The Night-Comers -
Eric Ambler
1956 - William Heinemann Ltd, London - First Edition
A fine first edition of this thriller set in Southeast Asia. 'The Night-Comers' covers 24 critical hours in a military coup d'etat. Published in America as 'State of Siege'. Filmed by Rank in 1959.
Written by Ambler on his return from travelling through Southeast Asia.
Batik style patterned dust jacket designed by Judith Bledsoe.
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Price HK$ 1,100
1956 - William Heinemann Ltd, London - First Edition
A fine first edition of this thriller set in Southeast Asia. 'The Night-Comers' covers 24 critical hours in a military coup d'etat. Published in America as 'State of Siege'. Filmed by Rank in 1959.Written by Ambler on his return from travelling through Southeast Asia.
Batik style patterned dust jacket designed by Judith Bledsoe.
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Price HK$ 1,100
Cause For Alarm -
Eric Ambler
1940 - Alfred A. Knopf, New York - Second Printing
A classic Ambler spy thriller.
‘It seemed to me that the train had started to make a curious thumping noise. I tried to separate the noise, identify it, and realised that it was the sound of the blood pumping in my head. I knew suddenly that I was scared, scared stiff’
‘Nicky Marlow needs a job. He's engaged to be married and the employment market in Britain in 1937 is pretty slim. So when his fiancée points out the position with an English armaments manufacturer in Italy, he jumps at the chance. Soon after he arrives, however, he learns the sinister truth about his predecessor's departure and finds himself courted by two agents with dangerously different agendas. In the process, Marlow realizes that it's not so simple just to do the job he's paid for - not in fascist Italy, on the eve of a world war’ [Penguin Classics]
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Price HK$ 2,000
1940 - Alfred A. Knopf, New York - Second Printing
A classic Ambler spy thriller.‘It seemed to me that the train had started to make a curious thumping noise. I tried to separate the noise, identify it, and realised that it was the sound of the blood pumping in my head. I knew suddenly that I was scared, scared stiff’
‘Nicky Marlow needs a job. He's engaged to be married and the employment market in Britain in 1937 is pretty slim. So when his fiancée points out the position with an English armaments manufacturer in Italy, he jumps at the chance. Soon after he arrives, however, he learns the sinister truth about his predecessor's departure and finds himself courted by two agents with dangerously different agendas. In the process, Marlow realizes that it's not so simple just to do the job he's paid for - not in fascist Italy, on the eve of a world war’ [Penguin Classics]
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Price HK$ 2,000
The Novels of Jane Austen. Comprising Sense and Sensibility, Pride and Prejudice, Mansfield Park, Emma, Northanger Abbey, and Persuasion -
Jane Austen, Charles and Henry Brock (illustrators)
1922 - J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd., London
‘I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading! How much sooner one tires of anything than of a book! When I have a house of my own, I shall be miserable if I have not an excellent library.'
An elegantly bound six volume set, comprising all of Austen's novels. Beautifully illustrated with ninety-six colour plates by the brothers Charles and Henry Brock, who both worked from the same studio in Cambridge, and have come to be widely regarded as the best illustrators of Jane Austen's works. With an introduction by Reginald Brimley Johnson.
‘Affectation of candour is common enough—one meets with it everywhere. But to be candid without ostentation or design—to take the good of everybody's character and make it still better, and say nothing of the bad—belongs to you alone.’
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Price HK$ 11,500
1922 - J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd., London
‘I declare after all there is no enjoyment like reading! How much sooner one tires of anything than of a book! When I have a house of my own, I shall be miserable if I have not an excellent library.'An elegantly bound six volume set, comprising all of Austen's novels. Beautifully illustrated with ninety-six colour plates by the brothers Charles and Henry Brock, who both worked from the same studio in Cambridge, and have come to be widely regarded as the best illustrators of Jane Austen's works. With an introduction by Reginald Brimley Johnson.
‘Affectation of candour is common enough—one meets with it everywhere. But to be candid without ostentation or design—to take the good of everybody's character and make it still better, and say nothing of the bad—belongs to you alone.’
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Price HK$ 11,500
The Book of Were-Wolves: Being an Account of a Terrible Superstition -
Sabine Baring-Gould
1865 - Smith, London - First Edition
Nearly as rare as it’s subjects, a first edition of the foundation work on shape-shifting, were-wolves, and the inspiration for Bram Stoker’s descriptions of Count Dracula’s wolfish appearance. In original bright pictorial gilt cloth, were-wolf to the front and the dark frontispiece of The Were-Wolves and their prey. Suitably housed in a blood red morocco leather clamshell case, lined with felt, and lettered in gilt.
‘The Book of Were-Wolves takes a rationalistic approach to the subject, the first ten chapters of this book constitute an essential work on the subject; however, starting with Chapter XI, the narrative takes a strange turn into sensationalistic 'true crime' case-studies of cannibals, grave desecrators, and blood fetishists, which have a tenuous connection with lycanthropy. This includes an extended treatment of the case of Giles de Rais, the notorious associate of Joan of Arc, who was convicted and executed for necrosadistic crimes.’
The author, eclectic British scholar, vicar, archaeologist, historian, Sabine Baring-Gould (1834-1924) inspired My Fair Lady, and wrote the hymn Onward Christian Soldiers.
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Price HK$ 46,000
1865 - Smith, London - First Edition
Nearly as rare as it’s subjects, a first edition of the foundation work on shape-shifting, were-wolves, and the inspiration for Bram Stoker’s descriptions of Count Dracula’s wolfish appearance. In original bright pictorial gilt cloth, were-wolf to the front and the dark frontispiece of The Were-Wolves and their prey. Suitably housed in a blood red morocco leather clamshell case, lined with felt, and lettered in gilt.‘The Book of Were-Wolves takes a rationalistic approach to the subject, the first ten chapters of this book constitute an essential work on the subject; however, starting with Chapter XI, the narrative takes a strange turn into sensationalistic 'true crime' case-studies of cannibals, grave desecrators, and blood fetishists, which have a tenuous connection with lycanthropy. This includes an extended treatment of the case of Giles de Rais, the notorious associate of Joan of Arc, who was convicted and executed for necrosadistic crimes.’
The author, eclectic British scholar, vicar, archaeologist, historian, Sabine Baring-Gould (1834-1924) inspired My Fair Lady, and wrote the hymn Onward Christian Soldiers.
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Price HK$ 46,000
Les grands vins de Bordeaux. -
M. P. Biarnez, Professeur Babrius [Psued. Dr. Jules Arthaud]
1870 - Féret, Bordeaux - Second Edition revised and enlarged
‘Biarnez takes us on a poetic tour of the Médoc, singing the praises of the classified growths (pages 17-93) and ends with a paean to the white wines of Bordeaux (pages 97-123) and the effect they have on the imbiber: “C'est une ivresse sainte, un sublime délire, Et, parmi tous les vins, notre vin seul l'inspire!. To the rear is Dr. Arthaud’s 51 page essay ‘De L’influence du vin sur la civilisation’.
A finely bound second edition illustrated with four engraved frontispieces and twenty full-page engravings of people in various social “wine” situations related to the text. The engravings are after designs by Pauquet.
Published 20 years after the first, this edition adds further lines to the verses, an enlarged preface, and includes an additional engraved frontispiece, and the original engraved plate from the first edition. The ‘hanging plate’ opposite page 73 has been replaced with the man being led to the gallows, perhaps readers had complained that it spoilt their enjoyment of a decent glass of claret.
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Price HK$ 7,000
1870 - Féret, Bordeaux - Second Edition revised and enlarged
‘Biarnez takes us on a poetic tour of the Médoc, singing the praises of the classified growths (pages 17-93) and ends with a paean to the white wines of Bordeaux (pages 97-123) and the effect they have on the imbiber: “C'est une ivresse sainte, un sublime délire, Et, parmi tous les vins, notre vin seul l'inspire!. To the rear is Dr. Arthaud’s 51 page essay ‘De L’influence du vin sur la civilisation’.A finely bound second edition illustrated with four engraved frontispieces and twenty full-page engravings of people in various social “wine” situations related to the text. The engravings are after designs by Pauquet.
Published 20 years after the first, this edition adds further lines to the verses, an enlarged preface, and includes an additional engraved frontispiece, and the original engraved plate from the first edition. The ‘hanging plate’ opposite page 73 has been replaced with the man being led to the gallows, perhaps readers had complained that it spoilt their enjoyment of a decent glass of claret.
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Price HK$ 7,000
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland – signed by the engraver Frederic Warde - with - Through the Looking Glass – signed by the "Original Alice," Alice Hargreaves -
Lewis Carroll [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson], Bruno Rollitz after John Tenniel (illustrators)
1932 - Limited Editions Club, New York - Each copy is number 1300 of a 1500 limited edition
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland with the illustrations by John Tenniel engraved on wood by Bruno Rollitz. Printed for the publisher by the printing house of William Edwin Rudge, Mount Vernon, N.Y. Typography and binding by Frederic Warde. Introduction by Henry Seidel Canby.
Through the Looking Glass with the illustrations by John Tenniel re-engraved by Frederic Warde. Printed for the publisher by the printing house of William Edwin Rudge, Mount Verson, N.Y. Introduction by Carl Van Doren.
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Price HK$ 21,000
1932 - Limited Editions Club, New York - Each copy is number 1300 of a 1500 limited edition
Alice's Adventures in Wonderland with the illustrations by John Tenniel engraved on wood by Bruno Rollitz. Printed for the publisher by the printing house of William Edwin Rudge, Mount Vernon, N.Y. Typography and binding by Frederic Warde. Introduction by Henry Seidel Canby. Through the Looking Glass with the illustrations by John Tenniel re-engraved by Frederic Warde. Printed for the publisher by the printing house of William Edwin Rudge, Mount Verson, N.Y. Introduction by Carl Van Doren.
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Price HK$ 21,000
The Hunting of the Snark, An Agony in Eight Fits -
Lewis Carroll [Charles Lutwidge Dodgson], Henry Holiday (illustrator)
1876 - Macmillan and Co., London - First Edition
‘Just the place for a Snark!’
A finely bound first edition of the author’s magnificent nonsense verse, the tale of the Bellman and his crew’s strange voyage in search of a Snark, and featuring an unlikely cast of characters drawn from his other works, Jabberwocky and Through the Looking Glass Wonderfully illustrated with nine imaginative woodcuts by Henry Holiday.
‘The Hunting of the Snark is a poem over which an unstable, sensitive soul might very well go mad.’ - Martin Gardner, The Annotated Snark.
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Price HK$ 6,000
1876 - Macmillan and Co., London - First Edition
‘Just the place for a Snark!’A finely bound first edition of the author’s magnificent nonsense verse, the tale of the Bellman and his crew’s strange voyage in search of a Snark, and featuring an unlikely cast of characters drawn from his other works, Jabberwocky and Through the Looking Glass Wonderfully illustrated with nine imaginative woodcuts by Henry Holiday.
‘The Hunting of the Snark is a poem over which an unstable, sensitive soul might very well go mad.’ - Martin Gardner, The Annotated Snark.
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Price HK$ 6,000
The Borders and Beyond -
Abel Chapman
1924 - Gurney and Jackson, London - First Edition
A bright copy of this informative work of field exploration and natural history in Northumberland and the Anglo-Scottish borderlands.
Hunter-naturalist Chapman includes chapters on the British red grouse, the wildfowl of the north east coast, a search for the ‘moorland nymph’, salmonology, seagulls, woodcocks and herons, ravens, and the otter, together with a commentary on ‘modern zoology’, and extensive particulars on the migrations and plumage-phases in certain waders, to which he gave the name ‘Globe-Spanners’.
Profusely illustrated throughout with seventeen wonderful colour illustrations (on fourteen plates) by W.H. Riddell, twenty one black and white plates, two folding maps, and 170 sketches by the author.
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Price HK$ 1,000
1924 - Gurney and Jackson, London - First Edition
A bright copy of this informative work of field exploration and natural history in Northumberland and the Anglo-Scottish borderlands. Hunter-naturalist Chapman includes chapters on the British red grouse, the wildfowl of the north east coast, a search for the ‘moorland nymph’, salmonology, seagulls, woodcocks and herons, ravens, and the otter, together with a commentary on ‘modern zoology’, and extensive particulars on the migrations and plumage-phases in certain waders, to which he gave the name ‘Globe-Spanners’.
Profusely illustrated throughout with seventeen wonderful colour illustrations (on fourteen plates) by W.H. Riddell, twenty one black and white plates, two folding maps, and 170 sketches by the author.
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Price HK$ 1,000