THE MASTERMIND RECOMMENDS . . .

by Steven Steinbock

A few weeks ago here in the pages of Criminal Brief, I mentioned the Doubleday Crime Club (1928-1991). The word “club” in the name is misleading. The Crime Club was not a Book-of-the-Month type of mail order program, issuing inexpensive editions of bestsellers at a cut price. Rather, it really was, like its British cousin the Collins Crime Club, an imprint that published high quality volumes of the best mystery and detective fiction.

Poet Ogden Nash, who had been doing editorial work at Doubleday since 1925, served as The Crime Club’s editor, reading and selecting books by Anthony Berkeley, Leslie Charteris, Edgar Wallace, Philip MacDonald, and Mignon Eberhart. During 1928, its inaugural year, the Crime Club published around 26 books. These included a “Bulldog Drummond” novel (The Female of the Species) by H. C. McNeile, and Rufus King’s first novel (The Fatal Kiss Mystery).

That year the Crime Club also published several short story collections, including Skin O’ My Tooth by Baroness Orczy, Shanghai Jim by Frank Packard, Hulbert Footner’s The Velvet Hand, and a collection of thirty solve-them-yourself puzzles by John T. Colter entitled The Baffle Book. In 1929, the Crime Club published Edgar Wallace’s short story collection, The Murder Book of J.G. Reeder (original title The Mind of Mr. J.G. Reeder), a Queen’s Quorum selection.

Early in my addiction as a mystery collector, I discovered that many of the authors to whom I was attracted (H.C. Bailey, John Stephen Strange, George Bagby, Patricia McGerr, Darwin Teihlet) were published by Doubleday. They all had the words “The Crime Club” or “A Crime Club Selection” on the cover, along with a strange design that looked like a man falling, or a man with a gun, depending on how you look at it. (I eventually figured out that this clever logo was comprised of the letters C-R-I-M-E. See if you can find them all).

The Doubleday Crime Club volumes are well-made and nice to look at. It’s hard to find the early ones with intact covers. But often the spine art beneath the jacket is nice to look at.

The Crime Club has never let me down. Whenever I’ve wanted to try a new (old) author, The Crime Club provides a ready selection. Clyde Clason and Manning Coles are two discoveries I made through the Club. Clason wrote about an American professor of classics named Theocritus Westborough. The archeological themes running through these books are reminiscent of some of the mysteries of R. Austin Freeman and Agatha Christie. Manning Coles (C.H. Coles and Adelaide Manning) wrote wonderful British spy thrillers featuring language expert Tommy Hambleton. The 1960 Manning Coles volume, Nothing to Declare, is a collection of a dozen short stories.

Lest anyone think that the Crime Club includes only older mysteries, Ian Rankin’s first two novels, Knots and Crosses and Watchman, were first published in the US by the Crime Club. The Crime Club also published Carolyn G. Hart, Margaret Maron, William L. DeAndrea, and Orania Papazoglou (who today writes predominantly as Jane Haddam).

Since we all like short crime fiction here at Criminal Brief, next week I’ll provide you with an annotated list of some anthologies published by the Crime Club. Meanwhile, if anyone would like to add anything about the Collins Crime Club, I’d love to hear it. (Martin Edwards, if you’re reading this, I’m thinking of you. In addition to being an excellent novelist, you’re also a serious collector, and you’re on the correct side of the Atlantic to have the answers).

Until then, keep reading. . .

PS. As I proofread this column, I can see how readers might think the title is pretentious. The Mastermind was the mascot of the Club during it’s first couple of years of operation. More on that next week.