Porlock, Martin (a.k.a. Phillip McDonald) — X V. Rex

Hamburg, Germany, Published for the Crime Club by The Albatross, 1933. . Softcover. Size: 12mo 7" - 7. Scarcely available in the trade in this state and condition but with a complicated bibliography. Both "Martin Porlock" and "Oliver Fleming" were pseudonyms used by the British authors Ronald MacDonald (1860-1933) and his son, Philip MacDonald (1900-1980). Philip MacDonald also wrote as "Anthony Lawless," "W. J. Stuart" and "Warren Stuart." This novel, X. V. Rex (1933) came also to be known as The Mystery of the Dead Police, a very, very early "serial killer" novel. This is not the later edition published by Collins, but rather, an addition, no. 107 to "The Crime Club," published by The Albatross Press, spawned by the Albatross Modern Continental Library, which was founded in 1932 primarily to sell English language to those living outside the U.K. but on the European continent, and The Crime Club published the first 13 Agatha Christie titles, thus spawning in a sense the genre's Golden Age. "Albatross" is spelled the same in English, German, French and Italian. The Albatross Crime Club launched in 1933 and ended its printing in 1939. Printed, illustrated wraps, a bit soiled, moderately worn, else clean and unmarked of interior, with light toning. 254 with a colophon noting the use of William Collins, Sons & Co., who did the printing, of paper supplied by the North of Ireland Paper Mill Company, and composed in Old Style type cut by the Monotype Corporation. FInal page notes nos. 101-114 in the Crime Club series, including Philip MacDonald writing under his own, true name.Member, I.O.B.A., C.B.A., and adherent to the highest ethical standards. . . . Good