Featured Items
LORDS OF THE STARSHIP.
London: Michael Joseph, [1971]. Octavo, boards. First edition. A military dystopia on Earth in the far future. "The starship is centuries in the building; around the immense yards nations rise and fall, battle after battle is fought. In the end, the whole thing is exposed as a terrible lie. A weird, horrifying future of continuous flux, stasis and war. Geston's first novel [as well as his first book], published when he was barely out of his teens. Amazing." - Pringle, The Ultimate Guide to Science Fiction, second edition (1995), pp. 216-7. One of the major novels of the 1960s. Anatomy of Wonder (2004) II-434. Sargent, British and American Utopian Literature, 1516-1985, p. 304. Survey of Science Fiction Literature III, pp. 1261-64.
THE SHADOWY THIRD AND OTHER STORIES.
Garden City: Doubleday, Page & Company, 1923. Octavo, pp. [1-6] [1-2] 3-291 [292: blank] [note: title leaf is an insert], inserted frontispiece with color illustration by Elenore Plaisted Abbott, title page printed in orange and black, original red-brown cloth, front and spine panels stamped in gold. First edition. "Psychological ghost stories by Pulitzer Prize winning Virginia regionalist; including oft-reprinted title story, also 'Dare's Gift,' an excellent treatment of ancestral curse theme. Subtle, sophisticated work; moral transgressions expiated in a supernatural context." - Robert Knowlton. Bleiler, The Guide to Supernatural Fiction 695. Sullivan (ed), The Penguin Encyclopedia of Horror and the Supernatural, pp. 171-72. Bleiler (1978), p. 82. Reginald 06028. Kelley, p. 55 (setting A; only impression).
RUMORS OF SPRING.
New York: Bantam, 1987. Octavo, Hardcover. First edition. "..Rumor of Spring is beautifully written and constantly surprising." - Anatomy of Wonder (1995) 4-189.
THE METAL GIANTS AND OTHERS: THE COLLECTED EDMOND HAMILTON VOLUME ONE.
Royal Oak, MI: Haffner Press, 2009. Octavo, cloth. First edition. One of 1,000 copies of the trade edition. Collects thirteen stories first published in Weird Tales and Amazing Stories/Amazing Stories Quarterly 1926-1929. Introduction by Robert Weinberg.
HAMMETT HOMICIDES.
New York: Dell Publishing Company, Inc., nd. [1948]. Small octavo, covver by Gerald Gregg. pictorial wrappers. Later edition. Dell 223. A mapback edition. First Dell edition. Collects the following stories, The House on Turk Street, The Girl With the Silver eyes, Night Shots, The Main Death (all Continental Op stories), Two Sharp Knives and Ruffian's Wife. Introduction by Ellery Queen.
BETWEEN PLANETS.
New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1951. Octavo, illustration by Clifford Geary, cloth. First edition. A Heinlein juvenile novel.
GLORY ROAD.
New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, [1963]. Octavo, jacket illustration by Irv Doktor, cloth. First edition. Nominated for the Hugo award for best novel. Anatomy of Wonder (1987) 3-200. Barron (ed): Fantasy Literature 4A-135. Pringle, Modern Fantasy: The Hundred Best Novels #27.
GRUMBLES FROM THE GRAVE ...
New York: Ballantine Books, [January 1990, i.e. November 1989]. Octavo, pp. [i-viii] ix-xviii, [1-2] 3-281 [282-283] [284-286: blank] [note: last leaf is a blank], illustrations, cloth-backed boards. First edition. A selection of letters written by Heinlein between 1939 and 1972, mainly to his editors (including John W. Campbell) and his longtime agent Lurton Blassingame. Appendixes include "Cuts in Red Planet" and "'Postlude' to Podkayne of Mars–Original Version." Edited, with "A Short Biography of Robert A. Heinlein" and other material, by Virginia Heinlein.
SPACE CADET.
New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1948. Octavo, illustrated by Clifford Geary, cloth. First edition. Heinlein's second young adult SF novel. Influenced by the author's experience at the U.S. Naval Academy.
STARMAN JONES.
New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, [1953]. Octavo, Illustrated by Clifford Geary, cloth. First edition. A Heinlein juvenile novel. "Striking are the detailed, convincing picture of spaceship operational procedures and the suspense whenever the ship must pass through an anomaly."- Anatomy of Wonder (1995) 5-64.
MIDNIGHT COWBOY.
New York: Simon and Schuster, [1965]. Octavo, cloth. First edition. Basis for the 1969 film with Jon Voight and Dustin Hoffman.
WHERE STRANGE GODS CALL: PAGES OUT OF THE EAST.
New York & London: The Century Co., [1924]. Octavo, cloth. First edition. Travelogue of the author's visits to Asian countries.
SHADOWS OF IMAGINATION: THE FANTASIES OF C. S. LEWIS, J. R. R. TOLKIEN AND CHARLES WILLIAMS...
Carbondale and Edwardsville: Southern Illinois University Press. London and Amsterdam: Feffer & Simons, Inc., [1979]. Octavo, pp. [i-v] vi-vii [viii-ix] x-xvii [xviii-xx] 1-190 [191-196: blank] [note: last three leaves are blanks], cloth. First printing of the enlarged edition. Collects thirteen essays by Chad Walsh, Hillegas, and others, enlarged by inclusion of a new essay, "The Wonder of The Silmarillion," by Peter Kreeft.
MEN OF THE DEEP WATERS.
London: Eveleigh Nash, 1914. Octavo, pp. [1-5] 6-11 [12] 13-303 [304: printer's imprint] [305-306: ads], original red cloth, front cover stamped in black with blind stamped border, spine stamped in black. First edition. Second binding of red cloth lettered in black. Collects two poems and ten short stories of the sea including "The Voice in the Night," Hodgson's most famous horror story. Ashley, Who's Who in Horror and Fantasy Fiction, pp. 94-5. Bleiler, The Guide to Supernatural Fiction 820. Bleiler, Science-Fiction: The Early Years 1108. Locke, A Spectrum of Fantasy, p. 114. Tymn (ed), Horror Literature 3-109. Sullivan (ed), The Penguin Encyclopedia of Horror and the Supernatural, pp. 203-04. See Barron (ed), Horror Literature 3-90. Bleiler (1978), p. 101. Reginald 07286.
BLACK VULMEA'S VENGEANCE & OTHER TALES OF PIRATES.
West Kingston, Rhode Island: Donald M. Grant, Publisher, 1976. Large octavo, cloth. First edition. Collects three novelettes, "Swords of the Red Brotherhood," first published here, "Black Vulmea's Vengeance", first published in Golden Fleece (1938) and "The Isle of Pirates' Doom," first published in 1975.
ETCHINGS IN IVORY: POEMS IN PROSE.
Pasedena, TX: Glenn Lord, 1968. Small octavo, printed wrappers. First edition. The correct first edition printed on laid paper water marked "Tweedweave" with "ROBERT E. HOWARD" printed on front wrapper in 18-point Bodoni Modern capital letters. 268 copies printed.
THRILLING WONDER STORIES.
New York: Standard Magazines, Inc., 1952. Octavo, single issue, cover by Earle Bergey, pictorial wrappers. Pulp magazine. Includes a Magnus Ridolph story "The Kokod Warriors" by Jack Vance. Tymm and Ashley, Science Fiction, Fantasy, and Weird Fiction Magazines, pp. 743-762.
THE FIVE JARS. Introduction by Rosemary Pardoe.
Penyffordd, Chester: Ash-Tree Press, 1995. Octavo, cloth. Later edition. Limited to 300 copies. The Ash-Tree Press edition adds a new introduction by Rosemary Pardoe. The second book published by the Ash-Tree Press and their first hardcover volume, preceded by LADY STANHOPE'S MANUSCRIPT AND OTHER SUPERNATURAL TALES.
NEW SPORTS MAGAZINE.
Chicago, IL: Popular Publications, Inc., 1949. Octavo, single issue, pictorial wrappers. Pulp magazine. This issue has a John D. MacDonald story, "Fight, Scrub, Fight!"
SOMNIUM, SEU OPUS POSTHUMUM DE ASTRONOMIA LUNARI. DIVULGATUM À M. LUDOVICO KEPPLERO FILIO, MEDICINAE CANDIDATO.
Sagan and Frankfurt: Sumptibus haeredum authoris, 1634. Small quarto (196 x 151 mm), two parts in one volume: pp. [1-4] 1-182 [183-184], title within typographical border, 6 woodcut diagrams in the text, woodcut head and tail pieces, modern full calf binding by Atelier Laurencet. First edition. A virtually unobtainable edition of a highly important early imaginary voyage to the Moon. "The 'Dream' is a curiously interesting tract for two reasons. First, its fantasy framework of a voyage to the Moon made it a pioneering and remarkably prescient piece of science fiction. Second, its perceptive description of celestial motions as seen from the Moon produced an ingenious polemic on behalf of the Copernican system." - DSB. The final part is Kepler's translation of, and commentary on, Plutarch's fantasy on the face of the Moon (see Nicolson, pp. 16-7). Kepler wrote SOMNIUM in 1609, circulating it in manuscript form, after which he amended and added to it, but the work was not published until after his death in 1630. "Around 1611, Kepler circulated a manuscript of what would eventually be published posthumously as SOMNIUM (A Dream), part of the purpose of which was to describe what practicing astronomy would be like from the prospective of another planet, and to demonstrate the feasibility of a non-geocentric system. The first version of SOMNIUM, a thesis rejected by the University of Tübingen in 1593, was shelved until 1609 when Kepler worked on developing it into its final form, a dream narrative with additional material on lunar geography. It was never published at the time, and during the 1620s Kepler, appreciating that it was too succinct and in need of further development, added 223 footnotes explaining the background theoretical physics and astronomy which expanded the text to several times its original length. He also included an essay on lunar geography with explanatory notes. Kepler died in 1630 and the compound manuscript was prepared for publication by his son Ludwig, together with Kepler's translation of Plutarch's 'The Face in the Moon' ... Kepler's SOMNIUM was first published at Frankfurt in 1634 ... The work remained little known for three centuries and was not reissued in the original Latin until 1969. It was first rendered into English in 1947 by Joseph Keith Lane as a thesis for a Master of Arts degree at Columbia University. This was never published. A partial translation of the basic document was made by Everett Bleiler in 1950, but it was not until 1965 that the first complete translation by Patricia Kirkwood was published by the University of California. The subsequent translation and commentary by Edward Rosen (1967, 2003), with its copious notes and introduction, is now regarded as definitive." - Howgego, Encyclopedia of Exploration: Invented and Apocryphal Narratives of Travel K2. "Ironically enough, the best of all supernatural voyages to the Moon was written by a great scientist. Kepler's SOMNIUM marks at once the end and the beginning of an era. No important later voyage will employ so fully the supernatural, yet none will be more truly 'scientific' than that 'Dream,' which was the fons et origo of the new genre, a chief source of cosmic voyages for three centuries." - Nicolson, Voyages to the Moon, pp. 41-7. "... Kepler's SOMNIUM has been very important in the early history of fantastic fiction." - Bleiler, Science-Fiction: The Early Years 1218. Anatomy of Wonder (1976) 1-22; (1981) 1-109; (1987) 1-54; (1995) 1-54; and (2004) II-590. Clute and Nicholls (eds), The Encyclopedia of Science Fiction (1993), p. 662. Ley, Rockets, Missiles, and Space Travel (1951), pp. 14-18. Versins, p. 493.
THE PURE PRODUCT: STORIES ...
New York: Tor, [1997]. Octavo, boards. First edition. Collects two poems and seventeen stories, nine of which appeared earlier in MEETING IN INFINITY (1992). Anatomy of Wonder (2004) II-593.
KATWALK
New York: St. Martin's Press, [1989]. Octavo, boards. First edition. Signed and dated by Kijewski on the title page. The first Kat Colorado mystery.
THINNER.
London: New English Library, 1984. Octavo, Hardcover. First British edition.
WITH THE NIGHT MAIL: A STORY OF 2000 A.D. ...
New York: Doubleday, Page & Company, 1909. Octavo, [1-2] [1-2] 3-77 [78-86] leaves [note: leaves following two preliminary leaves are printed on rectos only; last two leaves are stubs with single folded leaf inserted between them], four inserted plates with color illustrations, two by Frank X. Leyendecker and two by H. Reuterdahl, original blue pictorial cloth, front panel stamped in gold and silver, spine panel stamped in gold, pictorial endpapers, fore and bottom edges rough trimmed. First edition. Collected later the same year in ACTIONS AND REACTIONS. Classic science fiction story of the world of the future governed by the Aerial Board of Control. Anatomy of Wonder (1976) 2-102; (1981) 1-110; (1987) 1-55; (1995) 1-55; and (2004) II-603. Bleiler, Science-Fiction: The Early Years 1234. Clareson, Science Fiction in America, 1870s-1930s 465. Clarke, Tale of the Future (1978), p. 37. Gerber, Utopian Fantasy (1973), p. 145. Lewis, Utopian Literature, p. 107. Locke, A Spectrum of Fantasy, p. 129. Negley, Utopian Literature: A Bibliography 640. Sargent, British and American Utopian Literature, 1516-1985, p. 135. Survey of Science Fiction Literature V, pp. 2053-054. Bleiler (1978), p. 115. Reginald 08282. Stewart 322.
NO BOUNDARIES.
New York: Ballantine Books, [1955]. Small octavo, cover art by Richard Powers, pictorial wrappers. First edition. Ballantine Book 122. Collects five stories, including "Vintage Season," in which time traveling thrill-seekers from the future accidentally annihilate modern man with a fatal plague virus, and "Two-Handed Engine," which depicts a dystopian future society dominated by machines. Sargent, British and American Utopian Literature, 1516-1985, pp. 256-7.