Detective Fiction
London, Hodder & Stoughton, 1938.
First edition. 8vo. Original blue cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 4/-.
A very good copy of this Inspector McLean title by prolific author Goodchild.
Detective Fiction
London, Ward Lock, 1935
First edition. 8vo. Original cloth. Dust-jacket priced at 3/6 on front flap and also has tell tale 3 digits on spine indicating a slightly later issue.
Hubin listed title featuring the author's regular detective Insepctor Mclean and his rather fuller-witted assistant Sergeant Brook
Detective Fiction
London, Hodder & Stoughton, 1941.
First edition. 8vo. Original blue cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 4/-.
Non-stop Inspector McLean - what more could you ask for?
Detective Fiction
London, Hodder & Stoughton, 1930.
First edition. 8vo. Original orange cloth. Dust-jacket, correctly priced 3/6.
A rather lovely copy of this non-McLean title by Goodchild.
Detective Fiction
London, Herbert Jenkins, 1941.
First edition. 8vo. Original orange cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
Excellent jacket artwork on this the last criminous title by Goodwin; a fugitive tale and a rare book in the jacket.
Detective Fiction
London, Putnam, 1932.
First edition. 8vo. Original red cloth. Dust-jacket,
Scotland Yard is baffled by a series of deaths climaxing in that of an oil magnate.
Sci-Fi & Fantasy
London, Heinemann, 1956.
First edition. 8vo. Original dark pink boards. Dust-jacket, pried 13s 6d.
The first edition of this keystone sci-fi work, fascinating on numerous levels, not least for the 'space-folding' capabilities of the indigenous 'dominant beings'.
Modern Literature
London, Hodder & Stoughton, 1939.
First edition. 8vo. Original cloth. Dust-jacket, correctly priced 7/6.
A great first edition of this uncommon 'thirties title in the jacket. The tale of one man's increasingly desperate attempts to avoid mediocrity.
American Literature
London, Chatto & Windus, 1951.
First UK edition. 8vo. Original blue cloth. Dust-jacket.
The US author's debut novel, and the most well regarded and critically acclaimed of his works, winner of the 1967 William Faulkner Foundation Award for notable first novel.
![Bruce Graeme, Blackshirt, first edition, [1925]](https://lycanthiabooks.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/84608-300x300.jpg)
Detective Fiction
London, T. Fisher Unwin, [1925].
First edition. 8vo. Original black cloth lettered in red. Dust-jacket, correctly priced at 3/6.
The notoriously difficult first edition of the first book in the Blackshirt series, by a founding member of the Crime Writer's Association. Despite the chipping, the upper panel with its wonderful artwork is intact.
London, Hutchinson, [1937].
First edition. 8vo. Original red cloth. Dust-jacket, early issue priced 3/6.
A very good first edition, in early jacket, of what is widely held to be one of the best shipboard murder-mysteries ever written. By the author the original 'Blackshirt' books.
London, T. Fisher Unwin Ltd (Ernest Benn Ltd), 1927 [but 1928?]..
First edition. 8vo. Original cloth. Dust-jacket, second impression (stated, and priced 3s.6d., with Benn imprint to spine).
The second of the author's famous 'Blackshirt' series, nothing to do with Oswald Mosley (or Rodney Spode), rather a 'Raffles'-esque character, author by day, cracksman by night. Early issues of the first and second titles are both known scarcities, especially in the jacket. The book itself has no impression indicated, suggesting it is the first; however, the list of works by the same author facing the title-page includes Passion, Murder and Mystery, which was not published until 1928 (BL). Benn & Fisher Unwin merged in 1926, and this title seems to have been absorbed into Benn's 3/6 Library in 1928 or 1929.
The last time this title surfaced at auction was in 2019, when it made $1875.
Detective Fiction
London, Harrap, 1933.
First edition. 8vo. Original black cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
The first mystery written under the pseudonym "David Graeme", introducing Raoul de Rohan, an ancestor of the later Blackshirt character that first appeared in 1925.
Weird & Supernatural
Graham (Winifred, pseud. Matilda Winifred Muriel) The Gods of the Dead
London, Rider, 1912.
First edition. 8vo. Original blind-tooled purple cloth.
A rare work of a weird & supernatural bent, Egyptian mummies, reincarnation, ghosts, that sort of thing... Winifred Graham was a a prolific author, though this title was the only one of hers to make it into Bleiler's Guide to Supernatural Fiction (and he was not exactly gentle with it therein!). Distinctly uncommon.
Modern Literature
A Novel of Cornwall
London, Ward Lock, 1945.
First edition. 8vo. Original orange cloth. Dust-jacket, correctly priced 8/6.
The book that started it all... also one of the most attractive dust-jackets from the series. Sales of the novel increased by 205% after the premiere of the 2015 television adaptation.
Weird & Supernatural
A Ghost Story
London & New York, Routledge, [1876].
Routledge's Christmas Annual for 1876. 8vo. Illustrations; advertisements. Original pictorial wrappers.
The first appearance of this classic Victorian ghost story by Scottish author Grant, in Routledge's Christmas Annual for 1876. Rare in the original wrappers.
Detective Fiction
Gray (Berkeley) [Brooks (Edwy Searles)] Six Feet of Dynamite
First edition, Collins, 1941. Edwy Searles Brooks was a UK novelist who wrote under a number of pseudonyms including Berkeley Gray and Victor Gunn. This is a rare work from his canon. From the library of Anthony Lejeune.
Detective Fiction
First edition, London, Alfred A. Knopf, 1929. Rare London Knopf imprint, in the remarkable striking dust-jacket designed by Shaw.
Detective Fiction
London, Longmans, Green and Co., 1938.
First edition. 8vo. Original purple cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
'Takes us from Australia to Hollywood and provides us with plenty of exciting and hilarious incident in addition to a romance that has a proper ending.'
War, Invasion & Spy
Written by himself. Foreword by Field-Marshal Earl Haig.
London, John Murray, 1924
First edition. 8vo. Original cloth. Dust-jacket, correctly priced at 15/-.
A scarce work in the original dust-jacket; an impressive autobiographical study by a man of equally impressive military standing, with a career spanning almost 35 years and seeing action in India, Africa and Sudan, as well as service in New Zealand and Cyprus. The foreword is by Field-Marshal Douglas Haig, a divisive figure in military history, garnering the unfavourable, and possibly unfair, moniker 'The Butcher of the Somme' for his strategic role in WW1.
Weird & Supernatural
or, the Dwarf and the Seer: A Caledonian Legend
London, Joseph Emans, 1824.
First edition. 8vo. Contemporary calf, rebacked in later calf.
A Gothic novel set in medieval Scotland, surprisingly uncommon with only 3 copies recorded in institutional holdings.
Modern Literature
London, Heinemann, 1935.
First edition. 8vo. Original red cloth.
A first edition from master storyteller Graham Greene, the tale of ne'er-do-well Anthony Farrant, who has boasted, lied and cheated his way through jobs all over the world.
Modern Literature
First edition.
London, Heinemann, 1955.
A tale of romance, gambling, revenge and redemption, subject to two film adaptations.
War, Invasion & Spy
London, Heinemann, 1958.
First edition. 8vo. Original cloth. Dust-jacket, correctly priced 15s.
A very good first edition of Greene's blackly comic espionage thriller, set amid the vice and squalor of pre-revolutionary Havana.
War, Invasion & Spy
First edition.
London, Heinemann, 1939
Basis of the 1945 film starring Lauren Bacall and Peter Lorre.
War, Invasion & Spy
First edition.
London. Heinemann, 1939
The basis for the 1945 film Confidential Agent, starring Charles Boyer, Lauren Bacall, Katina Paxinou and Peter Lorre. In the book, the nationality of the agent is not stated; in the film, he is Spanish.
Modern Literature
and other essays
London, Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1951.
First edition. 8vo. Original pale cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 12s6d.
A handsome first edition of this collection, in which Greene shares his love affair with reading in this collection of essays, memories, and critical considerations, both affectionate and tart.
Detective Fiction
London, John Hamilton, [1939].
First edition. 8vo. Original blue cloth. Dust-jacket, 7/6.
That "debonair, monocled dude of South Africa", the Major, is back.
Detective Fiction
London, John Hamilton, [1934].
First edition. 8vo. Original pale blue cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6 to inside front flap with later price-sticker of 1/- to spine.
A decent first edition of this story set in South Africa, by a British author who spent several years in Rhodesia working as a civil servant.
Modern Literature
London, John Hamilton, [1935].
First edition. 8vo. Original red boards. Dust-jacket, priced 3/6.
A decent first edition of this adventure story by a British author who spent several years in Rhodesia working as a civil servant.
Children's Books
his travels and perils
London, S.O. Beeton, n.d. [1865/66].
First edition. 8vo. Original green cloth, gilt tooled spine.
The rare true first edition in book form of this adventure tale, serialised previously in Boys Own in 1865. Ward Lock took over Beeton in 1866 and republished the title that year under their own imprint.
Detective Fiction
London, Herbert Jenkins, 1936.
First edition. 8vo. Original mustard yellow cloth. Dust-jacket, correctly priced 7/6.
A splendid first edition of this romantic novel about a young musical protégé's adventures.
Detective Fiction
London, Philip Allan, 1937.
First edition. 8vo. Original blue cloth. Dust-jacket.
A collection of short stories, drawn from the case-book of Gribble's series character Superintendent Anthony Slade.
Modern Literature
First edition.
Edinburgh & London. William Blackwood, 1913
very rare in dust-jacket, correctly priced at 6/- "It would need more than a ten years' change of date and a series of pseudonyms to conceal the fact that Sydney Grier has taken the events which happened in the Jamaica rising of the early 'sixties as her theme and Governor Eyre as her hero. " [Spectator, October 1913]
Illustrated Books
One
Sheffield, Dancing Elephant Enterprises, June 1986.
Large 8vo. Comic-book format. Original pictorial wrappers.
An early publication by Grist, who would garner fame as the creator of hard-boiled police series 'Kane' and his unorthodox superhero series 'Jack Staff', published under his own imprint Dancing Elephant Enterprises.
Sci-Fi & Fantasy
London, John Lane The Bodley Head, 1919.
First edition. 8vo. Advertisements. Original blue cloth ruled in black. Dust-jacket, correctly priced 7s.
A very good early dust-jacket, uncommon thus. This collection of tale comes from the pen of Scottish author Gerald Grogan, author of the sci-fi novel A Drop in Infinity (1915); the author was killed in the First World War, in 1918.