Five Complete Miss Marple Novels is an omnibus edition of Agatha Christie works published by Avenel Books in 1980. The omnibus is available in hardcover only and comprises five novels: The Body in the Library, A Caribbean Mystery, The Mirror Crack'd, Nemesis and What Mrs. McGillicuddy Saw.
This omnibus came in several versions with at least two different covers and several reprints. The earliest version was published by Avenel Books and distributed by Crown Publishing, by arrangement with Dodd Mead. Besides the jacketed version, there was also a non-jacketed library binding (ISBN 97800517321768). Some later versions have also been seen. A leather bound version without jacket was issued by Chatham River Press, another imprint of Crown Publishing circa 1984 (ISBN 9780517436356). A later hardboard version with a different jacket design ISBN 9780517035801 was issued by Avenel, this time distributed by "Outlet Books Company, a Random House company". This is more difficult to date but must come after 1988 since Outlet Books, the same company as Crown Publishing, was only taken over by Random House in 1988. While the first impression of this ISBN used the Avenel imprint, by the 5th impression, the imprint name had changed to Wings Books.
Blurb on front flap[]
AGATHA
CHRISTIE
FIVE COMPLETE
MISS MARPLE NOVELS
Miss Marple. Ah, yes. The mind flies instantly to St. Mary Mead, with its Blue Boar, vicarage church, and little nest of Queen Anne and Georgian houses, including that of Jane Marple. The beloved Miss Marple, who is the amazingly clever and plucky octogenarian, addicted to undercover sleuthing.
The Mirror Crack'd is strangely touching and thoroughly engrossing story of an ill-fated glamorous actress. The clues are particularly closely knit as a pleasant charity party is marred by a murder, with several others to follow.
In A Caribbean Mystery, Major Palgrave interrupts his boring stories to tell Miss Marple about a murderer he has known; then he pulls out a snapshot of that murderer. A killing follows, and the mystery is airborne.
Nemesis is a fascinating tale that takes Jane Marple traveling a route given her by a dead man. A handsome sum will be hers if she can solve a murder she knows absolutely nothing about.
Nobody would believe What Mrs. McGillicuddy Saw! On a train going to visit Miss Marple, she sees a man in a passing train. "His hands were round the throat of a woman who faced him, and he was slowly, remorselessly, strangling her."
A dance-hall girl becomes The Body in the Library--in the exclusive home of Mrs. Bantry, one of Jane Marple's friends. A house full of likely suspects includes the angry in-laws of a rich crippled man who wanted to adopt the girl.
"A prolific author who never misses," said The New Yorker. These five Miss Marple classics prove it again and again.
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