Featured Items
ASSIGNMENT: STAR STEALERS.
Greenwich, CT: Fawcett Gold Medal, 1970. Small octavo, pictorial wrappers. First edition. Gold Medal T2281. C.I.A. agent Sam Durell. Bill Pronzini writing of the Sam Durell novels "Despite all the violence and melodrama...[the] Durell novels are compulsive reading. Aarons was an accomplished writer, with excellent descriptive abilities...and an expert sense of narrative pacing." - Pronzini and Muller, 1001 Midnights, The Aficionado's Guide to Mystery and Detective Fiction, p. 1.
AMAZING STORIES.
Jamaica, NY: Experimenter Publishing Company, 1930. Large octavo, single issue, cover by Leo Morey, pictorial wrappers. Pulp magazine. Includes "Piracy Preferred" by John W. Campbell, Jr.
AMAZING STORIES.
New York, NY: Teck Publishing Corporation, 1931. Large octavo, single issue, cover by Leo Morey, pictorial wrappers. Pulp magazine, bedsheet format. Stories by David H. Keller, Jack Williamson and others.
WEST BY ONE AND BY ONE: AN ANTHOLOGY OF IRREGULAR WRITINGS BY THE SCOWRERS AND MOLLY MAGUIRES OF SAN FRANCISCO AND THE TRAINED CORMORANTS OF LOS ANGELES COUNTY.
San Francisco: Privately Printed, 1965. Octavo, cloth. First edition. An uncommon title. Contributors include: Anthony Boucher, Edgar W. Smith, Poul Anderson, Fritz Leiber and many others.
ARGOSY.
New York: The Frank A. Munsey Company, 1927. Octavo, single issue, cover by Paul Stahr, pictorial wrappers. Pulp Magazine. Features part four of the serial "Seven Footprints to Satan" by A. Merritt.
BALLANTINE BOOKS THE FIRST DECADE. A BIBLIOGRAPHICAL HISTORY & GUIDE OF THE PUBLISHER'S EARLY YEARS.
Rochester, MI: Bailiwick Books, [1987]. Small octavo, cloth. First edition. This copy signed by Aronovitz and also by publisher Ian Ballantine. Bibliographic checklist of hardcover books published by Ballantine Books, 1952-1961. Burgess, Reference Guide to Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Horror 247.
PEBBLE IN THE SKY.
Garden City: Doubleday, 1950. Octavo, jacket illustration by Richard Powers, Hardcover. First edition. Author's first book. Anatomy of Wonder (1995) 3-15.
ASTOUNDING SCIENCE FICTION.
New York: Street & Smith Publications, Inc., 1939. Octavo, single issue, cover painting by Gilmore, pictorial wrappers. Pulp magazine. Includes part 3 of "Gray Lensman" and "Discord in Scarlet" by A.E. van Vogt - a sequel to "The Black Destroyer." Tymm and Ashley, Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Weird Fiction Magazines, pp. 60-103.
BITTERSWEET.
New York: St. Martin's Press, [1984]. Octavo, boards. First edition. The author's first novel. The lives of two women and love in the 19th Century American west.
BEARING SECRETS.
New York: Walker, 1996. Octavo, boards. First edition. Signed. Author's second mystery.
THE 25TH HOUR.
New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers, Inc., [2000]. Octavo, boards. First edition. Contemporary crime novel, filmed in 2002 by Spike Lee.
THE SECOND CENTURY OF DETECTIVE STORIES.
London: Hutchinson & Co. (Publishers) Ltd., n.d., [1938]. Octavo, pp. [1-18] 19-761 [762: blank] [763-768: publishers ads], original light green cloth, front and spine stamped in black. First edition. An important anthology. "The author of Trent's Last Case" has done a remarkable job in sticking to real detection for this omnibus, but the biographical notes on the 30 authors are tantalizingly poor; one doubts that Bentley wrote them. Many good and inaccessible tales more than compensate for this lack. The items are drawn from Livingston's Dodd Cases, the Coles' Superintendent Wilson's Holiday, Wade's Here Comes the Copper, Bramah's Eyes of Max Carrados. Also: Knox's tale The Motive and H. Russell Wakefield's The Inevitable Flaw. One of F. Tennyson Jesse's rare Solange Stories is included, and samples from Bailey, Bell, Chesterton, Gribble, Keverne, Leacock, Oppenheim, Phillpotts, Wallace, plus well-known tales by Conan Doyle, Bramah, Bentley, Freeman and Sayers." - Barzun and Taylor: A Catalogue of Crime (1989), #3613. Queen, The Detective Short Story, p. 132.
THE TWENTY-FIFTH HOUR.
New York: Random House, [1940]. Octavo, [1-10] [1-2] 3-321 [322-326]. cloth. First edition. An outstanding post-catastrophe novel. "Good character development -- complex. Thoughtful anthropological insight." - Anatomy of Wonder (1987) 3-29. Anatomy of Wonder (1976) 4-62 and (1981) 3-77.
IN THE MIDST OF LIFE: TALES OF SOLDIERS AND CIVILIANS.
New York and London: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1898. Small octavo, pp. [1-2] [i-ii] iii [iv] v-vi 1-362 [363-366: ads] [367-368: blank] [note: first and last leaves are blanks], original decorated maroon cloth, front and spine panels stamped in gold. Enlarged edition. First printing of the enlarged edition of TALES OF SOLDIERS AND CIVILIANS (1891), the first and best of two collections of Bierce's short fiction published during his lifetime. The enlarged edition adds three stories including the classic, "The Damned Thing," a chilling narrative of an encounter with a malignant being from another dimension. Anatomy of Wonder (1995) 1-13. Barron (ed), Horror Literature 2-7. Bleiler, The Guide to Supernatural Fiction 162. Clareson, Science Fiction in America, 1870s-1930s 073. Sullivan (ed), The Penguin Encyclopedia of Horror and the Supernatural, pp. 33-4. Survey of Modern Fantasy Literature III, pp. 1436-40. Tymn (ed), Horror Literature 3-23. Bleiler (1978), p. 23. Wright (III) 523. BAL 1119. Starrett 15. Baird and Greenwood, An Annotated Bibliography of California Fiction 1664-1970 250.
CITIES IN FLIGHT.
[New York]: Avon, [1970]. Small octavo, pictorial wrappers. First combined edition. Avon Books W187. Collects four connected novels; THEY SHALL HAVE STARS (1956), A LIFE FOR THE STARS (1962), EARTHMAN, COME HOME (1955), and THE TRIUMPH OF TIME (1958). "Part I builds the foundation for the tetralogy: invention of anti-agathic drugs and anti-gravity transport which make it possible to escape decadent Earth. Part II deals with the launching of the Okie cities with their computerized "City Fathers." Part III covers the period leading up to the settlement of New Earth by the Okie city New York. Part IV encompasses nothing less than the destruction of the old and creation of a new universe." - Mowshowitz, p. 302. Anatomy of Wonder ((2004) II-137. Survey of Science Fiction Literature I, pp. 358-62.
BLOOD RUNS COLD.
New York: Simon and Schuster, 1961. Octavo, boards. First edition. Collection of seventeen short stories, mostly crime, but including several horror stories. Bleiler, The Guide to Supernatural Fiction 211.
THE OPENER OF THE WAY.
Sauk City, Wisconsin: Arkham House, 1945. Octavo, First edition. 2065 copies printed. Inscribed and signed on the title page by Bloch. The author's first book, preceded by a 40-page booklet printing four stories. Barron (ed), Fantasy and Horror (1999) 4-19. Barron (ed), Horror Literature 3-29. Bleiler, The Guide to Supernatural Fiction 209. Tymn (ed), Horror Literature 4-30.
THE TOYNBEE CONVECTOR.
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1988. Octavo, cloth backed boards. First edition. This is the author's first story collection since 1980.
WHO?
Boston: Gregg Press, 1979. Octavo, cloth. First U.S. hardcover edition, first printing. This copy signed by Budry's on the front free endpaper. "An American scientist is badly injured in an explosion, then "repaired" by Soviet doctors and returned to the USA. The problem is that he is now virtually a cyborg and no one can be sure of his identity. A clever cold-war thriller which established this young writer's reputation." - Pringle, The Ultimate Guide to Science Fiction, second edition (1995), p. 419. "A strong indictment of the idiocies dignified at that time (and to a great extent still today) as 'security,' but a parable also of estrangement and alienation more generally." - Anatomy of Wonder (2004) II-183. "Perhaps as fine a study of dehumanization and alienation as SF will ever produce." - Gene Wolfe. 1959 Hugo nominee. Filmed in 1973 with Elliott Gould and Trevor Howard, it is faithful to the concept of the novel. Retitled for the video release as Roboman, apparently to cash in on the Robocop craze. Survey of Science Fiction Literature V, pp. 2474-77.
THE GODS OF MARS.
New York: Grosset & Dunlap Publishers, n.d., [c. 1933-34]. Octavo, pp. [i-vi] vii-xi [xii] 1-348, one inserted plate with illustration by Frank E. Schoonover, original red cloth, front and spine stamped in green and black, top edge stained green. Later edition. The second in the Mars series. Heins GM-4. Luke, Bibliography of the Grosset & Dunlap Reprints GM-7, Jacket variant 9b.
LOST ON VENUS.
Tarzana, California: Edgar Rice Burroughs, Inc. Publishers, [1935]. Octavo, pp. [1-4] 5 [6-8] 9-318 [319: ads] [320: blank], five inserted plates with illustrations by J. Allen St. John, original pebbled blue cloth, front and spine panels stamped in orange, top edge stained red. First edition. Second book of the Venus series. Anatomy of Wonder (1976) 2-29. Bleiler (1978), p. 35. Reginald 02293. Heins LV-1.
THE FOLK OF THE FRINGE.
West Bloomfield, MI: Phantasia Press, 1989. Octavo, Hardcover. First edition. Trade edition. Signed inscription by Card. Five stories about life on the fringe in America's future, when society has collapsed under the weight of war. Sargent, British and American Utopian Literature, 1986-2009.
THUS WAS ADONIS MURDERED.
London: [William] Collins [Sons & Co., Ltd.], 1981. Octavo, cloth. First edition. Author's first mystery novel.
KILLER IN THE RAIN.
Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1964. Octavo, cloth. First edition. Collection of eight stories, five previously uncollected. All where used in parts of his early Philip Marlowe novels, THE BIG SLEEP, FAREWELL, MY LOVELY and THE LADY IN THE LAKE. Introduction by Philip Durham. Hubin, pp. 152-153.
THE SAINT AND THE PEOPLE IMPORTERS.
Garden City: Published For The Crime Club By Doubleday & Co., Inc., 1972. Octavo, boards. First hardcover edition. Apparently precedes the U.K. hardcover edition which is published in 1973, the U.K. paperback was published in 1971. According to Hubin this was adapted from a teleplay written by Fleming Lee with final manuscript revision by Charteris, Hubin: Crime Fiction: A Comprehensive Bibliography 1749-1990, p. 155.