More Signed Mysteries, in Two Forms ...

Our winter work here has included making sure a larger proportion of our mysteries are signed. Many are signed by the author on the title page, the classic way to add value and delight to a good first edition. We attend many author events, to meet the authors and ask them to add their John/Jayne Hancock to fine volumes.

But what can be done about authors we don't get to see -- like Westerners who stay in Texas or along the West Coast, folks in the Deep South where we never manage to visit, and those hard-writing British, Irish, French, even Palestinian authors that we may never meet in person?

Dave's spent the winter getting in touch with many of them and asking them whether they are willing to sign bookplates that we send to them -- nice elegant ones, archivally stable, that we simply lay into the books (we don't do any "sticky stuff" here). People have been incredibly generous in saying yes. If you can't quite read the image below, it's the signature of phenomenal award-winning British author Minette Walters. Peter Lovesey, Matt Beynon Rees, Lee Child, Cara Black, Lawrence Block, and many others have also helped in this way. Others, like Joe Lansdale and Linda Barnes, recently signed books directly for us. More arrive daily, as the old expression goes.

So do browse the collection again, and watch for updates. Check each of our signed items for the type of signature provided -- on the title page, or on a laid-in bookplate. (To search our listings on ABE, jump to our web site, www.kingdombks.com, and use the browse button there -- you can always search by author or title, and can also request that ABE search for signed material.)

And join us, please, in appreciating this added level of connection between mystery/crime authors and their readers. Thank you to the authors and readers!