For many years I’ve owned pair of a paperback copies of the John Holbrook Vance mystery novels, The Fox Valley Murders and The Pleasant Grove Murders. These Ace paperbacks were published in 1967. The latter bears a stamp on the inside cover from “The Exchange,” a now defunct used bookstore in Georgetown, Texas. The cover bears a large letter “F” next to the word “The” and a sharp crease along the spine mars both covers. In other words, they are far from pristine copies, but what can you expect when the books first appeared over 50 years ago, having passed through many hands and many readings.
John Holbrook Vance is the real name of my favorite writer, who published most of his books under the name, “Jack Vance.” Although Vance is known more for his science fiction and fantasy work, he wrote several mystery novels. Both of these books feature a sheriff in an imaginary county south of San Francisco by the name of Joe Bain. A final book in the series was apparently outlined, but never written (such a shame; it would have been nice to have see The Genesee Slough Murders in print).
In 1966, Bobb-Merrill published The Fox Valley Murders in hardcover. They released The Pleasant Grove Murders the following year. My beat-up copies of the two paperbacks are books that I’ve each read several times, while always wishing for more stories featuring that setting and the characters; it’s a time and place long gone, replaced by tech companies and vast wealth changing the landscape and populace.
A few years ago I bought the hardcover edition of The Fox Valley Murders. The stark cover illustrates the many murders in that book. Recently, I acquired the hardcover edition of The Pleasant Grove Murders. Finding a book originally published in the 1960s—published a half century ago as I write this post, and in decent condition mind you—is nearly impossible. Copies of this book that I’ve seen advertised for sale online have usually been ex-library books, or bear water stains, spine leans, and other flaws. Both my paperback copies of the two Sheriff Joe Bain murder mysteries have heavy spine leans, cover creases, strange smells, and many other flaws, but getting a hardcover edition has always been a goal. Sadly, neither copy is pristine; there are slight tears in the cover, a bit of speckling on the edges, and an musty smell.
In a sense, I don’t need either book, as Subterranean Press published them in an omnibus edition in 2012, along with The Dark Ocean, another favorite novel of mine. I already own the Underwood-Miller edition of that book, which was published without a cover. The Sub Press edition, under the title, Desperate Days (Selected Mysteries, Volume Two), remedies that with a brilliant scene taken from Dark Ocean. Still, the Sub Press book doesn’t include the maps from the originals, which is a strange omission. The first volume from Sub Press, Dangerous Ways, contains three other mystery novels (The Man in the Cage, Bad Ronald, and The Deadly Isles), but good luck finding a copy of that book at a reasonable price. However, the thrill of owning the first hardcover edition is too much to ignore, especially for books published in the mid-1960s, a time that now seems like a million years distant.
