The Club Dumas

SYNOPSIS

You can call Lucas Corso the Sam Spade of the antiquarian business. He’s sly and resourceful, and he lives a life most bibliophiles would envy. Though he’s no stranger to breaking hearts or even breaking clients’ bank accounts.
       Serving as a mercenary to those elite enough to afford him, Corso sniffs out and hunts down the very finest of his clients’ desires: ultra-rare and valuable books. And he’s darn good at it too. So good that even he can attract the wrong kind of attention.
       While at work authenticating an Alexandre Dumas manuscript, Corso is summoned at the behest of a wealthy client in Toledo, Spain. There, he discovers his next foray: track down two copies of a demonology text called The Nine Doors and verify their authenticity against his client’s alleged forgery. He may have reservations, but the ever-dutiful Corso agrees.
       With his client’s copy in hand, Corso shuffles off to Madrid, hoping to glean intel on his forgery. Then, he swoops into Lisbon where the real fun begins: the search for the first of its two siblings. But it doesn’t take long before he suspects a tail. Being nearly run off the road is a good indication of it. And the coincidences — including book burning and rigor mortis — don’t end there. They follow him with each new destination and detail revealed.
       However, all isn’t what it seems to be. For the deeper Corso digs, the more he becomes embroiled in the devil’s handiwork and the dark underworld of idol worship. But for whom or why is open for debate. It’s a tale not too dissimilar from that of a harrowing Dumas adventure — a dangerous game of life and death, where the truth is stranger than fiction.
       As thrilling as it is absorbing, The Club Dumas is a literary tour de force, dazzling and captivating in its ambition to push the erudite envelope as far as it can go. The multi-layered and nuanced narrative is an eclectic mix of mystery, occult, and murder. And it’s filled with enough biblio-references to impress even the most ardent critic. There’s no shortage of Sherlock Holmes, Poirot, Poe, Doyle, and of course Dumas to go around. But step lightly, for even Lucifer may be waiting in the wings.
       It's a novel that celebrates the escapism of storytelling as much as it celebrates the book as an object of fanatical obsession. But in a world where book collecting is akin to religion, the devil is most certainly in the details. However, uncovering them may bring you no closer to the truth.
       Our forthcoming edition of Arturo Pérez-Reverte’s The Club Dumas has the following features:
      Six interior illustrations and reverse dustjacket artwork by Greg Bell; and dustjacket, frontispiece, lead illustration, and endpapers by Ricardo Martinez. Illustrated endpapers, two-tone cloth slipcase with stamping, top-edge stain, ribbon marker, and creative book stamping and spine-onlay, and two-color printing on laid paper. Each copy is signed by Arturo Pérez-Reverte, Ricardo Martinez, and Greg Bell. 

EDITION INFORMATION

• Limited to 500 copies, signed by Arturo Pérez-Reverte, Ricardo Martinez, and Doug Bell
• Book size is 6; × 9¼ inches.
• Two- and four-color printing throughout on laid paper.
• Full color wraparound dustjacket by Ricardo Martinez.
• Reverse wraparound dustjacket by Doug Bell.
• Numerous interior illustrations.
• Full Japanese black cloth with two-color stamping on front and onlay label on spine.
• Illustrated endpapers.
• Top-edge stain.
• Ribbon marker, head and tail bands.
• Two-color cloth slipcase, with label on spine and two-color stamping on front board.
• Mylar dustjacket protector, 2.0mil, already applied!
• Published September 2023.
• ISBN 978-1-61347-299-6.