American Literature
London, Hamish Hamilton, 1958.
First UK edition. 8vo. Original red boards. Dust-jacket, priced 12s6d.
The first UK edition of Capote's famous novella, filled out famously for the film starring Audrey Hepburn and George Peppard.
Detective Fiction
London, Hamish Hamilton, 1938.
First UK edition. 8vo. Original green cloth.
The first UK edition of what is considered one of the best locked room mysteries of all time.
Detective Fiction
London, Hamish Hamilton, 1940.
First UK edition. 8vo. Original grey cloth.
Macabre murder mystery by one of the great Golden Age authors, uncommon.
Children's Books
London, Ward, Lock, c.1933.
4to. Original cloth-backed pictorial boards. Dust-jacket.
A very attractive example of this edition of Carroll's classic for children, splendidly illustrated by Margaret Tarrant throughout.
Detective Fiction
London, Hamish Hamilton, 1950.
First UK edition. 8vo. Original red cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 10s6d.
Contains Chandler's essay on the art of detective stories and a collection of eight classic Chandler mysteries.
London, Hutchinson, [1938].
First edition. 8vo. Original blue cloth lettered in white. Dust-jacket, priced 7/6.
A very attractive first edition by the woman who not only married Dennis Wheatley but also convinced him to take up writing. "A riot of romance set in the most glamorous town in Europe," according to the publisher's preferred jacket blurb.
London, Hutchinson, [1935].
First edition. 8vo. Original orange cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 3/6.
Attractive first edition of this important anthology, featuring Anthony Berkeley, John Dickson Carr, Agatha Christie, Dorothy L. Sayers and many many more of the biggest names in crime fiction.
Detective Fiction
London, Cassell, 1926.
First edition. 8vo. Original black cloth blocked in red. Later issue jacket, priced 3/6.
An uncommonly good jacket, albeit not first issue, on 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'.
A Diary of Tragic Adventure
London, John Murray, 1937.
First edition. 8vo. Original pale blue cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 6s.
The tragic true story of Edgar Christian, who, along with his cousin John Hornby and another companion, starved to death in the Barren Lands of the Canadian Arctic during an ill-fated expedition in the late 1920s. This edition had sections removed, possibly due to perceived implications of homosexuality, with a fuller version published in 1980 as Death in the Barren Ground.
Detective Fiction
New York, Grosset & Dunlap, 1937.
First US edition, no printing specified on copyright page. 8vo. Original dark beige cloth lettered in dark blue. Early/first reprint dust-jacket, no price.
The first US edition of one of Christie's most famous Poirot novels, here in probably the first reprint dust-jacket, issued the same year.
Detective Fiction
London, Collins, 1954.
First edition. 8vo. Original red cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 10s6d.
An attractive first edition example of this 1950s Agatha Christie, set largely in Morocco.
Detective Fiction
London, Collins Crime Club, 1952.
First UK edition. 8vo. Original orange cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 9s6d.
A decent first UK edition of this famous village 'whodunit', playfully placing Poirot in the scene rather than Miss Marple.
Detective Fiction
New York, Dodd, Mead, 1929.
First US edition. 8vo. Original turquoise cloth lettered & decorated in red. Dust-jacket.
An attractive first US edition of this short story collection featuring Christie's detectives Tommy and Tuppence Beresford, first introduced in The Secret Adversary (1922). All of the stories in the collection had previously been published in magazines.
Detective Fiction
A New Poirot Mystery
New York, Dodd, Mead, 1936.
First US edition. 8vo. Original yellow cloth. Dust-jacket, priced $2.00.
First USA edition of this excellent Hercule Poirot novel, satisfyingly televised by the BBC in 2018 with John Malkovich as the moustachioed detective.
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, 1962.
First edition. 8vo. Original red boards. Dust-jacket, price-clipped.
An appealing first edition of this Miss Marple staple.
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.
Detective Fiction
London, Alston Rivers, [1932].
First edition. 8vo. Original green cloth. Dust-jacket, priced 7s6d.
"This thrilling novel deals with the ever threatening Red Menace..." (jacket blurb).
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.
![Len Deighton, [The Harry Palmer quartet], 4 vol., first editions, 1962-66.](https://lycanthiabooks.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/85928-300x300.jpg)
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.