You can't get visually upstaged by barcodes, man! Come on.

Page 123~

"Perhaps it is better to speak frankly.”

It is the formal position of this blog that it is always better to do Everything "frankly." 

~RP

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and BlueSky]

Paperback 1096: Red Harvest / Dashiell Hammett (Perma Books M-3043)

Paperback 1096: Perma Books M-3043 (1st ptg, 1956)

Title: Red Harvest

Author: Dashiell Hammett

Cover artist: Lou Marchetti

Condition: 8/10

Value: $25

Best things about this cover: 

• More like Red Housecoat! Just an amazing garment.
• "Say 'candy cane' again. I dare you. I double dare you, motherfucker. Say 'candy cane' one more goddamn time!"
• The geometry of this interaction is mesmerizing. The hand triangle! Her left hand and her right cross and his "fear hand"—so much intense hand drama. Plus that look of complete contempt on her face ... god bless you, Lou Marchetti, king among cover artists!

Best things about this back cover: 

• Not sure whose idea it was to put the "-DER" over the "WHO-" but it was not a good one.
• This is a fairly succinct and vivid account of a thing that actually happens in the book. It does make me want to read the book. Nothing fancy going on back here, but in terms of drumming up interest in the story, mission accomplished.
• I miss laudanum. And ice picks. Do people still do laudanum and kill with ice picks? Inebriation and murder were just *better* in the old days, man.

Page 123~

    "Reno and his mob were in the can. Reno was Yard's pup, but he didn't mind crossing up his head-man. He already had the idea that he was about ready to take the berg away from Lew." I turned to Reno and asked: "Isn't that it?"

    He looked at me woodenly and said: "You're telling it."

    I continued telling it. 

I love how much Hammett loves hardboiled slang. Always got the tough-guy patter down pat. This is what makes Hammett so enthralling—a great ear for dialogue, which makes the whole criminal scene feel dramatic and authentic. 

~RP

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Paperback 1095: Man-Killer / Talmage Powell // Running Scared / Bob McKnight (Ace D-469)

 Paperback 1095: Ace D-469 (PBO / PBO, 1960)

Title: Man-Killer / Running Scared

Author: Talmage Powell / Bob McKnight

Cover artist: Rudy Nappi / Rudy Nappi (signature visible)

Condition: 8 or 9/10

Value: $30

Best things about this cover: 

• "You've had your breakfast of canned baked beans and coffee, now get out of my yellow house! Don't make me have to hold this gun properly!"
• She and that rifle sure seem, uh, friendly.
• This is one of the greatest fuck-off power poses I've ever seen on a paperback cover. I do believe she would, in fact, kill a man, possibly several.
• "The Lady's For Hanging" yeah good luck with that

Best things about this back cover: 

• Crawling Scared!
• "Murder On My Heels ... hey, where the hell are my heels, anyway? Must've lost 'em when I crawled through the swamp in my underwear oh well"
• The Ghost of Lee Marvin is very disappointed in your push-up technique

Page 123~ (from Man-Killer)

    The man paused at the mouth of the alley, a big, brawny shadow. I saw him stiffen. He was staring at the white blob of my face in the infiltrating light. 

    "Calhoun!"

    It was Giles Hustin.

OK, whatever suspense, whatever sense of impending terror you were trying to work up there was immediately and entirely dissipated by "It was Giles Hustin." Giles Hustin is not the name of a man who makes other men quake in fear. Giles Hustin is the name of a man who plays folk music every Thursday from 9 to 10 at The Rusty Skillet. 

Also, I'm worried about Calhoun's face.

~RP

[Follow Rex Parker on Twitter and BlueSky]