Lestrade And The Kiss Of Horus

Lestrade and the Kiss of Horus (1995) – M.J. Trow
(Constable, ISBN: 9780094740006, Condition: Good — battered into circulation and now liberated by “Crappy Old Books.” Ex-library copy, once stamped and catalogued by Suffolk County Council.)

Inspector Lestrade: long-suffering Scotland Yard man, eternal butt of Sherlock Holmes’s sarcasm, and — thanks to M.J. Trow — improbably the star of his own crime capers. Lestrade and the Kiss of Horus (1995) proves once again that the poor inspector has more lives than a cat and more misadventures than Holmes would ever admit. Here we get a romp involving ancient curses, suspicious Egyptology, and enough eccentric suspects to make Poirot throw in his moustache.

This particular copy has history. Not the glamorous Nile-delta kind, but the municipal kind: it’s an ex-library book from Suffolk County Council, which means it has survived the judgement of thousands of readers who probably borrowed it because the Holmes shelf was empty. Expect the usual library tattoos: stamps, stickers, maybe the odd barcode scar — the literary equivalent of battle honours.

Condition: Good. In Crappy Old Books vocabulary, that means “you can read it without the pages crumbling, though it does carry faint echoes of a thousand rainy afternoons in Lowestoft.” The dust jacket may have fought valiantly against both time and sticky fingers, but the story inside is intact, ready to whisk you back to Victorian skulduggery with a wink.

So if you’ve ever wondered what happens when Sherlock’s perennial punchline finally gets his turn in the spotlight — and if you don’t mind your Egyptology laced with dry British humour — then this ex-library veteran is your man. Crappy Old Books is perversely proud to present it: stamped, stickered, slightly municipal, but still striding forth in full detective dignity.

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