A Maybe Miracle

I may be premature in announcing this to be a Monday Miracle, because it hasn’t actually arrived yet.  However, I did get an email notification that the book has shipped.

Shipped, I tell you!

And you tell me, “We don’t know what you’re talking about!”

Explanations are in order.

Once upon a time, when I was about twelve, I discovered a series of murder mysteries written by Frances and Richard Lockridge.  They featured a pair of amateur detectives, Mr. and Mrs. North.  They featured them, in fact, in a series of 26 novels, a Broadway play, a film, and a couple of TV and radio shows.

I don’t remember which book I read first.  I do remember I got it out of my grandmother’s library one summer.  And then another and another.

They were smart books.  Funny.  Full of the flavor of NYC in the Forties and Fifties.  Unusually for the time period, it was usually Mrs. North who figured out who the murderer was.

Over time, I read them all.  And I wanted to be able to re-read them all at will.  Thus, they were high on my list at used book stores and flea markets.  I picked them up here and there, and then, some time ago, a number of them were re-released.  I was able to find them at regular book stores.

For years now, I have had 25 of them on my shelves.  Untidy Murder, written in 1947, was the lone volume missing.  Twice, I have nearly had it.  The internet greatly facilitates the search for ancient tomes.  When I have remembered to check, copies of it have appeared to be for sale.  But twice, I have ordered, had the order accepted and, subsequently, gotten a “We’re sorry, we no longer have that book” email.

Just two weeks ago, I decided to spend part of the $40 I did not have to pay my doctor (thank you, President Obama) on Untidy Murder.  It was a splurge.  Out-of-print and in demand books are not cheap.  I ordered it.  And five days later, I got the “We’re sorry” email.

Undaunted and determined–it’s the last book in a forty year search–I remembered that another copy was available, for a higher price, and I ordered it again.

Yesterday, I got the email that it had been shipped.

Hooray!

I haven’t read Untidy Murder in a long time.  How great to finally, finally, finally have the whole series! I’m excited.

Now, it should be noted that these are not first editions or anything.  They are simply good reading copies of “good reads.”

But isn’t that what a book is for?