1951 Pocket reissue

one of SMB founder Bill Farley’s Top Five Mysteries of all time. Sir Eustace is a cad of the first water, with a specialty in other men’s wives, and the list of people who might want to do him in could fill a London phone book. But which of them actually sent the chocolates with their nasty hidden payload? Scotland Yard is baffled. Enter the Crime Circle, a group of society intellectuals with a shared conviction in their ability to succeed where the police have failed. Eventually, each member will produce a tightly reasoned solution to the Case of the Poisoned Chocolates, but each of those solutions will identify a different murderer. First published in 1929, this is both a classic of the golden age of mystery fiction, and one of the great puzzle-mysteries of all time.

September 1945 issue ~ cover art by Gloria Stoll

September 1945

cover art by Gloria Stoll

better image than previously posted

~ Dale Clark, “Heir in the Air”, 22nd of 28 with house dick Mike O’Hanna story, at San Alpa Resort hotel, 25th of 32 stories in BM

~ Brett Halliday (pseud. of David Dresser), “Dead Man’s Diary”, 2nd of 2 Mike Shayne stories in BM

~ Julius Long, “Over My Dead Body”, 7th of 17 stories with ’Ben Corbett, D.A.’s chief investigator, 1st -person narrator’, 12th of 23 stories in BM

~ Robert Reeves, “Alcoholics Calamitous”, last of 10 Cellini Smith appearances, last of 12 appearances in BM

©Seattle Mystery Bookshop