I was bookhunting recently with the Mom unit when we came across some neat vintage mysteries.  These were editions I hadn’t seen before.  (Mom, of course, had, being an avid mystery reader, especially of anything written before 1950.) Seems the idea of a subscription book “club” is not a very recent idea after all – Doubleday had their own version for over 60 years, starting back in the 1920s.  I just hadn’t run across them before.

So I did a little research: Daniel Longwell, a man who worked his way up through the ranks of Doubleday, Doran from night clerk at the Doubleday store to advertising manager, came up with the idea of Doubleday’s Crime Club after visiting England back in the 1920s. Across the pond, the top mystery fiction writers were members of The Detection Club where only the best stories were published, and Longwell realized that America needed something similar to help increase US mystery novel sales.

Edgar Wallace

Edgar Wallace, probably best known for his part in making KING KONG a household name, had written tons of popular books in England, but they were relatively unknown in the US.  Longwell got the bright idea that Wallace’s writing would be perfect for jumpstarting a “book of the month” type sales format, offering 1 Wallace title per month for 12 months.  Already a bestselling author, Wallace’s book sales jumped up to over 5 million in 1928 with the help of the Crime Club title sales.

In 1928, a Crime Club Jury was used to decide what books to present to the public. Members of the Jury included Ogden Nash, Grant Overton, John G. Kidd, Frances Noyes Hart, Arthur T. Vance and William Rose Benet.  The first book published specifically for the Crime Club was THE DESERT MOON MYSTERY by Kay Cleaver Strahan.  According to the blurb, it was about “Three murders and a suicide-one of a lovely girl with a secret. No clues, yet clues everywhere. Days and nights of suspense, danger, suspicion…”  It was supposed to have a “secret ending”, one which Crime Club members were not to divulge.

Novels were offered to club members 10 days before they were made available to the public and were issued in uniform black cloth editions, featuring red lettering and bright red endpapers, along with a Crime Club gunman in white logo and had priced dust jackets, designed by artists, including works by Boris Artzybasheff, one of their most prolific illustrators whose work is still very highly collectible.  The books would be subscribed to like a magazine, then shipped to the local bookstore who would then make sure the customer received the book ahead of the trade edition release.

That first year saw the publication of another 25 book club offerings besides THE DESERT MOON MYSTERY:

THE SILK STOCKING MURDERS – Anthony Berkeley
HOUSE OF TWO GREEN EYES – Stephen Chalmers
JUGGERNAUT – Alice Campbell
THAT GAY NINETIES MURDER – Foxhall Daingerfield
THE BLACK HOUSE ON HARLEY STREET – J. S. (John Smith) Fletcher
THE VELVET HAND: NEW MADAME STOREY MYSTERIES – Hulbert Footner
IN SEARCH OF A VILLIAN – Robert Gore-Browne
THE BELLAMY TRIAL – Frances Noyes Hart
THE BLACK HEART – Sydney Horler
THE FATAL KISS MYSTERY – Rufus King
THE PRISONER IN THE OPAL – A.E.W. (Alfred Edware Woodley) Mason
THE FEMALE OF THE SPECIES – H.C. (Herman Cyril) McNeile
SKIN O’ MY TOOTH (Short Stories) – Baroness Orczy
SHANGHAI JIM (Novelettes) – Frank L. Packard
TIGER CLAWS – Frank L. Packard
THE INNOCENT ACCOMPLICE – Mrs. Baillie Reynolds
THE MASTER MYSTERY – Austin J. Small
THE MYSTERY OF UNCLE BOLLARD – H. (Henry) deVere Stacpoole
THE MAN WHO KILLED FORTESCUE – John Stephen Strange (Dorothy Stockbridge Tillett)
WEREWOLF – Charles Lee Swern
THE CLEVER ONE – Edgar Wallace
THE DOUBLE – Edgar Wallace
THE FEATHERED SERPENT – Edgar Wallace
THE MASTER OF REVELS – Richard Howells Watkins
THE BAFFLE BOOK (Puzzles) – Lassiter Wren & Randle McKay (John T. Colter)

63 years later and hundreds of titles and authors later, including  such notables as Leslie Charteris (THE SAINT) and Sax Rohmer (FU MANCHU) who had many of their First Editions put out through the Crime Club, Doubleday closed the division in 1991.  But during those years, they gave readers the detective fiction and mystery novels they craved, at prices they could afford. (In 1929, a Crime Club hardcover could be had for $1.00!)

William Peter Blatty, best known for his 1971 book THE EXORCIST, is now 82, but that hasn’t slowed him down any.  He just published a new thriller book, DIMITER, set in the Holy Land in the 1970s, just in time for the Easter holiday.

Blatty, originally a comedy writer and screenplay author of such fun fare as A SHOT IN THE DARK, never figured to get famous from THE EXORCIST.  He thought it would be a one-shot wonder, a thriller to explore his own beliefs in good and evil, but after it was published, it seemed he was now known as the eminent horror writer of all time, and couldn’t get work anymore in comedy. Winning an Oscar for his screenplay of THE EXORCIST seemed to put a nail in that coffin. (Sorry, couldn’t help myself…)

So, for the next 40 years, he’s tried to recapture the amazing popularity of that book, but has never had another success of that magnitude. His books THE NINTH CONFIGURATION (a full-length novel of his earlier novella TWINKLE, TWINKLE, KILLER KANE) and LEGION were both made into movies, but the books were only warmly received.

DIMITER had been in the works since 1974, but bouts with prostate cancer, and the loss of his son in 2006, slowed the writing down.  He compiled notes and ideas, with the stack of paper growing and growing, but it was only 2 years ago that the plot finally crystallized in his mind, and he was able to finish the book.  There’s already talk of turning it into a movie, but don’t expect the gore and goo of THE EXORCIST if Blatty has anything to say about it. He’s on record as being against the current trend of chainsaws, blood and guts of today’s movies, saying in an interview in the LA Times that “The studios have so debased the tastes of kids that that’s all the kids want now.”  He prefers the story to be the motivation, not the special effects. (Of course, once you sell the rights to your book, unless Blatty retained the screenplay rights, too, all bets will be off on DIMITER’S adaption not being bloody…)

And who knows? Maybe for his next project, he could combine his two strengths, comedy and horror, and write the next SCARY MOVIE???  (Couldn’t be any worse than what the first 4 were like… BWAHAHAAH)

While out bookhunting yesterday, Mom and I stopped by one of our favorite semi-local book haunts, only to find out they’re closing in the next month or two, like too many others. Unfortunately, their rent has been raised and sales haven’t been enough to justify keeping it open. (Not to mention that during the horrific flooding a couple years back, they lost a lot of inventory to water damage and haven’t ever really recovered…)  They’re an older couple, and they’ve decided it’s time to close.

So imagine our surprise when they said that they were going to have a big sale over the next month and then take all the unsold books to the dump, however many that may be…!  AAAAAAAACCCCCKKK!  Both mom and I leaped to the books’ defense.  We begged the owners to reconsider.  We had just been to a library book sale in their area, one where they were giving out leaflets asking for more donations. Seems the bookstore owners hadn’t heard that local libraries have book sales to help fill in budget gaps, especially important now that cities and counties are cutting back, with libraries taking some of the largest cuts.  (We get a newsletter from our own library asking for books all the time now!)

The bookstore people weren’t aware that donations to library Friends’ organizations are charitable write-offs if the Friends have registered with the IRS.  Why pay the dump to take the books (especially based on weight!) when you can take money off your taxes instead and give the books a 2nd life in a new home?  The bookstore had taken a few to Goodwill in the meantime, but while I appreciate the efforts Goodwill puts into communities, they’ve been upping their prices locally and acting more like upscale boutiques than thrift stores, especially in their book depts.   (Some of the local Goodwills are now selling the used books for as much as $8-10 or more – hard for people to fit into their already tight budgets these days.)  The local libraries, on the other hand, still sell the donated books for a more reasonable $1-3 each or so, win-win for them and people who need to read and save.

So, if you hear of a book store going out of business in your area, please make sure they know they have other options than throwing out undamaged books, making landfills fuller than they already are.  Libraries, thrift stores, literacy programs and even schools would be grateful to get the remaining unsold inventory.  Please, don’t let good books go bad… =)

2010 has started out with a bang, and it’s not a good one:  quite a few well-known writers have died since this year began!

Here are some of the authors we’ve lost:

William Tuohy, 83
He was a former Pulitzer Prize-winning Los Angeles Times foreign correspondent who covered the Vietnam War and who wrote three well-known books: DANGEROUS COMPANY (1987), detailing his time as a war correspondent; THE BRAVEST MAN: The Story of Richard O’Kane and U.S. Submariners in the Pacific War (2001); and “AMERICA’S FIGHTING ADMIRALS: Winning the War at Sea in World War II” (2007). Tuohy died Dec. 31 after open-heart surgery at a hospital in Santa Monica, Calif.

Dick Zunt, 78
Cleveland’s Plain Dealer sports writer who covered the city’s high school teams for more than 50 years, died on Jan 2nd.

Margery Beddow, 72
Broadway dancer, choreographer, director and author of BOB FOSSE’S BROADWAY, also passed away Jan 2nd.

Stephen Huneck, 60
A Vermont man whose love of dogs inspired his art and books (SALLY GOES TO THE BEACH, MY DOG”S BRAIN) and the building of a unique dog chapel,  died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound on Jan 7th. He had been suffering from depression for quite some time before taking his own life.

William J. Lederer, 97
Co-author of THE UGLY AMERICAN, the fiction book that brought to light some of the US foreign service’s unsavory practices and associations in Southeast Asia and which was to serve as a warning about the coming loss of US influence in the area, passed away on Dec 5th, but it wasn’t made public until a month later while funeral arrangements were being made.  A former Naval line officer in World War II, he’s to be buried in Arlington National Cemetery on Feb 16th.

George B. Leonard, 86
An editor and writer for Look magazine and an advocate for counterculture and the “human potential movement”, over the years he wrote a dozen books, including “The Transformation: A Guide to the Inevitable Changes in Humankind” (1972), “The Silent Pulse: A Search for the Perfect Rhythm That Exists in Each of Us” (1978), “The End of Sex: Erotic Love After the Sexual Revolution” (1983), “Walking on the Edge of the World” (1988) and “The Ultimate Athlete” (2001).  He passed away on Jan 6th.

Georges Anglade, 65
Canadian geographer and author, he and his wife Mireille, also 65, were killed in the Port-Au-Prince earthquake on Jan. 12.  Born in Haiti, Anglade had moved to France during the reign of dictator “Papa Doc” Duvalier, getting a degree in geography.  He then moved to Canada in the late ’60s, teaching geography at l’Université du Québec à Montréal, a school he helped found. During the 1990s, he turned to writing French-language books:  ”Les Blancs de Mémoire” (Memory Blanks), “Leurs jupons dépassent” (Their Slips are Showing), “Ce pays qui m’habite” (This Country that Lives Inside Me) and “Et si Haïti déclarait la guerre aux USA?” (And What if Haiti Declared War on the USA)

Erich Segal, 72
Best known for the tearjerker LOVE STORY, Segal died of a heart attack on Jan 17th.  He had suffered with Parkinson’s disease for more than 2 decades.  Unlike most bestselling books, LOVE STORY was actually a novelization of an uproduced screenplay by Segal rather than starting life as an original manuscript. The book was critically panned when it came out, and even the National Book Award jury threatened to walk out if the book wasn’t taken out of contention for that year’s award. (It was removed to their delight, but the publisher had the last laugh as the book spent a year on the hardcover bestseller lists…)  The screenplay was finally produced about then, and the movie became a blockbuster.

Robert B. Parker, 77
A writer who “died in the saddle” (he had a heart attack at his writing desk on Jan. 18), Parker was the profilic author of the Spenser murder mystery series, writing 37 books in that set alone. Spenser (no first name), a wise-cracking, street-smart and surprisingly literate Boston P.I. became extremely popular, propelling Parker onto the bestselling lists over and over, and spawning a TV series based on him. Another of his series characters, Jesse Stone, also became the basis for another TV series.

Paul Quarrington, 56
Award-winning author of WHALE MUSIC, a book loosely based on Beach Boys’ Brian Wilson’s life which was made into a movie, Quarrington passed away from lung cancer on Jan 21.  His memoir, Cigar Box Banjo, is due out in May.  He was also a screenwriter, helping to pen the TV series DUE SOUTH.

Dave Berry, 66
He wrote the reference work WALES AND CINEMA – The First Hundred Years and was a former critic and correspondent with the South Wales Echo. Mr. Berry had been ill for some time before he passed away on Jan 23rd.

Howard Zinn, 87
Author of the book “A People’s History of the United States”, which started out with a small printing (5000)  back in 1980 and almost no interest and then grew into a million-copy selling monster, died from a heart attack in Santa Monica, California, on Jan 27th. His book took a very “left-wing” approach to history, taking “established” views of the past and turning them on their heads.  (Rather than treat historical figures such as Columbus and others as heroic explorers, he instead charged them with genocide.)  While many complained his books weren’t accurate or very thorough, he himself said his book wasn’t intended as the be-all and end-all of history books, but rather a starting place to discuss what really happened, a book to get people talking and creating change.

Louis Auchincloss, 92
A Manhattan lawyer, novelist, essayist, biographer and editor who wrote about the decline of the old WASP world of power and privilege (a world he was intimately familiar with), died Jan. 26 at Lenox Hill Hospital from complications from a stroke.  He was best known for books like THE RECTOR OF JUSTIN and THE EMBEZZLER, both written in the 1960s.  He also wrote POWER OF ATTORNEYS, a collection of short stories, all of which take place in a Manhattan law firm.

J. D. Salinger, 91
If you aren’t familiar with CATCHER IN THE RYE, you may be one of the only people in the world who’s never heard of it. Salinger’s book to date has sold over 60 million copies, and even though it was written in the early ’50s, it still resonates with readers today.  A reclusive writer, Salinger originally started out writing short fiction for magazines, especially the New Yorker.  However, after CATCHER became a mega-hit, Salinger developed an intense dislike for the publishing industry and stopped giving interviews or promoting his books.  That didn’t stop his later works from becoming bestsellers in their own rights, including FRANNY AND ZOOEY.  However, none ever reached the level of popularity of CATCHER. (And now that Salinger has passed away and can no longer object/sue as he was wont to due, word has it that it may finally be made into a movie.)

Ralph McInerny, 80
A professor at the University of Notre Dame, McInerny wrote more than 80 books, the most well-known and popular being his Father Dowling books about a priest who solved murder mysteries. They also became the basis for a well-liked TV series that aired from 1989-1991. He died Jan. 29 of esophageal cancer.

Tomas Eloy Martinez, 75
Martinez’s SANTA EVITA, THE FLIGHT OF THE QUEEN and THE PERON NOVEL mixed fiction and reality about Argentina during and after the rule of Juan and Eva Peron, the fascinating and fearsome couple who dominated the nation’s politics in the 1950s. His books struck such a nerve with the public that Isabel Peron, 2nd wife and widow of Juan, had Martinez exiled from Argentina during the ’70s. He later returned to Argentina and was living in Buenos Aires when he passed away from cancer on Jan 31.

(R.I.P. to them all and any I missed mentioning…)

Dan Brown’s bestselling THE LOST SYMBOL, featuring Harvard symbology professor Robert Langdon, will follow THE DA VINCI CODE and ANGELS & DEMONS into theaters, but it won’t be written by Akiva Goldsmith, writer of the first two screenplays.

According to reports in Variety, Steven Knight (Eastern Promises) has been chosen to pen the 3rd movie.  Also, so far, Ron Howard, director of the first two, is currently only attached as a producer, and Tom Hanks hasn’t signed up to repeat his role as Langdon, but it’s hoped that the duo will continue the successful relationship that helped turn the 1st two movies into box office magic.   Hanks himself has said about doing a third movie, “I’d love to if they’re going to do it. I’m not going to walk away from that. If they make it again, I hope they ask me.”

ANGELS & DEMONS did not due as well as THE DA VINCI CODE at the box office.  However, THE LOST SYMBOL was the fastest selling adult fiction book in history (selling 1 million copies on its first day of release back in Sept 2009) so it’s no doubt hoped by Columbia that the new movie will kick the franchise’s revenue back up a notch or two. The new book (and film) take Langdon this time to Washington DC and up against Freemason mythos.  The movie has an anticipated release date of 2012.

Michael Crichton, bestselling author of such techno-thrillers and adventure fiction JURASSIC PARK, THE ANDROMEDA STRAIN and THE GREAT TRAIN ROBBERY and creator of the TV series ER, was also an avid collector of fine art.  Four paintings from his collection, all created sometime in the 1960s and worth approx. $30-35 million, will be on display in Britain this week before they go under Christie’s hammer this May.

The paintings being sold by his estate include Femme et Fillettes by Pablo Picasso, Studio Painting (Combine) by Robert Rauschenberg, and Girl in Water by Roy Lichtenstein. Also being displayed for the first time in public in about 2 decades will be a Flag painting created in encaustic by Jasper Johns sometime in the early ’60s, a work that was originally critically panned, including by critic Robert Rosenblum, who wondered if it was ”disrepectful” and “simple-minded” among other things, but which became a pop-art icon, paving the way for such artists as Warhol and Lichtenstein.  The poor reviews didn’t stop  Crichton from falling in love with it, though, and he bought directly from the artist.

Crichton had said at one time  ”the act of painting a flag at this time  seemed to many observers an absurdity: an American flag might be many things, but it was certainly not art. Yet Johns presented a carefully worked, elegantly executed painting.”   He enjoyed Johns’ work so much, he wrote the catalog for Johns’ 1977 exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art, New York – it gave him the opportunity to pick the reclusive Johns’ brain regarding art and his contributions to it. (Crichton wasn’t the only one who loves Johns’ work:  to date, the record for a privately bought Johns painting is approx $80 million for False Start while a Johns painting  was auctioned off for a record $17.4 million.)

The Crichton paintings will be on display in the UK through February 12th and then will be auctioned off by Christie’s New York May 11th with proceeds benefiting his estate.

In 2006, Crichton became a member of the board of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art. In November 2008, he passed away from cancer suddenly at the age of 66.

Here’s a neat little game I came across on Facebook:

Grab the book nearest you. Right now. • Turn to page 56. • Find the fifth sentence. • Post that sentence AS YOUR STATUS. AND POST these instructions in a comment to this status. • Don’t dig for your favourite book, the coolest, the most intellectual. Use the CLOSEST book!

My quote turned out to be:

“To reach a desired goal, a person must implement planning along with a sincere desire to work hard.”

(The book closest to me at that moment just happened to be Delmar’s Comprehensive Medical Assisting Administrative and Clinical Comptencies 2nd Edition – say THAT fast 3 times in a row! LOL)

Nothing I like better than combining 2 things I love: books and games. Try it yourself. It’s fun and sometimes amazing, sometimes pretty darn funny and on occasion, pretty dang weird!

Jim Harrison, best known for his book of novellas LEGENDS OF THE FALL which had the title story made into a movie with Brad Pitt and Anthony Hopkins, has a new book of novellas out, called THE FARMER’S DAUGHTER.  (And no, it isn’t a dirty jokebook, although it does have some sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll in at least one of the stories.)

This new book includes three stories: THE FARMER’S DAUGHTER, a coming of age tale; BROWN DOG REDUX, a story of the continuing adventures of Brown Dog, a part Native American character from an earlier book; and THE GAMES OF NIGHT, a werewolf tale.

As Harrison’s writing has matured, it has moved more and more towards poetry, his preferred method of storytelling, and away from pure fiction, and this book is no different. In fact, if you’re not used to his style of writing, you may find this book a little hard to read.  It may be better to actually go back and find his earlier works, and read those first,  ”easing” yourself into his current style.

Looking to get a copy of your book signed or want to meet the author of your favorite novel? From celebrities to regular writers, many will be out and about in January.

Here are just a few of the book signings coming up this month in some of the major cities across the U.S.:

Back in 1968, Philip K. Dick wrote a science fiction novel entitled DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP, starring an bounty hunter looking for Nexus series androids, which later became the movie BLADE RUNNER.

Now, in 2010, Google has come out with a phone called the Nexus One based on their Android OS-software / technology.  Philip K. Dick’s family feels that hits a little too close to home, so they’ve filed suit against Google for infringement of intellectual property.

According to a letter Isa Dick-Hackett, Philip K. Dick’s daughter, sent to Google regarding their use of those names for their products, she said, “Google takes first and then deals with the fallout later. In my mind, there is a very obvious connection to my father’s novel. People don’t get it. It’s the principle of it. It would be nice to have a dialogue. We are open to it. That’s a way to start.”

It’s not the first time Dick’s family has sued Google. When Google began scanning books into their online database, many writers and their heirs tried to stop Google or at least negotiate better rights.  Google ended up settling the case by setting up a fund for the copyright holders, and they also agreed to set up a Book Rights Registry to distribute the revenue.

(Of course, it’s kind of ironic when you consider that the name of the movie, BLADE RUNNER, originally belonged to Alan E. Nourse’s book from 1974. Supposedly, writer Hampton Fancher, who was doing the screenplay for the Dick story, had seen a screenplay story treatment for Nourse’s book, and liked the name, so suggested they use that instead of DO ANDROIDS DREAM OF ELECTRIC SHEEP. Ridley Scott ending up paying out extra to be able to get the rights to the new name. Now if Nourse’s heirs ever do manage to sell their screenplay based on THE BLADERUNNER which has been around since the 70s, they’ll have to get a new name for it.  Kind of ironic, indeed…)