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Wise Blood -
Flannery O'Connor
1952 - Harcourt, New York - First Edition
‘Where you come from is gone, where you thought you were going to never was there, and where you are is no good unless you can get away from it.’
A superb copy, and scarce in such a bright dust jacket without the usual toning, fading or chipping to the spine.
Considered a cornerstone of the southern-gothic genre, this lovely copy of O’Connor’s first book delves into themes of depression, sin, and redemption, while retaining a biting sense of humour. Listed among the Guardian’s list of the 100 greatest novels of all time, this is a powerful exploration of character and motivation, reminiscent in style to other masters such as Kafka, Waugh, and Faulkner.
More details
Price HK$ 45,000
1952 - Harcourt, New York - First Edition
‘Where you come from is gone, where you thought you were going to never was there, and where you are is no good unless you can get away from it.’A superb copy, and scarce in such a bright dust jacket without the usual toning, fading or chipping to the spine.
Considered a cornerstone of the southern-gothic genre, this lovely copy of O’Connor’s first book delves into themes of depression, sin, and redemption, while retaining a biting sense of humour. Listed among the Guardian’s list of the 100 greatest novels of all time, this is a powerful exploration of character and motivation, reminiscent in style to other masters such as Kafka, Waugh, and Faulkner.
More details
Price HK$ 45,000
The Old Man In the Corner -
Baroness Orczy
1909 - William Briggs, Toronto - First Canadian Edition (or first edition, Canadian issue, comprised of the sheets from the Greening and Co. publication of the same year with a new title-leaf)
‘The man in the corner pushed aside his glass, and leant across the table. ‘Mysteries!’ he commented. ‘There is no such thing as a mystery in connection with any crime, provided intelligence is brought to bear upon its investigation.’
A superb copy, illustrated with eight full page plates by H. M. Brock.
The nameless hero of this masterpiece has since been credited as the world’s first ‘armchair’ detective, solving crimes simply by reading newspaper articles whilst sipping tea in the corner of London’s A.B.C Teashop. His eccentricities include tying and unravelling complicated knots of string as he explains his deductions to his primary audience, Polly Burton, a young journalist who eagerly chronicles his adventures.
Throughout a series of twelve short stories and anecdotes, our protagonist does occasionally find purpose to leave his chair for the odd courtroom visit, and extremely polite interrogations, though, unusually for the genre, our hero disdains the police and seldom gives up the identities of the various perpetrators, often leaving them to wander the streets of London unassailed.
More details
Price HK$ 1,200
1909 - William Briggs, Toronto - First Canadian Edition (or first edition, Canadian issue, comprised of the sheets from the Greening and Co. publication of the same year with a new title-leaf)
‘The man in the corner pushed aside his glass, and leant across the table. ‘Mysteries!’ he commented. ‘There is no such thing as a mystery in connection with any crime, provided intelligence is brought to bear upon its investigation.’A superb copy, illustrated with eight full page plates by H. M. Brock.
The nameless hero of this masterpiece has since been credited as the world’s first ‘armchair’ detective, solving crimes simply by reading newspaper articles whilst sipping tea in the corner of London’s A.B.C Teashop. His eccentricities include tying and unravelling complicated knots of string as he explains his deductions to his primary audience, Polly Burton, a young journalist who eagerly chronicles his adventures.
Throughout a series of twelve short stories and anecdotes, our protagonist does occasionally find purpose to leave his chair for the odd courtroom visit, and extremely polite interrogations, though, unusually for the genre, our hero disdains the police and seldom gives up the identities of the various perpetrators, often leaving them to wander the streets of London unassailed.
More details
Price HK$ 1,200
After Claude -
Iris Owens
1973 - Farrar, New York - First Edition
Rare in first edition, even more so in dust jacket, and here you have a fine and signed first edition.
Cult classic and the first of only two books published under the author’s own name. The rest of her career was spent writing pornography as ‘Harriet Daimler’ for the Olympia Press in Paris.
‘After Claude’ features Harriet one of the first anti-heroines, it is ‘a foulmouthed comic tour de force, still capable of offending the offendable and casting a blue-streaked spell of hilarity over everyone else.’ [Gerald Howard]
There is too much written about Iris Owens and ‘After Claude’ to do either justice in this short note, below are a few short reviews, and extracts from articles.
‘If there’s one thing on this earth that irritates me, it’s when a dumpy, frigid, former nymphomaniac assumes that my tongue is hanging out, thirsting for marital bliss.’
More details
Price HK$ 8,000
1973 - Farrar, New York - First Edition
Rare in first edition, even more so in dust jacket, and here you have a fine and signed first edition.Cult classic and the first of only two books published under the author’s own name. The rest of her career was spent writing pornography as ‘Harriet Daimler’ for the Olympia Press in Paris.
‘After Claude’ features Harriet one of the first anti-heroines, it is ‘a foulmouthed comic tour de force, still capable of offending the offendable and casting a blue-streaked spell of hilarity over everyone else.’ [Gerald Howard]
There is too much written about Iris Owens and ‘After Claude’ to do either justice in this short note, below are a few short reviews, and extracts from articles.
‘If there’s one thing on this earth that irritates me, it’s when a dumpy, frigid, former nymphomaniac assumes that my tongue is hanging out, thirsting for marital bliss.’
More details
Price HK$ 8,000
The Motives of Nicholas Holtz. Being the Weird Tales of the Ironville Virus -
Thomas Painter, Alexander Laing, Lynd Ward (illustrator)
1936 - Farrar & Rinehart Incorporated, New York - First Edition
A sharp and bright first edition, rather scarce in such nice condition. With frontispiece and dust jacket illustrated by Lynd Ward.
“‘The Ironville Virus’, a bacterium capable of reproduction at a terrific rate, which to one man’s grief, proves to be the carrier of a deadly plague and which, as far as anyone knows, has no antivirus...”
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Price HK$ 2,200
1936 - Farrar & Rinehart Incorporated, New York - First Edition
A sharp and bright first edition, rather scarce in such nice condition. With frontispiece and dust jacket illustrated by Lynd Ward.“‘The Ironville Virus’, a bacterium capable of reproduction at a terrific rate, which to one man’s grief, proves to be the carrier of a deadly plague and which, as far as anyone knows, has no antivirus...”
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Price HK$ 2,200
The Godwulf Manuscript - Signed -
Robert B. Parker
1974 - Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston - First Edition
‘Halfway through my steak I caught sight of myself in the mirror behind the bar. I looked like someone who ought to eat alone. I didn't look in the mirror again.’
A handsome, signed first edition of Robert Parker’s debut novel, featuring the introduction of hard-boiled P.I, Spenser, as he investigates the theft of a fourteenth century manuscript from Boston University, the only clue being the bullet-riddled corpse of a former student...
The novel is credited with reviving popular interest in crime-fiction during the early 1970’s, primarily due to its unconventional protagonist, a pupil of the ‘school of hard knocks’, with little regard for rules, and even less for the cops.
More details
Price HK$ 4,000
1974 - Houghton Mifflin Company, Boston - First Edition
‘Halfway through my steak I caught sight of myself in the mirror behind the bar. I looked like someone who ought to eat alone. I didn't look in the mirror again.’A handsome, signed first edition of Robert Parker’s debut novel, featuring the introduction of hard-boiled P.I, Spenser, as he investigates the theft of a fourteenth century manuscript from Boston University, the only clue being the bullet-riddled corpse of a former student...
The novel is credited with reviving popular interest in crime-fiction during the early 1970’s, primarily due to its unconventional protagonist, a pupil of the ‘school of hard knocks’, with little regard for rules, and even less for the cops.
More details
Price HK$ 4,000
Spy For Sale -
Laurence Payne
1969 - Hodder and Stoughton, London - First Edition
A sharp first edition of the first book in the John Tibbett Mystery series, in which ‘Tibby’, a young unskilled burglar, is thrown into the international bodysnatching trade ‘for which, to put it charitably, he is professionally unqualified’.
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Price HK$ 1,300
1969 - Hodder and Stoughton, London - First Edition
A sharp first edition of the first book in the John Tibbett Mystery series, in which ‘Tibby’, a young unskilled burglar, is thrown into the international bodysnatching trade ‘for which, to put it charitably, he is professionally unqualified’.
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Price HK$ 1,300
The Poetry of Sport -
Hedley Peek (editor)
1896 - Longmans, London and Bombay - First Edition
‘Haste, ranger, to the Athol mountains blue! Unleash the hounds, and let the bugles sing! The thousand traces in the morning dew, the bounding deer,the black-cock on the wing, bespeak the rout of Scotland’s gallant king...from cairn of Bruar to the dark Glen-Morre, the forest’s in a howl, and all is wild uproar!’
A handsomely bound edition, with a distinctly Glaswegian accent, being bound in Glasgow and owned by the renowned medical Professor David Fyfe Anderson.
Containing a chapter on classical allusions to sport by Andrew Lang, and a lively preface to the Badminton Library by A.E.T Watson. Accompanied with illustrations by artists A. Thorburn, Lucien Davis, and C.E Brock, among others, this is a lovely compilation of poetry on the subject of sport for young men in the late eighteen-hundreds, primarily depicting activities such as fishing, hunting, and shooting.
More details
Price HK$ 2,000
1896 - Longmans, London and Bombay - First Edition
‘Haste, ranger, to the Athol mountains blue! Unleash the hounds, and let the bugles sing! The thousand traces in the morning dew, the bounding deer,the black-cock on the wing, bespeak the rout of Scotland’s gallant king...from cairn of Bruar to the dark Glen-Morre, the forest’s in a howl, and all is wild uproar!’A handsomely bound edition, with a distinctly Glaswegian accent, being bound in Glasgow and owned by the renowned medical Professor David Fyfe Anderson.
Containing a chapter on classical allusions to sport by Andrew Lang, and a lively preface to the Badminton Library by A.E.T Watson. Accompanied with illustrations by artists A. Thorburn, Lucien Davis, and C.E Brock, among others, this is a lovely compilation of poetry on the subject of sport for young men in the late eighteen-hundreds, primarily depicting activities such as fishing, hunting, and shooting.
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Price HK$ 2,000
Raffles and the Key Man -
Barry Perowne (pseud. Philip Atkey)
1940 - J. B. Lippincott Company, Philadelphia New York - First Edition
‘The peerless Raffles returns to continue his thrilling career outside the law. Raffles, who is well known as a second-story burglar of outstanding ability, a cracksman, a lone wolf always one jump ahead of the police, runs afoul of a master crook known as the “Key Man”” [from the dust jacket]
More details
Price HK$ 1,500
1940 - J. B. Lippincott Company, Philadelphia New York - First Edition
‘The peerless Raffles returns to continue his thrilling career outside the law. Raffles, who is well known as a second-story burglar of outstanding ability, a cracksman, a lone wolf always one jump ahead of the police, runs afoul of a master crook known as the “Key Man”” [from the dust jacket]
More details
Price HK$ 1,500