
cover art by Andrew Benson

cover art by J.W. Schlaikjer
~ Thomson Burtis, “They Don’t Shake Hands in Arkansas”, ‘Slats Kirke in Detroit’, 4th of 6 appearances in BM
~ Paul Cain, “Velvet”, ‘Kells & Granquist; part 3 of Fast One’, reprinted in The Complete Slayers (2011 Centipede Press), Black Mask: The Complete Stories (2013 Mysterious Press), Lead Party: The Complete Fiction Works of Paul Cain (Steeger, 2024), 4th of 17 stories in BM
~ Carroll John Daly, “The Amateur Murderer”, 45th of 53 with Race Williams, part 3 of 4, published as a novel in 1933, reprinted in If Death is Respectable: The Collected Hard-boiled Stories of Race Williams, v.4 (Altus, 2018), 57th of 71 appearances in BM
~ Norbert Davis, “Reform Racket”, ‘Dan Stiles; one-time gunman’, 1st of 13 stories in BM
~ Erle Stanley Gardner, “Cooking Crooks”, 44th of 73 with Ed Jenkins, ‘with Norma Gay’, 61st of 99 stories in BM
~ Horace McCoy, “The Golden Rule”, 11th of 14 Frost stories ‘Capt. Jerry Frost, Texas (Air) Ranger’, reprinted in Headfirst into Hell: The Complete Black Mask Cases of Jerry Front, Vol. 2 (Steeger, 2025), 13h of 17 stories in BM
~ Henry Wallace Phillips, “A Touch of Nature”, Western mystery, last of 8 with Red Saunders who ‘fights a “wild man in kilts”’, last of 12 stories in BM
©Seattle Mystery Bookshop

cover art by Walter Baumhofer
better image than previously posted
Carroll John Daly, “Red Dynamite” (Vee Brown)
Frederick C. Davis, “The Case of the Corpse’s Bride” (Carter Cole, MD)
T.T. Flynn, “Murder Moon”
Robert Sidney Bowen, “The Other Bullet” (Kip Lacey)
William E. Barrett, “Death on the Double-O” (Blue Barrel)


pseudonym of Lee Roberts
1954 Dodd Mead hardcover, this the later 1955 Bantam paperback
cover art by Mitchell Hooks

movie poster – Wicked – Oct 1931
artist unknown (??orge ??uere = George Bruere?)

Wicked (1931) is an American Pre-Code prison melodrama about a woman who commits murder while trying to save her bandit husband and bears a child in prison

cover art by H.C. Murphy
better image than previously posted
~ Charles G. Booth, “The Malevolent Bequest”, 3rd of 7 stories in BM
~ Marjory Stoneman Douglas, “White Midnight”, 3rd of 4 parts, ‘South Seas setting’, author’s only story in BM
~ Dashiell Hammett, “One Hour”, the Op [8th of 25], reprinted in The Return of the Continental Op (Dell mapback, 1947), reprinted in Nightmare Town (Knopf, 1999), reprinted in The Big Book of the Continental Op (Vintage, 2017), reprinted in Zigzags of Treachery: The Complete Black Mask Cases of the Continental Op, Vol. 1 (Steeger, 2023), 14th of 45 stories in BM
~ Harold Freeman Miners, “Twisted Trails”, ‘Western’, 3rd of 5 stories in BM
~ Frederick Moore, “Jerauld of Beranda Island”, “called ‘A detective story of the sea’”, author’s sole appearance in BM
~ William Rollins, Jr., “The Ring of the Hand of the Dead”, see “Footsteps of the Dead” (May 1934), for sequel, 6th of 23 stories in BM
~ Charles Somerville, “Numbers and Threads”, ‘Detective James McCoy, NYPD’, 27th of 47 articles in the ‘Manhunter’ series, 28th of 49 total articles in BM
~ Merlin Moore Taylor, “Ivywild”, part 2 of 2, ‘family secret in ancient English castle’, 7th of 8 appearances in BM
©Seattle Mystery Bookshop