The Friends of Eddie Coyle - George V. Higgins 1972 - Alfred A. Knopf, New York - First Edition A fine copy of the highly acclaimed hard-boiled murder mystery and first novel by U.S. Attorney George ‘Fuzz’ Higgins. Housed in a custom chemise and slipcase, which also contains specially made pockets containing three contemporary reviews.

‘What I can’t get over is that so good a first novel was written by the “Fuzz”.’ – Norman Mailer.

New York Times – ‘I don’t know what kind of lawyer George Higgins is, but I know now that he’s a writer. With “The Friends of Eddie Coyle” he’s given us the most penetrating glimpse yet into what seems the real world of crime’;

When asked to name the top ten mysteries, Elmore Leonard said, ‘My all-time favorite, the one book that has made a lasting impression is
The Friends of Eddie Coyle by George V. Higgins. That would be my list’.

Life
magazine – Shove over, Raymond Chandler, if you don’t want an elbow in the eye, And somebody pull up a chair for George Higgins, the new boy in the back room. Hard-nosed George is an assistant U.S. attorney by trade. But that first cops-and-robbers novel tucked under his arm qualifies him for the corner table where all the best tellers of low tales sit, taking their Dashiell Hammett straight with a Hemingway chaser’.

Time magazine – ‘George Higgins’s pungent, ironic dialogue precisely registers the feints and formalities of a world in which unguarded speech can often be fatal He risks confusing us in order to make us sink or swim as his characters must learn to do. Alertness is richly rewarded’.
  Source for the 1973 Peter Yates film starring Robert Mitchum as Eddie Coyle and Peter Boyle as Dillon.

First edition dust jacket in first state with Macdonald and Mailer blurbs on rear panel, book in the variant binding of blue cloth, also seen in green cloth.

Provenance: From the library of book collector and Long Island real estate mogul Walter T. Shirley II, with his book plate to the inside of the chemise.

Octavo. pp. [6] 183 [3]. In publisher's blue cloth, spine lettered in gilt, spine and front board stamped in gilt, top edge tinted green, dust jacket priced $5.95 to upper corner of front flap.
  Condition: Fine in fine dust jacket.   Ref: 109101   Price: HK$ 2,500