Detective Fiction
London, Collins Crime Club, 1960.
First edition. 8vo. Original red boards. Dust-jacket.
A nice first edition of this Hercule Poirot title, featuring five cases set in an English country house at Christmas time.
Detective Fiction
London, Collins Crime Club, 1955.
8vo. Original red cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 6s.
Attractive jacketed edition of this murder-mystery with supernatural elements.
Modern Literature
London, John Lane The Bodley Head, 1927.
First edition. 8vo. Original black cloth lettered and ruled in pink. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
An attractive first edition by this Scottish author, one of his 'lunatic at large' series of books.
Modern Literature
London, Eveligh, Nash & Grayson, [1922].
First edition. 8vo. Original red cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
The continuing Wodehousian adventures of adventures of Mr. Francis Mandell-Essington, the basis for the 1927 silent film The Lunatic at Large.
Weird & Supernatural
London, Smith, Elder, 1875.
'New Edition'. 8vo. Later half calf.
Wilkie Collins's first collection of six short stories, first published in 1856. The book is a series of tales supposed to be told to poor travelling portrait-painter, William Kerby, who is forced to abandon his profession for six months in order to save his sight.
Victorian Literature
London, Sampson Low, Son, & Co., 1862.
First edition. 3 vols. 8vo. Original blind tooled red cloth, spine lettered & decorated in gilt.
A very good first edition set in the original cloth of this epic tale of disinheritance and illegitimacy, originally serialised in Charles Dickens' magazine All the Year Round.
Modern Literature
London, Hodder & Stoughton, [1928].
First UK edition. 8vo. Original blue cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
Colver was a prolific author, best remembered today perhaps for her Joan Foster series.
Modern Literature
London, Jarrolds, [1938].
First edition. Signed presentation copy from the author. 8vo. Original yellow cloth. Dust-jacket, later issue ('7th thousand') priced 2/6.
Signed by the author on front free endpaper. Great jacket artwork.
Non-Fiction
London, Warne, [1931].
First edition. 8vo. Original brown cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 6/-.
The Story of Electrical Communications.
Detective Fiction
London, Collins, 1922.
First edition. 8vo. Original blue cloth lettered and ruled in red.
Uncommon first edition of this pre Inspector French title.
Weird & Supernatural
or, Ghosts & Ghost Seers
London, Routledge, Warne, and Routledge, 1863.
'New Edition'. 8vo. Modern green cloth preserving original upper cover and part of original spine.
One of two anthologies of supposedly true ghost stories by Crowe, originally published in 1848 and considered one of the first serious collections of this sort. Rare.
Sci-Fi & Fantasy
Whistable, Oyster Press, 1994.
First edition. One of 500 numbered copies. Original blue boards. Dust-jacket.
A fine copy of this limited edition autobiographical fantasy by renowned actor Peter Cushing, published shortly before he passed away.
From the outbreak of war with Turkey to the Armistice
London &c., Hodder & Stoughton, 1919.
First edition. 8vo. Original blue cloth lettered in gilt to spine. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
An uncommon book in the original jacket.
Detective Fiction
London, Herbert Jenkins, n.d. [c.1925].
Early printing. 8vo. Original red cloth blocked in black. Dust-jacket, priced 3/6.
Great jacket artwork on this early printing of one of six titles Goodchild published under the name 'Alan Dare', originally published in 1924. The title was reissued under Goodchild's name by Newnes in 1934.
Modern Literature
London, Hutchinson, [1937].
First edition. 8vo. Contemporary lending-library cloth. Dust-jacket, with price-sticker of 2/- to spine.
"A romantic story of impulsive youth", according to the rather lovely dust-jacket's blurb.
Modern Literature
London, John Long, 1938.
First edition. 8vo. Original red cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
The author's first novel, a tale of a neglected housewife and her internal struggle with making the right choice when tempted by an affair.
War, Invasion & Spy
Comprising: The IPCRESS File; Horse Under Water [with original crossword slip]; Funeral in Berlin; Billion-Dollar Brain
London, Hodder & Stoughton; Jonathan Cape, 1962-66.
First editions, first impressions. 4 vol. 8vo. Original boards. Dust-jackets, all correctly priced.
An unusually good set of the first quartet of Deighton's "Harry Palmer" novels (although the character is never actually named in the books); increasingly difficult to find as a set and in comparable condition, here with the original crossword slip in the second book as called for. The stories' popularity received an additional bolstering from the three film versions made starring Michael Caine, and have enjoyed ongoing success for fans of spy fiction, not least as a counterpoint to Fleming's James Bond novels.
War, Invasion & Spy
London, Jonathan Cape, 1963.
First edition. 8vo. Original red boards with black 'rubber stamp' to upper cover. Dust-jacket, price-clipped.
A very good first edition of the second 'Harry Palmer' spy novel (although the character is never named in the books), that began with The IPCRESS File (1962).
Modern Literature
London, Hutchinson, [1934].
First edition. 8vo. Original orange cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
A shipwreck leads to the formation of a new community. Uncommon in jacket.
Sci-Fi & Fantasy
London, Eyre & Spottiswoode, 1930.
First edition. 8vo. Original cloth-backed marbled boards. Dust-jacket, priced 8/6.
The first edition of this science fiction author's reflections on the ways in which the world might in fact end.
Detective Fiction
London, Macmillan, 1977.
First edition. 8vo. Original black boards. Dust-jacket, priced £3.50.
The scarce third Inspector Morse title.
Sci-Fi & Fantasy
London, Rapp & Whiting, 1970.
First UK edition. 8vo. Original boards. Dust-jacket, priced £1.40.
A very good first UK edition of this novel set in a future 1992 where psychics are common and utilised in corporate espionage while intricate technologies allow recently deceased people to be maintained in a lengthy state of hibernation.
Modern Literature
Diehl (Ludwig); Wilcox (Louise Collier, translator) The Sardonic Smile
London, Thornton Butterworth, 1928.
First English edition. 8vo. Original blue cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
A very nice, jacketed first edition in English of Diehl's novelised take on the life of Heinrich Heine.
Children's Books
London, John Lane The Bodley Head, 1934.
First UK edition. Small 4to. Original pictorial boards. Dust-jacket, priced 2/6.
"Story and Illustrations by the staff of the Walt Disney Studios".
Children's Books
London, Newnes, 1936.
First edition. 8vo. Original brown cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 3/6.
Maritime treasure-hunting thriller for children; listed in Hubin.
Detective Fiction
comprising: The Adventure of the Blue Carbuncle; The Adventure of the Speckled Band; The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor; The Adventure of the Copper Beeches
London, George Newnes, 1892.
Together in The Strand Magazine, vol.III January to June. 4to. Bound in contemporary half calf, spine gilt.
Including several of the most famous Sherlock Holmes adventures, in their original first appearance.
Detective Fiction
London, Newnes, 1902.
First edition. 8vo. Original red cloth blocked in elaborate gilt to upper cover and spine, with inset black silhouette of the Hound to upper cover.
Without doubt one of the most thrilling and atmospheric adventures of everybody's favourite consulting detective, a glorious blend of goth pseudo supernatural and definitive Holmesian deductive scene stealing, The Hound of the Baskervilles exists very much in a realm of its own.
The novel, the third of four featuring Holmes, was the first tale to be published after Doyle threw his most notable creation off a waterfall, and its considerable commercial success was really the catalyst for Holmes' triumphal return to life. With more plots than Varney the Vampire (actually five in all, including red herrings...so we're exaggerating, because everyone knows Varney has about 750), it seems very much a harking back to the Victorian style of creeper, very Le Fanu or Wilkie Collins, with its diary entries, and letters, unearthed manuscript and doom laden portents uttered by gloomy locals staring out of windows overlooking marsh land.
American Literature
An essay toward an autobiography of a race concept
New York, Harcourt, Brace, 1940.
First edition. 8vo. Original dark orange cloth. Dust-jacket, priced $3.00.
An important work, regarded in part as one of the first scientific treatises in the field of American sociology. The title refers to his hope that African Americans were passing out of the darkness of racism into an era of greater equality.
American Literature
The Negroes in the Making of America
Boston, Mass., The Stratford Co., 1924.
First edition. 8vo. Original blue cloth lettered in gilt.
An important work by the American sociologist, socialist, historian, and Pan-Africanist civil rights activist Du Bois, highlighting the unique contributions of African-Americans in building the United States.
Children's Books
Dulac (Edmund).- Quiller-Couch (Sir Arthur) The Sleeping Beauty
and other fairy tales from the old French
London, Hodder & Stoughton, 1910.
First Dulac edition. Deluxe issue, one of 1000 numbered copies signed by the artist. 4to. Original brown morocco gilt.
A handsome copy of the superior issue of Dulac's rendering of these fairy tale classics.
Detective Fiction
London, Skeffington, n.d..
Early printing, stating '6th Thousand' on jacket spine. 8vo. Original olive cloth. Dust-jacket, with price rather dramatically excised from spine.
An early printing of the US author's first book.
Detective Fiction
Eadie (Arlton, pseud. Leopold Leonard Eadie) The Crimson Query
London, Skeffington, n.d..
Early printing, stating '7th Thousand' to title-page. 8vo. Original red boards. Dust-jacket, priced 2/6.
Originally published in 1929, sometimes subtitled Or How the Squid Got Besuckered, introduces a villain known as the Crimson Query because he leaves, Zorro-like, a sign of his machinations. In this case, a bright red question mark. All in all, this hard-to-find detective story stands alongside the more horrific novels Eadie is known for.
Modern Literature
London, Nicholson & Watson, 1939.
First edition. 8vo. Original green cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
Attractive jacket artwork on this uncommon first edition about the divisive effect a legacy gift has on a town.
Detective Fiction
London, Faber & Faber, 1935.
First edition. 8vo. Original black cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
22 murder stories that only appeared in periodical form before.