# Is "Sweet Danger" by Margery Allingham a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of Sweet Danger by Margery Allingham (Heinemann, 1933) is identified by: CONFIRMED, WITH THE MONTH CORRECTED. UK precedes US and the census claim is confirmed, but the published month needs correcting against a common error.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- CONFIRMED, WITH THE MONTH CORRECTED. The true first is William Heinemann Ltd, London, 1933; the Library of Congress catalogues it as "London, W. Heinemann, Ltd. [1933]" with the note "Maps on lining-papers"
- Those endpaper maps are a real, checkable structural point and are double-sourced: the Library of Congress note is independently corroborated by a dealer description of a Heinemann first that refers to "the map on the pastedown" and a "Rear map"
- Under the Heinemann rule in force from the 1920s, a first states "First published [Year]" or "First published in Great Britain [Year]" on the copyright page with later impressions noted beneath it; there is no number line (Heinemann did not use them until the 1980s), so the absence of any "reprinted"/"second impression" line under the first-published statement is the test
- The Classic Crime Fiction checklist records the binding as yellow cloth lettered in black with a priced jacket (price present at the flap); that binding description is single-sourced here
- The first American edition is Doubleday, Doran for The Crime Club, Garden City, N.Y., 1933, retitled — the Library of Congress records it under the full title "Kingdom of death, the further adventures of Albert Campion, private investigator" — and under the Doubleday, Doran rule states "First Edition" on the copyright page
- Publisher imprint reads Heinemann
- Not a book-club edition (see below)

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Margery Allingham |
| Publisher | Heinemann |
| Year | 1933 |
| True first | UK edition |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | CONFIRMED, WITH THE MONTH CORRECTED. The true first is William Heinemann Ltd, London, 1933; the Library of Congress catalogues it as… |
| Book-club edition exists? | Yes |

## Points of issue
CONFIRMED, WITH THE MONTH CORRECTED. The true first is William Heinemann Ltd, London, 1933; the Library of Congress catalogues it as "London, W. Heinemann, Ltd. [1933]" with the note "Maps on lining-papers". Those endpaper maps are a real, checkable structural point and are double-sourced: the Library of Congress note is independently corroborated by a dealer description of a Heinemann first that refers to "the map on the pastedown" and a "Rear map". Under the Heinemann rule in force from the 1920s, a first states "First published [Year]" or "First published in Great Britain [Year]" on the copyright page with later impressions noted beneath it; there is no number line (Heinemann did not use them until the 1980s), so the absence of any "reprinted"/"second impression" line under the first-published statement is the test. The Classic Crime Fiction checklist records the binding as yellow cloth lettered in black with a priced jacket (price present at the flap); that binding description is single-sourced here. The first American edition is Doubleday, Doran for The Crime Club, Garden City, N.Y., 1933, retitled — the Library of Congress records it under the full title "Kingdom of death, the further adventures of Albert Campion, private investigator" — and under the Doubleday, Doran rule states "First Edition" on the copyright page.

## Is this the true first?
UK precedes US and the census claim is confirmed, but the published month needs correcting against a common error. Heinemann, London, March 1933 is the true first: the Margery Allingham Society gives March 1933, and this is settled independently by a contemporary review of "Sweet Danger. By Margery Allingham. (Heinemann)" in The Spectator of 31 March 1933 — a book reviewed in March cannot have been published in October. Wikipedia's "first published in October 1933" is therefore wrong and should not be relied on. The first American edition is Doubleday, Doran / The Crime Club, Garden City, N.Y., 1933, retitled Kingdom of Death, and is collected in its own right — name both. "The Fear Sign" is a later US retitle of the same novel, a first-thus trap, not a first edition; a buyer chasing "Sweet Danger" in America must know to look under Kingdom of Death.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
The Doubleday/Crime Club book-club tells apply to the US Kingdom of Death issue and are well documented: no price at the front jacket flap or "Book Club Edition" printed there, a blind stamp debossed into the rear board near the spine, and a five-digit code in a white block on the jacket rear. No UK book-club issue points specific to this title are documented in the sources consulted. The Heinemann, London, 1966 issue — which the Library of Congress records with the note "Originally published as Kingdom of death, New York, Doubleday, 1933" — is a later reprint under the restored UK title and is not a first.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *Sweet Danger* by Margery Allingham a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/sweet-danger
CC BY 4.0. Part of the Canonical First-Edition Points of Issue dataset (https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/api/first-edition-titles.json). Last reviewed 2026-07-04.