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The first book published by Red Arrow Books is Thirteen at Dinner by Agatha Christie, first published as Lord Edgware Dies in 1933 by the Scottish-British publisher Wm. Collins. The American edition with the new title was published New York: Dodd, Mead, 1933.
Thirteen at Dinner is 288 pages long and is 111 mm (4 3/8") wide by 179 mm (7 1/16") tall, the same size as the early Penguins. The page collation is:
[1] half-title,
[2] BY THE SAME AUTHOR [list of seven books],
[3] title page,
[4] copyright page,
[5] about Red Arrow Books,
[6] blank,
[7-8] contents,
[9] dedication,
[10] blank,
11-283 Thirteen at Dinner,
[284-288] blank.
The copyright date is 1939.
There are variant covers: two text, a "Book Club" edition and an illustrated one. One text version has a red spine and back cover (see below), the other a brown spine and back cover.
Here are the seventh of nine illustrated covers seen on Bantam Publications books. There are two copies of The Blue Geranium and other Tuesday Club Murders. On the first the laminate covering the card stock can be seen. This is the only illustrated Bantam I've seen with laminate on the back cover. The other copy has only the ghost of laminate remaining. The effect of the laminate on the image is very clear.
LA Bantam 26
LA Bantam 26 back
The two early short-lived mass market paperback publishers that share this blog also share one author - Agatha Christie. With the 120th anniversary of her birthday just four days away this is a good time to compare her treatment by these two publishers.
It is not surprising Christie is the one author shared by the two publishers. Generally accepted as the second best selling author of all time (behind Shakespeare with an estimated 2 - 4 billion books sold) Christie's books are among the earliest published by the early mass market publishers. The early Dell version of The Tuesday Club Murders is below.
The LA Bantam is a collection of five stories chosen from an original 13 that were published as The Thirteen Problems in England and as The Tuesday Club Murders in the US in 1931. The Red Arrow is a novel originally published in 1934 as Lord Edgware Dies. Later that year it was published in the United States as Thirteen At Dinner. Both examples below are the text only covers. They exist in illustrated versions also.
Red Arrow 1 - 1939
Bantam 26 - 1940
Dell 8 - 1943
Bantam Publications, Inc. of Los Angeles published 29 mass market paperbacks in 1940 and 1941. Often called LA Bantam to distinguish it from the New York mass market publisher Bantam Books, LA Bantam is an obscure and intriguing publisher with complicated business and bibliographic histories. In this blog we'll take a look at the books, myths and history of LA Bantam.
The best place to start is to describe one of LA Bantam's books.
The 26th book in the series is Agatha Christie's The Blue Geranium and other Tuesday Club Murders. It is a collection of five stories chosen from 13 that were published in The Thirteen Problems (London: Wm. Collins, 1932) and as The Tuesday Club Murders (New York: Dodd, Mead, 1933) when published in the US. There is a detailed publishing history and plot description of each story here. The stories are :
The Blue Geranium
The Companion
The Four Suspects
A Christmas Tragedy
Death by Drowning
In common with all but one of LA Bantam's books The Blue Geranium and other Tuesday Club Murders is 100 pages long and is 110 mm (4 5/16") wide by 152 mm (6") tall. Cover and pages are made from high acid pulp paper. The page collation is:
[1] title page,
[2] copyright page,
[3] contents,
[4] blank,
5-21 The Blue Geranium,
[22] blank,
23-41 The Companion,
[42] blank,
43-58 The Four Suspects,
59-77 A Christmas Tragedy,
[78] blank,
79-100 Death by Drowning.
Note that the cover shown below has a title different from the one on the title page. The copyright page states that the stories are from The Tuesday Club Murders and has four copyright dates - 1928, 1929, 1930 and 1933. The back cover lists 12 of the books from 1, The Spanish Cape Murder to 28, Strangers in Flight.
In common with most LA Bantams there are variant covers. In addition to the strong blue/vivid yellow and illustrated versions shown below there is a strong yellowish green/light blue version.
