Murder by Death

Mysterious Books in New York sucked me in again with their newsletter.  They have a list of used books at the end of each one and most of the time they're heavily noir/thriller/hard-boiled, but once in awhile they have titles I can't refuse.

The bottom one is a new release - I have NO idea if it's good, but the title is The Book Worm and its protagonist is a Russian historian nicknamed Lara the Bookworm.   About the only thing this author didn't include to entice me specifically is cream puffs popping out when I opened the cover.

I finally found a copy of The Circular Staircase by Anna Katherine Green, which I've been hunting for a while.  I know I could get a reprint copy easily, or if I liked ebooks (I don't) get it for free on Gutenburg, but here's my feeling on old titles: if I can get an original edition for a reasonable price, I'd rather have it.  (Reasonable being less than than the price of a new HC.)  Something about having an old copy of an old title just feels right.

I also grabbed The Mystery of the Hasty Arrow by AKG - I don't know much about this one except it takes place in a museum.

The little pamphlet on the top is a tiny surprise (pun intended):  I knew it was small when I ordered it, but it's tiny.  Like prize at the bottom of a cereal box tiny.  But the bonus is that it also includes The Raven and Annabelle Lee, along with 2 other titles whose names escape me at the moment, though one has to do with a haunted house.

But the big win of the bunch is the top one.  I thought I'd lost out on it to someone who lived local to Mysterious Books, but while I was chatting with Tom at the bookshop via email, it came out that my original request actually arrived in their inbox (the wrong inbox, so went unseen) before the local guy claimed it.  He still would have gotten it, except he put off showing up to pay/pick it up.  Tom came through for me and I could not be more excited.  Why?  Because:

 - it's a detective mystery

 - it's a detective mystery written by Mark Twain

 - it's a detective mystery written by Mark Twain as a pastiche of Sherlock Holmes!!

'nuff said.