The Scoop -&- Behind the Screen

New York: Harper & Row. (c.1983). 1st U.S. edition. Hardcover. Near Fine in Near Fine dj. [minor shelfwear only, one-time owner's name plus date & place of purchase and brief note in ink at top of front endpaper; the jacket is bright and clean, flawless but for a tiny bit of wear at the spine ends]. Two mystery novellas, written in collaboration by the members of the Detection Club -- Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers, Hugh Walpole, E.C. Bentley, Anthony Berkeley, Clemence Dane, Ronald Knox, and Freeman Wills Crofts -- originally composed for radio broadcast in 1930, but not published in book form until the 1980s (by Gollancz in the U.K., just before this U.S. edition). "The Scoop," a murder tale set in a newspaper office, was plotted in outline form before the writers set to work; "Behind the Screen," by contrast, "was approached more in the spirit of a game: Walpole launched the story entirely on his own; Christie and Sayers continued as they fancied, each where her predecessor left off; and only the last three authors consulted together on how to unravel the clues presented by the first three -- in other words, they themselves had to solve a mystery." Introduction by Julian Symons, who gives a brief history of the Detection Club itself. .