A Dell Mystery paperbacks

Remember this post? I never got those paperbacks, even though they were lovely. As I wrote in the post, I'm not paying 50 kr for them. That was thinking they were Agatha Christies though. As you can see, the one on the far left is a John Dickson Carr called Death in Five Boxes. Now that one I saw as a possible it turned out, when I went in yesterday just to browse and saw that they still had two books left. They must have had loads in that I just didn't see at the time, but now there were too, this one and a Mary Roberts Rhinehart. Anyway, I decided that ok, I'll splurge on them. Go to the counter and your man says 175 kr please. What? Oh no, that pencilled "50 kr" on the inside isn't from us. Our price is here (pointing) and our price is 80 for the Dickson Carr and 95 for the Rhinehart (I think it was). Good grief. So I said sorry, I'll have to think about it. In my shock I walked out and realised I should have taken new photos of them, because I missed the backs last time - and the backs, my they're so adorable. They have little drawings of the layout of the murder scene and so on. It's all like a lovely vintage Cluedo game. I image-googled quickly and though you can see a lot of examples of the cover art you can't see any back covers, mores the shame. I'm going to see if I can get a photo today. If it's not the same fella behind the counter.

... Hang on now. While I'm writing I'm googling. They're called "mapbacks" apparently. LMGTFY again ... Oh, now I feel foolish. On Wikipedia no less. They are so pretty ... I'll have to think and google and see of they're worth it.

Dorothy Gilman: Mrs Pollifax on the China Station

I’m not sure why the previous owner (TPO) poked a hole through the cover and first finger-width of pages of my second-hand copy (see picture after the jump). Did he or she feel a burning urge to try to drive a nail through a paperback, but then give up? Was it a tragic accident? Did TPO really hate it? Hate hats?

Ursula K. Leguin: Rocannon's World

This is one of LeGuin's earliest novels, and she places it at the beginning of the Ekumen books, if only for that reason. The Ekumen doesn't exist yet, instead we have a League of Worlds, that isn't as respectful and non-interfering as the Ekumen at all. They have interplanetary wars and everyfink. This is the book I picked up for 20 kr in a second-hand book dealer's in Stockholm, and the fecking thing was falling apart as I was reading. What a waste of money! But speaking of spending money, apparently there's an edition with this book, Planet of Exile and City of Illusions all in one, and that would be quite nice to have. Although, to be honest, I'd have to read the latter two first for free, because maybe (backtracking!) they're not that good and I don't want to own them. Hm, tricky and pondersome.

So first I read the blurb on the back of the book, and my, was it funny. It's so funny I have to quote the whole thing. Ready?

"On the far planet of Fomalhaut II, where three races lived in uneasy peace, the Starlords had landed generations back in their great ships to levy tribute on behalf of the League if All Worlds. Now disaster had struck, and Rocannon, the expedition leader, was marooned on that distant world, eight years away from the nearest planet.

His friends murdered and his spaceship destroyed, Rocannon led the battle to save Fomalhaut II, in strange alliance with the three native races - the cavern-dwelling Gdemiar, the elvish Fiia and the warrior-clan Liuar. And in that desperate battle against an alien foe the myths were born and the legends grew. They were not his people, but the place became Rocannon's World."

Isn't it hilarious? You can almost hear the deep voice intoning it for the sci-fi special on Friday night. This is an interesting mix between science-fiction and fantasy, since the warrior clan are, well, just that, and speak like something from the more high-falutin' pages of Tolkien, all while they hack at people with swords. I'm not sorry I read it, but it's not fantastic. Bits of it are though. Bits are GREAT.

Ngaio Marsh: A Man Lay Dead

This is the infamous paperback I paid 20 kr for in Stockholm. Apparently her first novel, which I didn't realise at the time - I just noticed that I didn't recognise the title so I bought it.
In the early days Alleyn has a journalist sidekick named Nigel Bathgate, who makes his appearance here. Bathgate gets an invitation to a week-end house party through an older cousin. The weekend is going to be spent playing a variation on a murder game - and you guessed it, there's a real murder.
While this has that lovely Marsh touch as far as language goes, and even some of the wry humour, it's still a bit rough. Alleyn is much too quick to feel certain that Bathgate's alibi is solid (based on three cigarette butts in an ashtray - I mean really), and even odder still he takes him completely into his confidence and allows him to join in a spy hunt. That's a bit absurd. But I still enjoyed it well enough.

Library visit today

I've been dipping into my small stash of (second-hand...) books I've bought so it was time for a library trip. Oh, I never wrote about my visit to a second-hand book shop in Stockholm not long ago - they wanted more than 100 :- for old Ellery Queens. The audacity. No wonder they had so many. I found a rather worn Ngaio Marsh novel the title of which I forget at the moment and they charged me 20:- for that.

But today I got:

Paretsky: Ghost Country - I was so pleased with Bleeding Kansas that I wanted to give another stand-alone a try

Ishiguro: Never Let Me Go - because why not, never read him

Proulx: Postcards - want more of her, more more

Hamilton, Jane: A Map of the World - on a whim, fell for the blurb

Le Guin: The Eye of the Heron - because I remain faithful and this might be good.

So I'll be alright for a while.