Diagnosis: Homicide -- The Casebook of Dr. Coffee

Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Company, 1950. Hardcover. Small 8vo. Teal green paper over boards with blue spine lettering, pictorial dust jacket. 217pp. Near fine/very good. Very faintest of binding wear, else internally fine; jacket a bit edgeworn and mildly rubbed, with several old and discreet mends on verso -- but complete and overall still fetchingly attractive. Tight and quite nice first edition of this highly regarded, Edgar Award-winning gathering of eight short stories about pathologist Dr. Daniel Webster Coffee and his Hindu sidekick Dr. Mootilal Mookerji, set at the Pasteur Hospital in Northbank, "a large American city." Dr. Thomas A. Gonzales, New York City's chief medical examiner, introduces this most unusual and ahead-of-its-day scenario, a volume in Lippincott's "Mainline Mysteries" series. Best of all, not only has Blochman boldly signed the title page in blue ballpoint, but he's inscribed and signed the front flyleaf large and bold: "For George E. Conley III / with the best / (non-homicidal) / regards of the / author. / Lawrence G. Blochman / Cranbury, N.J. / April 26 / 1950." Our diagnosis: Scarce in first edition, doubly scarce in dust jacket, triply scarce in signed (twice!) and inscribed form. QUEEN'S QUORUM 106.