[Next project] Partners in Crime, by Agatha Christie

[David]

Tommy and Tuppence #2 showed up recently on PG, so while I'm working my way through my current proof-reading, I thought I'd prep this for something light when my current project is done.

PG: https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/78342

IA: https://archive.org/details/bwb_C0-BNY-672

GH: https://github.com/dajare/agatha-christie-partners-in-crime (soon to be populated)

It looks like there's a few more "1930" PD books showing up on PG, and I've got my eye on another one. But this will do for now! :)

Hope this looks okay.

David / Fife, UK

[David]

Oops! Wrong repo link. Should have been: https://github.com/dajare/agatha-christie_partners-in-crime

(And it has the initial commit.) Sorry about that!

(And also to correct: this is from 1929, not 1930.)

[Alex Cabal]

OK, Vince will manage with Lukas reviewing.

On 4/4/26 11:40 AM, David wrote:
> Oops! Wrong repo link. Should have been: https://github.com/dajare/
> agatha-christie_partners-in-crime
> (And it has the initial commit.) Sorry about that!
>
> (And also to correct: this is from 1929, not 1930.)
>
> On Saturday, 4 April 2026 at 10:29:38 UTC+1 David wrote:
>

> Tommy and Tuppence #2 <https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/agatha-
> christie/partners-in-crime> showed up recently on PG, so while I'm

> working my way through my current proof-reading, I thought I'd prep
> this for something light when my current project is done.
>

> PG: https://gutenberg.org/ebooks/78342 <https://gutenberg.org/
> ebooks/78342>
> IA: https://archive.org/details/bwb_C0-BNY-672 <https://archive.org/
> details/bwb_C0-BNY-672>
> GH: https://github.com/dajare/agatha-christie-partners-in-crime

> <https://github.com/dajare/agatha-christie-partners-in-crime> (soon
> to be populated)
>
> It looks like there's a few more "1930" PD books showing up on PG,
> and I've got my eye on another one. But this will do for now! :)
>
> Hope this looks okay.
>
> David / Fife, UK
>

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[David]

A question for you Vince: this is a bit of an odd "shorts" collection, in that it also has an overarching frame narrartive: "a group of short detective stories within a detective novel", as a contemporary review put it.

As such, editions whether first edition or modern reprints use chapter numbers. I'm thinking it would be justifiable, then, to split into `chapter-1.xhtml`, etc., as usual, rather than by the name (`a-fairy-in-the-flat.xhtml`).

Thoughts? Thanks!

[Vince]

It’s not common, but it’s not unusual, either. :) Even so, they’re still short stories—they stand by themselves. You can read any one of the stories without knowing anything about the framing device and still get everything out of that particular story. As such, I would say they should be “articles,” and should use the name of the story as the title.

[David]

Okay - that makes sense!

Would this be another edge-case? There are six of the stories that are split into two parts, with the second part always called: "... (continued)", like this:

Do those get any special treatment? The only precedents I've found in the corpus aren't good analogies for this. It's the two "chapters" together that (it seems to me as I type) constitute the "article". So should they be combined into a single file and sectioned? or some other option? or just leave each to be an "article"?

Thanks!

[Vince]

Edge cases everywhere. :)

This is one of the (relatively few) Christie’s I don’t personally own, so I haven’t seen or or read it. My understanding is that the stories themselves were originally published in a magazine, and then she rearranged the order and modified the stories a bit to make them fit and flow better into the framing device. So, originally, those “two-chapter” stories were one story, and were just broken up into chapters for the sake of the book. So combining them back into a single file makes sense to me; the question would be whether it even needs the “continued” section at that point.  You’re the best judge of that, since you’ve read (or are reading) the stories; if the breaks are needed, then I would make them sections in the file, and then just use CSS to force a page break at the section break.

On Apr 8, 2026, at 5:13 AM, David <djre...@gmail.com> wrote:

Okay - that makes sense!

Would this be another edge-case? There are six of the stories that are split into two parts, with the second part always called: "... (continued)", like this:

[David]

Right you are - I see that now in the book's Wikipedia page (with references). That helps a lot as I work through this one. Thanks!

On Wednesday, 8 April 2026 at 21:42:11 UTC+1 Vince wrote:

Edge cases everywhere. :)

This is one of the (relatively few) Christie’s I don’t personally own, so I haven’t seen or or read it. My understanding is that the stories themselves were originally published in a magazine, and then she rearranged the order and modified the stories a bit to make them fit and flow better into the framing device. So, originally, those “two-chapter” stories were one story, and were just broken up into chapters for the sake of the book. So combining them back into a single file makes sense to me; the question would be whether it even needs the “continued” section at that point.  You’re the best judge of that, since you’ve read (or are reading) the stories; if the breaks are needed, then I would make them sections in the file, and then just use CSS to force a page break at the section break.

[David]

I should be able to wrap this up in the next few days, so time for a cover. From the Artworks DB, William Henry Dethlef Koerner’s “In Safe Arms“ works well (IMO) for Tommy and Tuppence in one of their scrapes:

The original is fairly small, so I upsized it twice with a free online tool. Full 1400x2100 looks like this. If you think Gigapixel could do a better job of it, could you have a go, Vince? Thanks!

[Alex Cabal]

Great find!

On 5/30/26 7:09 AM, David wrote:
> I should be able to wrap this up in the next few days, so time for a
> cover. From the Artworks DB, William Henry Dethlef Koerner’s “In Safe

> Arms <https://standardebooks.org/artworks/william-henry-dethlef-koerner/
> in-safe-arms>“ works well (IMO) for Tommy and Tuppence in one of their
> scrapes:
>

> cover-safe-400x600.jpg
>
> The original is fairly small, so I upsized it twice with a free online

> tool. Full 1400x2100 looks like this <https://i.ibb.co/XksLwrzk/cover-
> safe-1400x2100.jpg>. If you think Gigapixel could do a better job of it,

> could you have a go, Vince? Thanks!
>
>

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[Vince]

I’ve assigned it. I’m woefully behind on Gigapixel since they went subscription only, but here’s the result. Keep whichever one you prefer.

On May 30, 2026, at 7:09 AM, David <djre...@gmail.com> wrote:

I should be able to wrap this up in the next few days, so time for a cover. From the Artworks DB, William Henry Dethlef Koerner’s “In Safe Arms“ works well (IMO) for Tommy and Tuppence in one of their scrapes:

[David]

Thanks for that, Vince: perceptibly better than my attempt, so I've used it.

And finally this is ready for review, Lukas. A few things to be aware of:

• I've included a production note about the chapter arrangement (see my message about this, above, and Vince's reply). I've combined the "continued" type chapters.
• `lip stick` -> `lipstick` modernization might be a mod-spell candidate? (cf. MW)
• You'll see I've got a book title which is wholly an abbreviation: I hope I've got that right!

I think that's it. Thanks, as ever, for your vigilance!

[Vince]

On Jun 9, 2026, at 10:30 AM, David <djre...@gmail.com> wrote:

…

• `lip stick` -> `lipstick` modernization might be a mod-spell candidate? (cf. MW)

Alex only adds things in modernize-spelling if it occurs often enough to be worth it, otherwise it would be far too bloated. There are only two “lip stick”s in the corpus currently, so probably not?, but up to him.

[Lukas Bystricky]

I'll review this in the next couple days. 

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[Lukas Bystricky]

Great work as usual David. Just a couple small things to look at. 

[Lukas Bystricky]

Alex, this is ready for you. One thing to note: David started this project with an older version of the toolset, so lint will report quite a few issues, but I think those are all due to the updated toolset. 

[Alex Cabal]

This ebook was produced by David Reimer. Thanks David!

Ebook URL:
https://standardebooks.org/ebooks/agatha-christie/partners-in-crime

GitHub URL:
https://github.com/standardebooks/agatha-christie_partners-in-crime

[Alex Cabal]

OK, looks good David, thanks! I've released it!

On 6/11/26 4:20 PM, Lukas Bystricky wrote:
> Alex, this is ready for you. One thing to note: David started this
> project with an older version of the toolset, so lint will report quite
> a few issues, but I think those are all due to the updated toolset.
>
> On Thursday, June 11, 2026 at 9:14:23 PM UTC+2 Lukas Bystricky wrote:
>
>
> Great work as usual David. Just a couple small things to look at.
> On Tuesday, June 9, 2026 at 11:06:39 PM UTC+2 Lukas Bystricky wrote:
>
> I'll review this in the next couple days.
>
> On Tue, Jun 9, 2026, 18:20 Vince <vr_se...@letterboxes.org> wrote:
>
>> On Jun 9, 2026, at 10:30 AM, David <djre...@gmail.com> wrote:
>>
>> …
>>

>> * `lip stick` -> `lipstick` modernization might be a
>> mod-spell candidate? (cf. MW <https://www.merriam-
>> webster.com/dictionary/lipstick>)

> Alex only adds things in modernize-spelling if it occurs
> often enough to be worth it, otherwise it would be far too
> bloated. There are only two “lip stick”s in the corpus
> currently, so probably not?, but up to him.
>
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[David]

Just wondering: this hasn't shown up yet in the "New Books" RSS feed(s). Perhaps the corpus is rebuilding? But it's been well over 24hrs, so thought I'd check, just in case.....

[Alex Cabal]

Thanks, this has been fixed!

> <https://github.com/standardebooks/agatha-christie_partners-in-crime>

>
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