Traveling encyclopedia salesman Oliver Quade may be the most unlikely detective to appear in the pages of the pulp magazines of the 1930s. Known for marveling crowds by reciting the memorized contents of The Compendium of Human Knowledge, Quade—known better as The Human Encyclopedia—has a habit of letting this knowledge lead him into the middle of one murder investigation after another.
Collected for the first time are the first half of The Human Encyclopedia stories, including the rare early stories: most of which have never before been reprinted. Also including all of the original magazine illustrations and an authoritative introduction by Black Mask conservator Keith Alan Deutsch.
Written by Frank Gruber; cover by J. George Janes; illustrations by Wynne W. Davies, Harold Heffernan & Arthur Rodman Bowker; introduction by Keith Alan Deutsch
Murder on the Midway: The Complete Black Mask Cases of the Human Encyclopedia, Volume 1 by Frank Gruber contains the following stories:
- “Brass Knuckles”
- “Death at the Main”
- “Murder on the Midway”
- “Pictures of Death”
- “Trailer Town”
- “Ask Me Another”
- “Rain, the Killer”
- “Death on Eagle’s Crag”
- “Dog Show Murder”
