Weird & Supernatural
and other stories
London, Cassell, [1920].
First edition. 8vo. Original decorative cloth, spine slightly sunned.
A very good copy of this collection by the creator of the Mapp & Lucia series, which includes, alongside the titular story alongside The Blackmailer of Park Lane, The Dance on the Beefsteak, The Oriolists In the Dark, The False Step and The Case of Frank Hampden. Some tales with supernatural tones.
Detective Fiction
London, Cassell, 1930.
First edition. 8vo. Original brown cloth. Dust-jacket, correctly priced 7/6.
The first UK edition of the fourth Charlie Chan book by Biggers, who set out to create a character that was the opposite of the 'yellow peril' portrayal of Orientals as villains that was the trend at the time. Uncommon in the dust-jacket.
Weird & Supernatural
London, Cassell, 1923.
First edition. 8vo. Original blue cloth lettered in gilt. Dust-jacket, priced 15/.
The early autobiography of legendary weird fiction author Algernon Blackwood, describing the author's life, adventures and misadventures in North America between his twentieth and thirtieth years. Uncommon in the dust-jacket. Precedes the US limited edition (1924).
Modern Literature
London, Cassell, 1932.
First UK edition. 8vo. Original black cloth lettered in red. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
An attractively jacketed edition of this work by US writer Katharine Brush, one of the most popular authors of her time, as well as one of most well-paid. 'Red headed woman! She went to New York; men looked at her, and say "Boy!"' (jacket). The book was adapted for the silver screen the same year, starring Jean Harlow as a woman who uses sex to advance her social position.
Detective Fiction
London, Cassell, 1926.
First edition. 8vo. Original black cloth blocked in red.
An uncommonly good example of this highly collectable Father Brown first edition: Father Brown 'unravels the tangled skein of crime with entire success, and does it with convincing common-sense logic' (dust jacket).
Detective Fiction
London &c., Cassell, 1913.
First edition. 8vo. 4pp. advertisements. Original brown cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 6/-.
The first chapter of Mr. Edge's story is enough to indicate the mystery which is to be unravelled, and every succeeding chapter makes the mystery deeper until the final elucidation... (The Bookseller, Vol. 60, 1914).
An early detective fiction title, in a remarkably excellent pre WW1 dust-jacket. Exceptionally scarce, with only six copies recorded by WorldCat, and no copies in trade or at auction that we could trace.
Modern Literature
London, Cassell, 1920
First edition. 8vo. Original light brown cloth. Dust-jacket, correctly priced at 8/6 net on spine.
An Allan Quatermain novel, direct sequel to The Ivory Child. An interesting way of resurrecting the character of Allan away from the period and Africa of his day.
Rare in jacket.
Modern Literature
London, Cassell, 1926.
First edition. 8vo. Original green cloth.
The first edition of one of Hall's better known works, after The Well of Loneliness, about a waiter who becomes disgusted with his job and goes to live in the forest as a hermit.
Detective Fiction
London, Cassell, [1886].
First edition. 8vo. 16pp. publisher's catalogue at end, dated '3 G. 8.86'.
A creative and productive author, Julian Hawthorne never sadly quite lived up to the literary pedigree inherited from his father, Nathaniel Hawthorne, but his fiction is engaging and often incorporates the sort of weird and sci-fi elements on which later subgenre fiction was predicated. This novel sees the author dallying rather with crime fiction, including mob-like figures, a bank robbery and the curse of opium addiction...
Detective Fiction
London, Cassell, 1945.
First edition. 8vo. Original cloth. Dust-jacket, correctly priced 7/6.
An intriguing psychological thriller by the author & philosopher H.F. Heard, author of The Ascent of Humanity (1929).
Weird & Supernatural
and Other Weird Tales
London, Cassell, 1947.
First UK edition. 8vo. Original orange cloth. Dust-jacket, price-clipped and with publisher's '4/6 Cheap Edition' sticker to upper panel.
A collection of mysterious and weird tales, by an author who numbered among his close friends Aldous Huxley and Christopher Isherwood, and whose work was compared favourably to that of H.G. Wells and Conan Doyle: "He plays as daringly with the test tubes of science as did the early H.G. Wells...Mr. Heard is a new master in this field..." (New York Times).
Children's Books
London, Cassell, 1941.
First UK edition. 8vo. Original brown cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 8/6.
The original Lassie novel, which led to numerous films and TV series, first published in Chicago in 1940. Uncommon in such nice condition.
Modern Literature
London, Cassell, 1925.
First edition. 8vo. Original brown cloth. Dust-jacket, no price.
An excellent first edition of this the sequel to Mackenzie's Carnival.
Detective Fiction
First edition.
London, Cassell, 1935.
The Phantom Gunman is the author’s first crime novel and imagines what would happen if Chicago gangsters were to come over to London. Features serial character Mrs Pym.
Exceptionally scarce in a jacket
Modern Literature
London, Cassell, 1926. First edition. Inscribed presentation copy from the author. 8vo. Original brown cloth. Tales of Indian life. Uncommon, especially thus inscribed.
Weird & Supernatural
A Romance of the Soul London &c., Cassell, 1912. First edition. 8vo. Original cloth. A solid first edition copy of this occult tale by Australian author Rosa Praed, underlined eventually by the reformative qualities of Christianity.
Detective Fiction
London, Cassell, 1944.
First UK edition. 8vo. Original cloth. Dust-jacket, correctly priced at 8/6.
Given it is a War-time production this is a surprisingly good first UK edition of this later but uncommon Sax Rohmer title.
Horror & Gothic
London, Cassell, 1936.
First UK edition. 8vo. Original black cloth with red spine label. Dust-jacket, correctly priced 7/6.
A rare Sax Rohmer edition, in which an ancient Egyptian secret intriguingly like atomic power is unleashed. Distinctly hard to find in the original dust-jacket.
Detective Fiction
Rohmer (Sax) [pseud. Arthur Sarsfield Ward]. Yu’an Hee See Laughs.
London, Cassell, 1933
'Popular edition'. 8vo. Original brown cloth. Dust-jacket, priced at 2/6.
An attractive copy of this early issue (the first UK edition was published the year before), from the creator of the sinister Dr Fu Manchu. The villainous & nebulous Yu'an Hee See does battle with Scotland Yard's Dawson Haigh against a backdrop of Limehouse, Marseilles, the Mediterranean and the Near East, with a vast fortune of gold at stake...
Weird & Supernatural
London [&c.], Cassell, 1941
First UK edition. 8vo. Original cloth. Dust-jacket.
A good copy of this title from the popular Fu Manchu series of books by Sax Rohmer.
Modern Literature
A Novel
London, Cassell, 1933.
First edition. 8vo. Original blue cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
An attractive first edition by this author of romantic literature set in South Africa and Rhodesia, a writing career which began in 1903 with Virginia of the Rhodesians.
Detective Fiction
First edition.
London, Cassell, 1917.
A collection of eleven tales, one of which is a locked room mystery and two of which have definite weird content. Not mentioned by Bleiler.
“The Mystery of Howard Romaine”
involves the disappearance of a coffin and a body from a locked room (Adey p.300)
The Cuckoo Clock" is a tale of delirium involving the transmigration of a soul into a cuckoo clock. "The Fatal Fairy" is about a man who kidnaps a fairy at dawn, whereupon it turns into a monstrous baby vulture -- until he releases it a day later.
Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree was an English actor and theatre manager. This collection appeared in the year of his death.
Very scarce in jacket.
Modern Literature
London, Cassell, 1935.
First edition. 8vo. Original black cloth lettered in gilt. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
A very pleasing first edition of this classic Vachell title.
Modern Literature
London, Cassell, 1933.
First edition. 8vo. Original blue cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 3/6.
A yearning for 'volcanic love' sees Veronica Manners travelling to South America, in this pleasingly jacketed first edition.