The Crime Club was the "brand" imprint of Doubleday's mystery line
from 1928 to 1991. Having an imprint brand was common among
publishers in the middle decades of the 20th Century. Duell, Sloan
and Pearce had their "Bloodhound Mysteries" that included a logo of a
bloodhound with its nose to the ground. J.P. Lippincott had the
"Mainline Mysteries" with a neat logo that featured the front of a
railroad locomotive encircled by a skull. There were a good many
others but I won't detail them here.
Doubleday Crime Club was never a club in the sense of being a
subscription book club. It was a very powerful force in the mystery
world for many years as was its long-time editor Isabelle Taylor. In
my view, the typical Crime Club novel was not the type of fiction
discussed on the list. Not all were cozies but few came within
hooting distance of the hardboiled.
It did publish some excellent books including several by one of my
favorites the Australian Arthur W. Upfield and as well as novels by
Leigh Brackett, Frederick C. Davis, Baynard Kendrick, Leslie
Charteris, Joe Hensley, Ruth Rendell. Way back, it published Edgar
Wallace, Sax Rohmer, Van Wyck Mason, Margery Allingham, and Philip
MacDonald.
There is a great book DOUBLEDAY CRIME CLUB COMPENDIUM 1928-1991 by the
late Ellen Nehr. Ellen was a dear friend of mine and others on this
list and she was a pioneer in researching and writing up obscure
writers. They were often stunned when contacted by someone who had
read and enjoyed the novels they had written decades before. She was
also a master at getting other people to research for her as I
discovered when I found myself in the Alexandria Virginia library
consulting city directories for information on Audrey Walz who wrote
several excellent novels under the name of Francis Bonnamy. I even
located her house in Alexandria which served at the crime scene for
her A KING IS DEAD ON QUEEN STREET.
Her followup work to the Doubleday book (which won the Anthony award
at Bouchercon) was a similar volume on the lending library publishers,
such as Phoenix Press, Gateway, Arcadia and others. At her death, her
friend Bill Deeck continued the research until cancer claimed him a
couple of years ago. Thanks to Bill Pronzini and Steve Lewis, MURDER
AT 3 CENTS A DAY Was published for for more information go to
http://www.lendinglibmystery.com/
Richard Moore
--- In rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com, "Jonathan G. Jensen"
<jcentaur@...> wrote:
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> Out from lurking here, wasn't there a Crime Club bunch of books
too?� Seem to remember them from a antique store near Eugene Or.
Passed on them at the time, may still check back someday (probably be
gone I know).� I saw these advertised in a pulp somewhere, anybody see
this?� Jonathan
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> --- On Wed, 10/22/08, Terry Sanford <mbtbone@...> wrote:
> From: Terry Sanford <mbtbone@...>
> Subject: RARA-AVIS: Detective Book Club - Walter J. Black
> To: rara-avis-l@yahoogroups.com
> Date: Wednesday, October 22, 2008, 2:23 PM
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> Black began publishing single, then double and finally,
triple book club volumes in the 1950's. Erle Stanley Gardner was a
mainstay for many years. The bodks also had dust jackets over brown
cloth initially. The series continued well into the 1990's. The "hook"
to get you started with them was five volumes (15 books in all!) for a
buck with no obligation to buy more. If you didn't send that card back
to them, then one was mailed to you every month.There are, of course,
people who collect these. I once saw a complete collection which was
housed in a 20' by 60" room although she did collect other books as
well. I didn't get a number of them since I had no interest in them.
There were a handful of books published by them in this format which
were true first editions, the first published appearance of said book.
I know one of Roy Vicker's novels fell in this category along with a
collection of Matt Taylor's humorous detective stories from Good
> Housekeeping
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> Magazine! Yes the same guy who wrote the tough Neon novels with his
wife in the 1980's.Cheap reads when you can them these days.Terry Sanford
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