Showing posts with label Penguin tribands. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Penguin tribands. Show all posts

Saturday, April 25, 2026

Penguin Green Tribands -- BOOK LIST

 


BOOK LIST

Penguin Green Tribands

The 400 vintage Penguin crime books in their ionic green triband covers make up my favorite book collection. 

Back in the darkest days of the pandemic lockdown, when bored out of my socks, I did a little bookish retail therapy. Thanks to eBay and Royal Mail, I found myself the new owner of a job lot of over 400 vintage Penguin mystery books. After arranging and rearranging them all over my living room floor for a few weeks, culling duplicates, and generally playing with them for a while, they had to sit in boxes until I could get shelves built for them. Now they are shelved in the little home office I call my growlery, where I go and growl at the world. The next step is to read them!

Early Penguin paperbacks were issued without illustrations on the cover, just a band of color at the top, the title on an off-white band in the middle, then another band of the same color at the bottom. Hence, "triband" editions. They were color coded. Green was for crime fiction – mysteries, thrillers, and, less commonly, true crime. These early Penguins were not sold in the United States (for copyright reasons I don't understand). You can now find them here used, but not often. Also, Penguin has more recently reissued some books with triband covers, along with triband coffee mugs that match the books. Those are cool in themselves, but not what I collect. I go for the vintage editions.

I don’t have nearly all the original green tribands, but I have about 415 of them, including duplicates. A few are first Penguin editions, most are Penguin reprints, all are pretty tattered. There are plenty of my favorites in the collection, like Agatha Christie, Ngaio Marsh, Raymond Chandler, etc. There are others I know of and haven’t read much of, or at all, like Margery Allingham and Simenon. And there are plenty that are brand new to me.

To inspire me to read all of my green tribands, and to keep track as I go, I decided to list them all here. Repeating author names every time seems crazy, so I only listed the name for the first book by the author and put that one in bold. I also tried to list them in publication order for each author, although some authors were so prolific they published more than one book in the same year. I haven't dived deep enough to know the exact date of publication, so if you see more than one book in the same year, I don't know which came first.

All these are on my shelves and most are still TBR for me. I've noted if I've read a book, even if I read it in a different edition. I also noted if the audiobook is available. If so, I may read it with my ears and save the triband further tattering. 

When possible, I've linked to the title (not usually the same Penguin edition) so you can read more about the book. A surprising number are available in a new edition or vintage copy, but several are out of print and hard to find. Some are available online but with no description of the story. I left out those links. Sometimes I had to link to the book under an alternate title. 

The Crime at Black Dudley (1929) by Margery Allingham

Mystery Mile (1930) ON LIBBY 

Look to the Lady (1931)

Police at the Funeral (1931)

Sweet Danger (1933)

Death of a Ghost (1934)

Flowers for the Judge (1936)

The Case of the Late Pig (1937)

Dancers in Mourning (1937)

The Fashion in Shrouds (1938) ON LIBBY

Mr. Campion & Others (short stories) (1939)

Traitor's Purse (1940)

Black Plumes (1940) ON LIBBY

Coroner's Pidgin (1945)

More Work for the Undertaker (1948)

Take Two at Bedtime (1949)

The Tiger in the Smoke (1952)

No Love Lost (short stories) (1954)

The Beckoning Lady (1955)

Hide My Eyes (1958)

Uncommon Danger (1937) by Eric Ambler

Cause for Alarm (1938)

Aphrodite Means Death (1951) by John Appleby

Ten Minute Alibi (1934) by Anthony Armstrong and Herbert Shaw

Mischief (1950) by Charlotte Armstrong

The Suva Harbour Mystery (Who Killed Netta Maul?) (1948) by Frank Arthur

Red is for Killing (1941) by George Bagby

Mr. Fortune, Please (1927) by H.C. Bailey

The Best We Can Do (1958) by Sybille Bedford

The Port of London Murders (1938) by Josephine Bell

Trent's Last Case (1913) by E.C. Bentley ON LIBBY


Trent's Own Case (1936)

Trent Intervenes (1938)

The Tongue-Tied Canary (1948) by Nicolas Bentley

The Floating Dutchman (1950)

Mr. Priestley's Problem (1927) by Anthony Berkeley

The Piccadilly Murder (1929)

Jumping Jenny (1933)

Trial and Error (1937)

Not to be Taken (1938)

My Name is Michael Sibley (1952) by John Bingham

Five Roundabouts to Heaven (1953)

A Scent of New-Mown Hay (1958) by John Blackburn

A Question of Proof (1935) by Nicholas Blake


The Case of the Abominable Snowman (1941)

See You at the Morgue (1941) by Lawrence Goldtree Blochman

Dead Lion (1949) by John Bonett

Dead Reckoning (1943) by Francis Bonnamy

A Rope of Sand (1944)

The King is Dead on Queen Street (1945)

A Bullet in the Ballet (1937) by Caryl Brahms

The Wooden Overcoat (1951) by Pamela Branch

Heads You Lose (1941) by Christianna Brand


Suddenly at His Residence (1946)

London Particular (1952)

Tour de Force (1955)

Case for Sergeant Beef (1947) by Leo Bruce

Three Bad Nights (1956) by Bruce Buckingham

The Case of the Second Chance (1938) by Christopher Bush

The Postman Always Rings Twice (1934) by James M. Cain FINISHED

Spider Web (1938) by Alice Campbell

Murder Included (1950) by Joanna Cannan

It Walks by Night (1930) by John Dickson Carr


The Waxworks Murder (1932)

Poison in Jest (1932)

Hag's Nook (1933)

The Mad Hatter Mystery (1933)

The Blind Barber (1934)

Death Watch (1935)

The Hollow Man (1935)

The Case of the Constant Suicides (1941)

The Emperor's Snuff-Box (1942)

Till Death do Us Part (1944)

He Who Whispers (1946)

Below Suspicion (1946)

Captain Cut-Throat (1955)

Patrick Butler for the Defense (1956)

Murder by Burial (1938) by Stanley Casson

The Big Sleep (1939) by Raymond Chandler 
FINISHED

Trouble is My Business (1939)

Farewell, My Lovely (1940) FINISHED

The High Window (1942) FINISHED

The Lady in the Lake (1943) FINISHED

The Little Sister (1949)

The Long Good-Bye (1953) FINISHED

Playback (1958)

The Innocence of Father Brown (1911) by G.K. Chesterton FINISHED

The Incredulity of Father Brown (1926) FINISHED

Poison Ivy (1937) by Peter Chaney

Can Ladies Kill? (1938)

The Urgent Hangman (1938)

Dark Duet (1942)

The Riddle in the Sands (1903) by Erskine Childers ON LIBBY

The Mysterious Affair at Styles (1920) by Agatha Christie 
FINISHED

The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (1926) FINISHED

The Big Four (1927) FINISHED

The Mystery of the Blue Train (1928) FINISHED

Miss Marple and The Thirteen Problems (1928) FINISHED

The Seven Dials Mystery (1929) FINISHED

The Murder at the Vicarage (1930) FINISHED

Peril at End House (1931) FINISHED

The Sittaford Mystery (1931) FINISHED

Murder on the Orient Express (1933) FINISHED

Lord Edgware Dies (1933)

The Mysterious Mr. Quin (1933)

Parker Pyne Investigates (1934)

Murder in Mesopotamia (1935)

The ABC Murders (1936) FINISHED

Death on the Nile (1937)

Murder in the Mews (1937)

Ten Little N_______ (1939)

Murder Is Easy (1939)

The Labours of Hercules (1939)

The Body in the Library (1942) FINISHED

The Moving Finger (1942)

Death Comes as the End (1945)

Crooked House (1949) FINISHED

The Deadly Reaper (1956) by Clark Smith

Appointment in New Orleans (1950) by Tod Claymore

Reunion in Florida (1952)

Public Enemy (1953) by Hugh Clevely

The Death of a Millionaire (1925) by G.D.H. Cole and Margaret Cole

The Moonstone (1868) by Wilkie Collins 
FINISHED

The Dangerfield Talisman (1926) by J.J. Connington

Death at Swaythling Court (1926)

The Case with Nine Solutions (1928)

The Golden Box (1942) by Frances Crane

The Moving Toyshop (1946) by Edmund Crispin

Swan Song (1947)

Buried for Pleasure (1948)

Love Lies Bleeding (1948)

The Long Divorce (1951)

The Cask (1920) by Freeman Wills Crofts

The Pit-Prop Syndicate (1922)

The Groote Park Murder (1923)

Inspector French’s Greatest Case (1924)

The Cheyne Mystery (1926)

Inspector French and the Starvel Tragedy (1927)

The Sea Mystery (1928)

Sir John Magill’s Last Journey (1930)

Mystery in the Channel (1931)

The 12.30 from Croydon (1934)

Crime at Guildford (1935)

The Loss of the Jane Vosper (1936)

Fatal Venture (1939)

Golden Ashes (1940)

Post Mortem (1953) by Guy Cullingford

Conjurer’s Coffin (1954)

Framed for Hanging (1956)

Dead March in Three Keys (1940) by Peter Curtis (Norah Lofts)

The House without a Door (1942) by Elizabeth Daly


Evidence of Things Seen (1943)

The White Priory Murders (1934) by Carter Dickson (John Dickson Carr)

The Plague Court Murders (1934)

The Red Widow Murders (1935)

The Ten Teacups (1937)

The Judas Window (1938)

The Reader is Warned (1939)

And So to Murder (1940)

She Died a Lady (1943)

He Wouldn't Kill Patience (1944)

Shear the Black Sheep (1942) by David Dodge

Bullets for the Bridegroom (1944)

The Long Escape (1948)

The Lights of Skaro (1954)

To Catch A Thief (1952)

The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes (1894) by Arthur Conan Doyle FINISHED
 
The Hound of the Baskervilles (1902) FINISHED

The Case-Book of Sherlock Holmes (1921) FINISHED

The White Cockatoo (1933) by M.G. Eberhart

The Cases of Susan Dare (1934)

Speak No Evil (1941)

Darling Clementine (1955) by Dorothy Eden

The Horizontal Man (1946) by Helen Eustis

The Missing Link (1952) by Katharine Farrer

The Cretan Counterfeit (1954)

The Big Clock (1946) by Kenneth Fearing

Stealthy Terror (1918) by John Ferguson

The Man in the Dark (1928)

Death Comes to Perigord (1931)

Night in Glengyle (1933)

Remove the Bodies (1941) by Elizabeth Ferrars

Don't Monkey with Murder (1942)

Murder in Time (1953)

The Bandaged Nude (1950) by Robert Finnegan

Death and Mary Dazill (1941) by Mary Fitt

Requiem for Robert (1942)

Death and the Pleasant Voices (1946)

Payment Deferred (1926) by C.S. Forester

Plain Murder (1930)

Rex v. Anne Bickerton (1930) by Sydney Fowler

Reunion with Murder (1941) by Tomothy Fuller

The Widow LeRouge (1866) by Emile Gaboriau


The Mystery of Orcival (1867)

Murder on Leave (1946) by G.V. Galwey

The Lift and the Drop (1951)

The Case of the Howling Dog (1934) by Erle Stanley Gardner

The Case of the Sleepwalkers Niece (1936)

The Case of the Stuttering Bishop (1936)

The Case of the Lame Canary (1937)

The Case of the Shoplifter's Shoe (1938)

The D.A. Holds a Candle (1938)

The Case of the Substitute Face (1938)

The Case of the Rolling Bones (1939)

The Case of The Perjured Parrot (1939)

The D.A. Draws a Circle (1939)

The Case of the Baited Hook (1940)

The Case of the Haunted Husband (1941)

The Case of the Careless Kitten (1942)

The Case of The Drowsy Mosquito (1943)

The Case of the Buried Clock (1943)

The Case of the Crooked Candle (1944)

The DA Calls A Turn (1944)

The Case of the Golddigger's Purse (1945)

The Case of the Half-Wakened Wife (1945)

The Case of the Borrowed Brunette (1946)

The Velvet Well (1946) by John Gearon

The Black Stage (1945) by Anthony Gilbert

Documents Marked "Secret" (1945) by John Gloag

The Leavenworth Case (1878) by Anna Katharine Green 
ON LIBBY

Reputation for a Song (1952) by Edward Grierson

The Thin Man (1934) by Dashiell Hammett FINISHED

Lady Killer (1957) by William Hardy

Tenant for Death (1937) by Cyril Hare


Death is No Sportsman (1938)

Suicide Excepted (1939)

Tragedy at Law (1942)

With a Bare Bodkin (1946)

An English Murder (1951)

That Yew Tree's Shade (1954)

He Should Have Died Hereafter (1957)

Cork on the Water (1951) by MacDonald Hastings

Cork in Bottle (1953)

Cork and the Serpent (1955)

Cork in the Doghouse (1957)

A Taste For Honey (1941) by Gerald Heard (H.F. Heard)

Fugitive from Murder (1940) by M.V. Heberden

Death in the Stocks (1935) by Georgette Heyer

Famous Trials III (1950) by James H. Hodge, Ed.


Famous Trials 4 (1954)

Night Has a Thousand Eyes (1945) by George Hopley

Raffles (1899) by E.W. Hornung ON LIBBY

Mr. Justice Raffles (1909)

Rogue Male (1939) by Geoffrey Household

The Murder of My Aunt (1936) by Richard Hull


The Ghost It Was (1936)

Excellent Intentions (1938)

Murder on Safari (1938) by Elspeth Huxley

Death at the President’s Lodging (1936) by Michael Innes


Hamlet, Revenge! (1937)

Stop Press (1939)

There Came Both Mist and Snow (1940)

The Secret Vanguard (1941)

Appleby on Ararat (1941)

The Weight of the Evidence (1943)

The Journeying Boy (1949)

A Private View (1952)

Man From the Sea (1955)

Old Hall, New Hall (1956)

Appleby Plays Chicken (1956)

A Pin to See the Peepshow (1934) by F. Tennyson Jesse

Death Takes Small Bites (1948) by George H. Johnston

Prelude to a Certain Midnight (1947) by Gerald Kersh

Carteret's Cure (1926) by Richard Keverne

William Cook Antique Dealer (1928)

The Sanfield Scandal (1929)

The Fleet Hall Inheritance (1931)

Missing From His Home (1932)

At the Blue Gates (1932)

He Laughed at Murder (1935)

The Three Taps (1927) by Ronald Knox

Murder on My Street (1958) by Edwin Lanham

Blood upon the Snow (1944) by Hilda Lawrence


Death of a Doll (1947)

Duet of Death (1949)

Uncle Silas (1864) by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

A Kiss Before Dying (1953) by Ira Levin ON LIBBY

The Kiss of Death (1947) by Eleazar Lipsky

The Rasp (1924) by Philip MacDonald


X v. Rex (1933)

The Bad Seed (1954) by William March ON LIBBY

Famous Trials of Marshall Hall (1950) by Edward Marjoribanks, Ed.

A Man Lay Dead (1934) by Ngaio Marsh 
FINISHED

Enter a Murderer (1935)

The Nursing Home Murder (1935)

Death in Ecstasy (1936)

Vintage Murder (1937)

Death in a White Tie (1938) FINISHED

Artists in Crime (1938) FINISHED

Overture to Death (1939) FINISHED

Surfeit of Lampreys (1940)

Death at the Bar (1940) FINISHED

Death and the Dancing Footman (1941)

The House of the Arrow (1924) by A.E.W. Mason

An Oxford Tragedy (1933) by J.C. Masterman


The Case of the Four Friends (1956)

He Never Came Back (1954) by Helen McCloy

Deadly Weapon (1946) by Wade Miller

The Red House Mystery (1922) by A.A. Milne ON LIBBY

The Mystery of a Butcher's Shop (1929) by Gladys Mitchell

The Longer Bodies (1930)

Death at the Opera (1934)

Come Away, Death (1937)

Laurels are Poison (1942)

Tom Brown's Body (1949)

Faintley Speaking (1954)

Watson's Choice (1955)

Twelve Horses and the Hangman's Noose (1956)

The Twenty-Third Man (1957)

Spotted Hemlock (1958)

The King and the Corpse (1948) by Max Murray

The Right Honourable Corpse (1952)

The Doctor and the Corpse (1953)

Royal Bed for a Corpse (1955)

The Rod of Anger (1953) by Derrick Nabarro

The Nightwalkers (1947) by James Norman

The Mysterious Mickey Finn (1939) by Elliot Paul

Verdict of Twelve (1940) by Raymond Postgate


The Ledger is Kept (1953)

The Diehard (1956) by Jean Potts

Information Received (1933) by E.R. Punshon

Crossword Mystery (1934)

Mystery Villa (1934)

The Roman Hat Mystery (1929) by Ellery Queen ON LIBBY

The French Powder Mystery (1930) ON LIBBY

The Dutch Shoe Mystery (1931) ON LIBBY

The Greek Coffin Mystery (1932) ON LIBBY

The Siamese Twin Mystery (1933) ON LIBBY

The American Gun Mystery (1933) ON LIBBY

The Chinese Orange Mystery (1934) ON LIBBY

The Spanish Cape Mystery (1935) ON LIBBY

The Door Between (1937) ON LIBBY

The Four of Hearts (1938) ON LIBBY

The King is Dead (1952) ON LIBBY

Puzzle for Fiends (1946) by Patrick Quentin

The Follower (1950)

The Man in the Net (1956)

The Cambridge Murders (1945) by Dilwyn Rees (Glyn Daniel)

The House on Tollard Ridge (1929) by John Rhode

Trial by Fury (1941) by Craig Rice

The Circular Staircase (1908) by Mary Roberts Rinehart


The Yellow Room (1945)

The Mystery of Dr. Fu-Manchu (1913) by Sax Rohmer

The Content Assignment (1954) by Holly Roth


The Sleeper (1955)

The Mask of Glass (1955)

Shadow of a Lady (1957)

Telling of Murder (1952) by Douglas Rutherford

Comes the Blind Fury (1953)

Night of the Horns (1961) by Douglas Sanderson

The Unpleasantness at the Bellona Club (1928) by Dorothy L. Sayers FINISHED

Documents in the Case (1930) 

A Crime in Holland and A Face for a Clue (1931) by Simenon

A Battle of Nerves and At the 'Gai-Moulin' (1931)

The Man from Everywhere and Newhaven-Dieppe (1931/1934)

In Two Latitudes (1932)

Maigret and the Burglar's Wife (1934)

The Murderer (1937)

Poisoned Relations (1938)

Havoc by Accident (1943)

Escape in Vain (1943)

To Any Lengths (1944)

On the Danger Line (1944)

Lost Moorings (1946)

The Hatter's Ghosts (1947)

Maigret's First Case (1949)

My Friend Maigret (1949)

Maigret in Montmartre (1951)

Maigret's Revolver (1952)

Maigret Sits it Out (1952)

Maigret's Mistake (1953)

The Speaking Eye (1955) by Clark Smith

Not Wanted on Voyage (1951)

The Evil of the Day (1955) by Thomas Sterling

Fer-de-Lance (1934) by Rex Stout FINISHED

The League of Frightened Men (1935) FINISHED

Red Threads (1939)

The Short Weekend (1953) by T.S. Strachan

The Missing Moneylender (1931) by W. Stanley Sykes

The Immaterial Murder Case (1945) by Julian Symons

The Man With My Face (1948) by Samuel W. Taylor

The Franchise Affair (1948) by Josephine Tey ON LIBBY


The Daughter of Time (1951) FINISHED

Docken Dead (1953) by John Trench

Dishonoured Bones (1954)

Man of Two Tribes (1956) by Arthur W. Upfield

The Battling Prophet (1956)

Department of Dead Ends (1949) by Roy Vickers

Murdering Mr. Velfrage (1950)

Don Among the Dead Men (1952) by C.E. Vulliamy

The Verdict of You All (1926) by Henry Wade

Policeman's Lot (1933)

Here Comes the Copper (1938)

Diamonds For Moscow (1953) by David Walker

The Four Just Men (1905) by Edgar Wallace

The Doors of Sleep (1955) by Thurman Warriner

The Invisible Man (1897) by H.G. Wells 
ON LIBBY

The Watersplash (1953) by Patricia Wentworth

The Wheel Spins (1933) by Ethel Lina White

Many Dimensions (1930) by Charles Williams





Wednesday, December 10, 2025

Red & Green Books to Put You in the Holiday Spirit -- BOOK THOUGHTS


BOOK THOUGHTS

Red & Green Books to Put You in the Holiday Spirit


Here’s a red and green stack of Christmassy (or at least wintery) books for a little festive fun.

I'm in a festive mood because I finished my last trial yesterday. The last one! I've practiced law for over 33 years, the last 18 spent working with adult survivors of childhood sexual abuse. My work was rewarding and I love the clients I've helped over the years. But I now have one foot and the toes of the other over the line to retirement. There’s still a fair bit of administrative wind up for my last cases, but (knock wood) I won’t have to go to court again. I loved my lawyer career, but I’m ready to spend time with my retired lawyer husband.

Now I plan to spend more time playing with my books, like this, and reading them. See any books here you’d read or have? I started A Christmas Treasury and am enjoying it tremendously. Just what I needed tto transition from work-mode to holiday-mode. 

Blood Upon the Snow (1944) by Hilda Lawrence

The Case of the Abominable Snowman (1941) by Nicholas Blake

A Holiday for Murder (1938) by Agatha Christie

The Gilded Man (1942) by Carter Dickson

Singin’ and Swingin’ and Gettin’ Merry Like Christmas (1976) by Maya Angelou

Christmas Stories by Charles Dickens

Elizabeth David’s Christmas (2003 compilation) by Elizabeth David

The Drunken Botanist (2013) by Amy Stewart

Evergreen (2023) by Lydia Millen

A Christmas Treasury of Yuletide Stories & Poems (1994), edited by James Charlton and Barbara Gilson

Snow White and Other Grimms' Fairy Tales (2022 MinaLima Edition) by The Brothers Grimm

The St. Nicholas Anthology (1952) edited by Henry Steele Commager

The German Christmas Cookbook (2023) by Jürgen Krauss

Downton Abbey Christmas Cookbook (2020) by Regula Ysewijn

Alpine Style: Bringing Mountain Magic Home (2024) by Kathryn O’Shea-Evans









Wednesday, April 9, 2025

49 Penguins -- BOOK THOUGHTS

 BOOK THOUGHTS

49 Penguins

Wowza! Nothing could make this bookworm’s heart pitter patter like the direct message I got last week from the Book Corner, the Beaverton Library's friends shop:
“Hi Gilion! We recently got these in and I know you are a vintage Penguin lover, so wanted to send you this in case you haven’t been in recently ☺️”
Um, yes! 

Here's the picture that accompanied this tantalizing message:


Needless to say, I raced over the very next day. They had kindly boxed them all up for me to go through. Several of the green tribands were duplicates of books I already have. (See here for more on my obsession with collecting green Penguin tribands, the "crime fiction" series.)  There were a few orange ones I either already have or really wasn't interested in, so I also set those aside. There was a nice young kid shopping for books who immediately snapped up Madame Bovary

All in all, I found 49 I didn’t have and wanted to add to my collection. Forty-nine! I can't believe it. 

Penguin Random House is now one of the "Big Five" mega-publishers. But Penguin Books started in 1935, in London, as a publisher of cheap, mass market paperbacks. They were usually reprints of earlier-published books. For reasons I don't remember, or never knew, most of the Penguin paperbacks from the 1930s and 1940s were not available in the US. As a result, these now-vintage books are hard to find over here. 

The earlier books had the now-iconic covers with a color band at the top and bottom and a white band in the middle with the title and author's name, no illustration. Contemporary readers may be more familiar with the coffee mugs with these color stripes than the original books. These covers became known as "tribands" for the three bands. Green was for mysteries, thrillers, espionage books, and true crime, collectively referred to as crime fiction. Orange was for general fiction, red for drama, pink for travel and adventure, blue for biographies, purple for essays, grey for current events, and yellow for miscellaneous. The standard triband was supplemented in 1949 by "vertical tribands" with the color strips on the left and right and the title, author's name, and illustration on the middle white strip. These are not as iconic, but are easier to find, so I have many of those. 

I kickstarted my collection of vintage Penguins during the pandemic lockdown when I (like so many others) sought retail therapy. I found a job lot of 425 green tribands for sale, bought them, and had them shipped over from England. I had to build new shelves in my home office to hold them all. I have only barely begun to read them. Since then, I buy the old ones when I find them, which isn't often. I have very few of the original tribands -- a handful of orange ones, a few red, one pink, and one yellow. I have never even seen a purple or grey one. I have quite a few of the orange vertical tribands. I like them because they have illustrations on the covers. Most of the illustrations are black and white line drawings, but some are color drawings. 

As the years went on, Penguin changed its cover designs and added other series. The original Penguin Classics was a big series that has continued, with different covers, until today. I have a few of those, but that's a whole different obsession. There are others, like "Marber Grid" covers originally designed by Polish emigré Romek Marber, which Penguin started using in 1961. Graham Greene books with covers illustrated by Paul Hogarth and P.G. Wodehouse book with covers illustrated by "Iconicus" are examples of smaller rabbit holes Penguin collectors can go down. 

I spend a lot of time playing with my Penguin collection. I should spend as much time reading the books as collecting and reading about them. 

I'll post more about my 49 new-to-me vintage Penguins in the next weeks. Check back! 




Thursday, March 20, 2025

Margery Allingham -- FAVORITE AUTHOR, BOOK LIST


FAVORITE AUTHOR, BOOK LIST

Margery Allingham

Marjory Allingham was one of the four Queens of Crime from the Golden Age of mystery fiction, reigning alongside Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, and Ngaio Marsh. Born in 1904, Allingham wrote dozens of mysteries and other books before her death in 1966. Her most famous body of work is a series featuring Albert Campion, gentleman sleuth.

ALBERT CAMPION BOOKS IN ORDER

  • The Casebook of Mr. Campion (1947) (short stories; I can't find on line)


Allingham's husband, Philip Youngman Carter, finished her last Campion novel, Cargo of Eagles, after her death. He went on to write three more Campion novels under his own name. The last of these was completed after Carter's death by Mike Ripley, who continued the series under his own name. 

Allingham also wrote plays for stage and radio, nonfiction, mysteries without Campion, and other fiction. The mystery and fiction books are:

My goal is to read all of the Albert Campion novels and short stories. I'm not going to try to read all of her books, although I will read the non-Campion short stories included in the collections I read and the two non-Campion books I already own. 

NOTES

Created on March 19, 2025. 

The e-book editions are available and are usually not very expensive.

Most of the Allingham books I have are part of my collection of vintage, green triband, Penguin Books. I plan to read all my Penguin books and hers come first alphabetically. A good place to start!







Wednesday, February 12, 2025

Wintery Books -- BOOK THOUGHTS


 BOOK THOUGHTS

Wintery Books

Snow is coming!

It is supposed to snow here in Portland this week, although I've been fooled already this winter. If it does snow, it will be a big deal for us. As cold, wet, and gray as Portland winters are, we can go whole seasons without a snowflake. When we do get snow, three to four inches can shut down the city. Yes, much of the shutdown is because we aren’t equipped to deal with it. But I grew up in the Midwest and the snow we get here is not like Midwest snow. 

Here, the snow usually comes when it has been raining and then the temperature drops. So first the wet streets freeze, then we get an inch or so of snow on top of that ice. That's bad enough. But then it thaws just enough to make the snow wet before it freezes again. That's when we get the ice/snow/ice sandwich. It's incredibly slippery and this is a hilly city. Forget winter tires or four wheel drive. It's just ice and it’s treacherous. 

Personally, I love a good snow day (or even a snow week). I have no place to go and no kids to entertain, so as long as the pantry is stocked (and the liquor cabinet), I’m happy to curl up with a good book and wait for everything to melt.

The forecast will most likely change and we will get more rain, not snow. But just in case, I made a stack of wintery books. See any here you’d read while the snow’s coming down?


Just seeing these gathered together make be want to put on a wooly sweater, curl up in front of the fireplace with a warm beverage, and get to reading!

What winter mix of books can you find on your shelves?


Saturday, February 1, 2025

My Goal to Read 425 Vintage Penguin Green Tribands -- BOOK THOUGHTS


BOOK THOUGHTS
My Goal to Read 425 Vintage Penguin Green Tribands

I wonder how many bookish goals we set with no intention of actually following through? One of my book goals -- more of a book fantasy -- is to read straight through my collection of vintage mysteries in Penguin green triband editions. 

For context, early Penguin paperbacks were issued without illustrations on the cover, just a band of color at the top, the title on an off-white band in the middle, then another band of the same color at the bottom. Hence, "triband" editions. They were color coded. Orange is the most common because it was used for general fiction. Green was for crime fiction -- mysteries, thrillers, and, less commonly, true crime. These early Penguins were not sold in the United States (for copyright reasons I don't understand). You can now find them here used, but not often. 

(Also, Penguin has, more recently, reissued some books with triband covers, along with triband coffee mugs that match the books. Those are cool in themselves, but not what I collect. I go for the vintage editions.)

I don’t have nearly all the original green tribands, but I have 425 of them. Almost all of mine (421) came in one job lot that I bought on eBay from a seller in England. A few are first Penguin editions, most are Penguin reprints, all are pretty tattered. It was during the covid lockdown and, like others, I did some retail therapy when I was cooped up at home and couldn't go anywhere. I had a set of shelves built in my little home office just for my collection of vintage Penguin paperbacks.  

But that was almost five years ago and I have only read a handful of them since I got them. This is why I fantasize about reading straight through the entire collection. I figure I could read them all in about two years if I really made an effort. But as much as I love vintage mysteries, I think doing so might have a deleterious effect on my brain chemistry. I’d see clues everywhere, always suspect foul play, and never be able to attend a dinner party without denouncing a guest as a murderer.

So I think the better plan would be to read them steadily, but salted in among other books. I just need to get going! The picture above shows a random selection of ten that should inspire me to get reading. 

Coroner’s Pidgin by Margery Allingham

Hag’s Nook by John Dickson Carr

Death on the Nile by Agatha Christie

Mystery in the Channel by Freeman Wills Crofts

Stealthy Terror by John Ferguson

That Yew Tree’s Shade by Cyril Hare

He Laughed at Murder by Richard Keverne

The Twenty-Third Man by Gladys Mitchell

The American Gun Mystery by Ellery Queen

The Mystery of Dr. Fu-Manchu by Sax Rohmer

The Hatter’s Ghost by Simenon

The Department of Dead Ends by Roy Vickers

See any you’ve read or would like to?






Thursday, August 3, 2023

He Laughed at Murder by Richard Keverne -- BOOK BEGINNINGS

BOOK BEGINNINGS ON FRIDAYS

I don't usually show my face on the blog, but I was having fun organizing my vintage Penguins and snapped this picture. 

During the 2020 lockdown, I did a little retail therapy in lieu of a vacation and bought a job lot of over 400 vintage green tribands. Early Penguin books were published in "triband" editions, with a color stripe, white stripe, color stripe. Different colors were used for different sorts of books. The Penguin orange tribands were general fiction and literature, for example. Green tribands were mystery and crime. 

Shortly after I got the set, I started a trial (by zoom because it was lockdown) that lasted for six weeks. I put the tribands in boxes to await new bookshelves. I got the bookshelves last year, but by that time had forgotten that I had not entered all the books into my master LibaryThing spreadsheet. I only recently remembered and started entering them. It takes a long time because the books don't have bar codes or ISBN numbers. Here's the stack I entered today. 

MY BOOK BEGINNING

Ahead of him the Great East Road stretched away into a misty distance, a broad, black ribbon shining in the winter sun.

-- from He Laughed at Murder by Richard Keverne. 

I grabbed this one because it was o the top of the stack. Richard Keverne is unknown today -- there isn't even the shortest Wikipedia article about him -- and his books are out of print. But he must have been popular back in the 1930 - 1950 period when he wrote mysteries because my copies of his books are all reprints. 

Most of the green tribands in my collection are by authors still read today, like Agatha Christie, Margery Allingham, Ngaio Marsh. I love those, of course, but I am also fascinated by the random books by authors who have disappeared from popular culture.


 YOUR BOOK BEGINNINGS

Please leave the link to your Book Beginnings post in the box below. If you share on social media, please use the hashtag #bookbeginnings.  

Mister Linky's Magical Widgets -- Thumb-Linky widget will appear right here!
This preview will disappear when the widget is displayed on your site.
If this widget does not appear, click here to display it.


THE FRIDAY 56

Freda at Freda's Voice hosts another teaser event on Fridays. Participants share a two-sentence teaser from page 56 of the book they are reading -- or from 56% of the way through the audiobook or ebook. Please visit Freda's Voice for details and to leave a link to your post.

MY FRIDAY 56

From He Laughed at Murder:

Men were absurdly stupid when women flattered them so brazenly. And Michael was more stupid than she had expected.

From these snippets, I am curious about this book. Would you read it?


Monday, April 17, 2023

New to Me Books from Arches Bookhouse -- MAILBOX MONDAY


MAILBOX MONDAY

I took a quick break between filing legal briefs last week to pop in to Arches Bookhouse. Arches is one of my favorite bookstores in the world and it just happens to be here in Portland! 

When I got there, my bookstore buddy Adam was cataloging new inventory for his website. The shop is packed (and stacked) with “good books” – mostly literature and “scholarly humanities books.”  The website is where to look for antiquarian, rare, and collectible books, like the 18th Century German theology book Adam had just added. Check out archesbookhouse.com if that’s your sort of thing.

For me, I’m happy to take my theology books in a more accessible form, like G.K. Chesterton’s Orthodoxy. I was looking for a book to fit the 1900-1910 decade in my nonfiction "10 Books, 10 Decades" challenge and this one is perfect. 

I’m excited about the others too:

  • The Plumed Serpent by D. H. Lawrence, because every used book shopping spree turns up a D. H. Lawrence book I've never heard of. It's some rule of the book cosmos. 
  • Clochemerle by Gabriel Chevallier is a French novel I’ve never heard of but sounds fun. There is also a movie apparently.
  • Shakespeare’s Henry IV, Part One, on the other hand, I was excited to find because I picked up a copy of Part Two a couple of weeks back, also in a Signet Classics edition. Now I have a matching pair.  My collection of "Shakespeare in vintage white paperbacks" is coming together! My plan is to gather them all and then read them straight through. 
  • The three Graham Green books all have covers by Paul Hogarth, which is what caught my eye. The Lawless Roads is a nonfiction book about his travels through Mexico in the 1930s when the state had destroyed or closed so many Catholic churches. The Man Within was his debut novel. The Ministry of Fear is one of his dark comedies.
  • Main-Travelled Roads by Hamlin Garland I bought on a whim because I liked the Signet Classics cover. It is a collection of short stories about Midwest farm families, published in 1922. 


None of these are top hits, they are definitely B-sides. See any you’ve read? Which would you start with? 


YOUR MAILBOX MONDAY BOOKS

What books came into your house recently?

Join other book lovers on Mailbox Monday to share the books that came into your house lately. Visit the Mailbox Monday website to find links to all the participants' posts. You can also find the hosts' favorites at posts titled Books that Caught Our Eye.

Serena of Savvy Verse & Wit, Martha of Reviews by Martha's Bookshelf, and Emma of Words and Peace graciously host Mailbox Monday.

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...