Paperback 1156: The Under Dog and Other Mysteries / Agatha Christie (Pocket Books 1085)

Paperback 1156: Pocket Books 1085 (1st ptg, 1955)

Title: The Under Dog and Other Mysteries

Author: Agatha Christie

Cover artist: James Meese

Condition: 9/10

Value: $12

Best things about this cover: 

• Me after three drinks and five pelvic lifts.
• Whodunnit? My money's on the giant yellow rectangle.
• Just a great dead-man-spilling-toward-the-foreground image here from James Meese. 
• On second thought, I don't think he's actually dead; I think he just got drunk and walked smack into the yellow rectangle. 
• I cannot figure out what the standing man is doing (besides looking suspicious)? He seems to be smoking a cigarette with his left hand but also holding what looks like a pipe (but is not a pipe) in his right hand? What is he holding? It's driving me nuts. [reader opinion is that he’s holding a lighter; I can live with that]
• I like how the lady combines Fear Hand with a kind of sexy hands-on-hips pose. Fear Hand, but make it shimmy.
• This book is in spooky-good condition. It's got some surface wear but otherwise it's square, sharp-edged and shiny.

Best things about this back cover: 

• That is possibly the most dramatic "For example..." in the history of the written word.
• I have questions about Submarines A through Y.
• "And in The King of Clubs Hercule Poirot's knowledge of bridge makes him even more insufferable than usual." No wonder the police are still looking for an answer—they probably couldn't bear to sit through his tedious explanation. 

Page 123~

"Think of that solid middle-class English family, the Oglanders."

I will not. You can't make me. Furthermore, if you're going to invent a family name, try to come up with something more plausible than the Oglanders. Next you'll be talking about the Blabfasters and the Foozengibbets and then where will we be? In a Dr. Seuss book, that's where?

~RP

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Paperback 1152: Murder on the Links / Agatha Christie (Dell 454)

Paperback 1152: Dell 454 (1st ptg, 1950)

Title: Murder on the Links

Author: Agatha Christie

Cover artist: Al Brulé

Condition: 7/10    

Value: $10

Best things about this cover: 

• I'm sorry but the freakiest thing about this cover isn't Poirot standing in the doorway, it's whatever that get-up is that she's got on, holy cow.
• Carhop? Ballerina? Working as a waitress in a cocktail bar?
• Those are the gapingest fishnets I ever did see. Reasonable-sized fish could escape through those holes.
• Classic Fear Hand! Or else she's telling Poirot, "Just give me five minutes, you impatient Walloon!"
• In other news, I think 2026 might be My Christie Year. I know a year isn't nearly enough to read all her novels, but I'm hoping maybe I can polish off a dozen, at least.

Best things about this back cover: 

• Mapback!! Paperback design peaked with the mapback. All downhill since then. Every book should have a map on the back. If I started a publishing co., this would be the one and possibly only thing I cared about.
• Look at the detail. Tiny cabanas and beach chairs and umbrellas and everything.
• LOL "Bench." Thanks, map!
• Love the perspective on this one, with Calais visible in the far distance. And clouds! It's lovely, really.
• "Copes" is a weird word to describe what Poirot does. He's solving a case, not surviving a week-end with his in-laws.

Page 123~

    But at that moment a stir and bustle was heard outside, and our old friend, the examining magistrate, accompanied by his clerk and M. Bex, with the doctor behind them, came bustling in.

OK, a couple things. First, M. Bex, cool name. Second, was there no editor to say "absolutely not" to the repetition of "bustle"? "Bustling" almost seems like an intentional comical callback to "stir and bustle," but if that were so, I'd expect all the people to come "stirring and bustling in." "Bustling" on its own gives the appearance of laziness (both authorial and editorial).

~RP

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Paperback 1150: The Hollow / Agatha Christie (Pocket Books 485)

Paperback 1150: Pocket Books 485 (1st ptg, 1948)

Title: The Hollow

Author: Agatha Christie

Cover artist: Uncredited

Condition: 8/10

Value: $10

[Still more Agatha Christie from this summer, Autumn Leaves, Ithaca, NY, 2025]

Best things about this cover: 

• She criticized his taste in statuary once too often!
• She criticized his Brylcrem obsession once too often!
• "Hold still, darling, while I smother you in THE HOLLOW of my neck"
• Man they are really doing battle for "worst hair."
• Huh. It doesn't look like he "inspires dangerous passion" so much as he "lavishes unwanted attention on women such that they are inspired to drive knitting needles into his neck."
• What are those things in her hand, anyway? I honestly have no guess. Part knitting needles part riding crop part busted umbrella. Whatever it is, I assume she's about to plant it right in his cherubic face.

Best things about this back cover: 

• Most accusations "for all to hear" are not "whispered," in my admittedly limited experience of guys dying near swimming pools.
• This is a pretty weak teaser. Also, a truly unnecessary explanation of what Hercule Poirot is going to do. "Oh, is he going to ask questions and gain insight into the character of suspects!? How novel!"
• I'm no legal scholar, but I'm pretty sure that a detective cannot "convict the guilty one."

Page 123~

"Oh, Gudgeon," said Lady Angkatell, "about those eggs. I meant to write the date in pencil on them as usual. Will you ask Mrs. Medway to see to it?"

This book is truly committed to insane names. Gerda and Gudgeon and Angkatell, and then of course there's Henrietta: "Henrietta Savernake [!] — a talented sculptress who sometimes cheats at cards" (per the "Cast of Characters"). As long as one of them writes the damn date on the damn eggs, I'm sure everything will be fine.

~RP

P.S. sorry for the two-week hiatus. Surgery + a cold + a threefold increase in teaching responsibilities really put me back on my heels. But I'm back at it now, 2-3x week for the foreseeable future.

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Paperback 1108: Double Sin / Agatha Christie (Dell 12144)

Paperback 1108: Dell 12144 (1st New Dell, 1980)

Title: Double Sin

Author: Agatha Christie

Cover artist: Uncredited

Condition: 6

Value: $6

Best things about this cover: 

• Hey kid, you got a little ... just ... on your mouth there ... no ... I'm a mirror ... my right, your left ...
• For some reason, Random Heap of Objects is a common Christie cover motif
• Who would arrange this stuff like this? What are the jewels even doing? How is that gun standing on end? Who would sculpt such a creepy wide-eyed kid? As you can see, all the blood is the least of my concerns
• Why is Hercule Poirot not also "incomparable" (or something like it)? Where's his hyperbolic adjective? I think he's earned it. 

Best things about this back cover: 

• This cover copy makes it sound like Marple and Poirot team up, or at least interact in some way, but I'm pretty sure this is a collection of short stories, none of which feature both detectives at the same time. Calling them an "unstoppable combination" is at least a little misleading.
• What year do UPC codes start appearing on paperback books? A truly evil year, that.
• This back cover is boring, the design uninspired. The corners of the text frame are vaguely deco-ish, which I guess is supposed to evoke the era in which the stories are set, but ... meh. I do kinda like the mirrored "A"s at the front and back of "AGATHA," but that may be the only design element here that I like.

Page 123~

An idle young man, she thought, but good-looking.

Finally—horny Miss Marple! It's what we've all been waiting for.

~RP

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Paperback 848: Appointment with Death / Agatha Christie (Dell 105)

Paperback 848: Dell 105 (1st ptg, 1946)

Title: Appointment with Death
Author: Agatha Christie
Cover artist: Gerald Gregg

Estimated value: $15-25


Best things about this cover:

• "Where have you been? You're late. We had an appointment. [Sigh]. I guess we can get coffee and wait for the next tour to start, but … I really wish you'd called." #PassiveAggressiveDeath
• Killer Gerald Gregg cover. KILLER.
• "AN Hercule Poirot Mystery"—I like that the cover knows the "H" is silent.

Best things about this back cover:

• O, man, jackpot. First off, MAPBACK!
• Second off, check out the 1946 map! Predates existence of Israel by a scant two years.
• Third, check out the insert map from "Star Wars." You can see a Jawa camp and everything.

Page 123~

"None of the servants seemed to be about, but I found some soda water and drank it."

You'll thrill to the tale of the intrepid rich guy who risked all to survive in … A House Without Servants.

~RP

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