THE KING IS DEAD

Boston: Little Brown & Co., 1952. Hardcover. Good Plus/Fair To Good. The 25th novel from the legendary mystery writing team of Frederic Dannay and his cousin, Manfred B. Lee, featuring their fictional writer and detective, Ellery Queen. This time Ellery and his father are taken at gunpoint to the Atlantic Ocean island kingdom of Abel Bendigo, wealthy international arms dealer. Bendigo hires the Queens to discover who, among his friends and family, is not only threatening to kill him, but has announced the exact minute, hour and day of the murder. The day arrives, Bendigo is locked in a sealed room and at the hour and minute, yes, he is murdered, leaving Ellery and his father with one of the genre's greatest locked room mysteries. First Printing, First Book Club edtion. 5 3/4 x 8 1/2 inches, 220 pages in red cloth-covered boards with black lettering on front cover and spine. The dustjacket's front panel shows a small pistol with a chipped hand grip resting on an outstretched hand. Except for a bit of bumping and wear at the corners and spine ends, and light rectangular stains on the end pages, the boards and text are complete, clean and unmarked, tight and square. The dustjacket is well-worn, with minor chipping at the corners and spine ends, and a 2-inch, nearly invisible closed tear at the bottom of the front panel, also creasing and small tears at the lower end of the spine and back panel. That noted, the dj, now in a mylar protector, is still 95% whole and quite presentable. A very decent reading copy of a classic locked-room mystery.