Three at Wolfe's Door explained
| Three at Wolfe's Door |
| Author: | Rex Stout |
| Cover Artist: | Bill English |
| Country: | United States |
| Language: | English |
| Series: | Nero Wolfe |
| Genre: | Detective fiction |
| Publisher: | Viking Press |
| Release Date: | April 29, 1960 |
| Media Type: | Print (hardcover) |
| Pages: | 186 pp. (first edition) |
| Oclc: | 1389148 |
| Preceded By: | Plot It Yourself |
| Followed By: | Too Many Clients |
Three at Wolfe's Door is a collection of Nero Wolfe mystery novellas by Rex Stout, published by the Viking Press in 1960. The book comprises three stories, one of them published previously:
Publication history
In his limited-edition pamphlet, Collecting Mystery Fiction #10, Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe Part II, Otto Penzler describes the first edition of Three at Wolfe's Door: "Orange cloth, front cover and spine printed with dark brown. Issued in a mainly green-brown dust wrapper."[2]
In April 2006, Firsts: The Book Collector's Magazine estimated that the first edition of Three at Wolfe's Door had a value of between $200 and $350. The estimate is for a copy in very good to fine condition in a like dustjacket.[3]
The far less valuable Viking book club edition may be distinguished from the first edition in three ways:
- The dust jacket has "Book Club Edition" printed on the inside front flap, and the price is absent (first editions may be price clipped if they were given as gifts).
- Book club editions are sometimes thinner and always taller (usually a quarter of an inch) than first editions.
- Book club editions are bound in cardboard, and first editions are bound in cloth (or have at least a cloth spine).[4]
- 1961, London: Collins Crime Club, January 20, 1961, hardcover
- 1961, New York: Bantam #A-2276, August 1961
- 1995, New York: Bantam Crime Line September 1995, paperback, Rex Stout Library edition with introduction by Margaret Maron
- 1997, Newport Beach, California: Books on Tape, Inc. October 31, 1997, audio cassette (unabridged, read by Michael Prichard)
- 2010, New York: Bantam Crimeline June 9, 2010, e-book
Notes and References
- Townsend, Guy M., Rex Stout: An Annotated Primary and Secondary Bibliography (1980, New York: Garland Publishing;), p. 84. John McAleer, Judson Sapp and Arriean Schemer are associate editors of this definitive publication history.
- Penzler, Otto, Collecting Mystery Fiction #10, Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe Part II (2001, New York: The Mysterious Bookshop, limited edition of 250 copies), p. 11
- Smiley, Robin H., "Rex Stout: A Checklist of Primary First Editions." Firsts: The Book Collector's Magazine (Volume 16, Number 4), April 2006, p. 34
- Penzler, Otto, Collecting Mystery Fiction #9, Rex Stout's Nero Wolfe Part I, pp. 19–20
