Archive for the ‘Science Fiction’ Category
Monday, April 18th, 2016
Another signed Ray Bradbury first, this one a collection of essays:
Bradbury, Ray. Yestermorrow. Joshua Odell Editions/Capra Press, 1991. First edition hardback (“First Edition” stated and numberline ending in 1), a Fine copy in a Fine- dust jacket with a tiny bit of dust jacket crimping at head and heel. Inscribed by Bradbury: “Matthew!/Ray Bradbury/ 4/30/94”. Bought off eBay for $20, which is 5¢ over cover price.
Tags:Books, Ray Bradbury, Science Fiction, signed
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Tuesday, April 5th, 2016
Bought another signed Ray Bradbury Christmas broadsheet:
Bradbury, Ray. Christmas Greetings 2008 (Imagine that you have been dead). Privately printed, 2008. First edition Christmas broadsheet, a Fine- copy with slight corner bumping. Signed by Bradbury. Bought for $25 off eBay.
Tags:Books, Ray Bradbury, Science Fiction, signed
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Tuesday, March 15th, 2016
Picked up a few more items signed by Ray Bradbury:
Bradbury, Ray. A Christmas Wish 1988 (If Only We Had Taller Been). Privately printed, 1988. First edition Christmas broadsheet, a Fine copy. Inscribed by Bradbury: “For Rev. Gerald Watt, C.R./With fond good wishes/for/1989/Ray Bradbury.” Bought for $28 off eBay.
Bradbury, Ray. A Christmas Wish 1989 (The Bread of Beggars, The Wine of Christ). Privately printed, 1989. First edition Christmas broadsheet, a Fine copy. Inscribed by Bradbury: “For Rev. Watt. Thanks for Asking!/Love!/Ray/Bradbury/ 5/6/90.” Bought for $29 off eBay.
(Bradbury, Ray) Weist, Jerry. Bradbury: An Illustrated Life. William Morrow, 2002. First edition hardback (precedes the Donald M. Grant limited edition by two years), a Fine-/Fine- copy with very slight bumping at head and heel. Inscribed by Bradbury: “To all the/Grand Tubers;Ray Bradbury.” Oversized illustrated history of Bradbury’s work. Bought for $27.10 off eBay.
I now have three of the Bradbury Christmas broadsheets (which he sent to friends as Christmas gifts/cards), all signed.
Tags:Books, broadsheet, First Edition, poetry, Ray Bradbury, Science Fiction, signed
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Thursday, March 3rd, 2016
I bought a lot of Jack Vance books from an Australian book auction. I’ll be selling the rest of the books from the lot in the next Lame Excuse Books catalog, but here are the two books from the lot that are going in my own library:
Vance, Jack. Cugal’s Saga. Timescape, 1983. First edition, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket. Third book in the Dying Earth series (or fourth, if you count Michael Shea’s A Quest for Simbilis). Hewett, A71. Preceded the Underwood/Miller limited edition by six months.
Vance, Jack. The Houses of Iszm. Underwood/Miller, 1983. First hardback edition, one of 482 trade copies, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket. Hewett, A12h.
Tags:Books, Dying Earth, First Edition, Jack Vance, Science Fiction, Underwood/Miller
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Monday, February 22nd, 2016
PS Publishing had a sale, and I picked up three limited editions of things I already had the trade editions of.
Bradbury, Ray. Greentown Tinseltown. PS Publishing, 2012. First edition hardback, #29 of 50 copies signed by editor Donn Albright, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket and decorated boards. Trade state lacks the dust jacket and limitation page.
Lansdale, Joe R. Edge of Dark Water. PS Publishing, 2012. First edition hardback, #221 of 300 signed copies, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket and decorated boards and a Near Fine slipcase with a 1″ indention.
Lansdale, Joe R. Trapped in the Saturday Matinee. PS Publishing, 2012. First edition hardback, #157 of 200 signed copies, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket and decorated boards and a Fine slipcase.
Tags:First Edition, Horror, Joe R. Lansdale, Limited Editions, Mystery, PS Publishing, Ray Bradbury, Science Fiction, signed
Posted in Horror, Science Fiction | No Comments »
Wednesday, February 17th, 2016
A follow-up to yesterday’s post, here are the non-fiction books I bought in that Cold Tonnage £5 sale:
Adams, Douglas and John Lloyd. The Deeper Meaning of Liff. Pan Books, 1990. First edition hardback, a Fine copy in a Near Fine, price-clipped dust jacket.
Carr, Terry. Fandom Harvest. Laissez Faire Productions AB, 1986. First edition hardback, a Fine copy in decorated boards, sans dust jacket, as issued. According to Chalker/Owings (1991), page 538, only 250 hardbacks were done.
(Hitchcock, Alfred) Paul Condon and Jim Sangster. The Complete Hitchcock. First edition trade paperback original, a Fine copy.
(Lovecraft, H.P.) Eddy, Muriel, and C.M. Eddy, Jr. The Gentlemen from Angell Street: Memories of H. P. Lovecraft. Fenham Publishing, 2001. First edition trade paperback original thus, containing additional material not in the 1961 edition, a Fine copy.
Tymn, Marshall B. American Fantasy and Science Fiction: Toward a Bibliography of Works Published in the United States, 1949—1973. Fax Collector’s Editions, 1979. Paperback original, a Very Good+ copy with spine creasing and wear along the spine. Though Tymn authored or co-authored a number of important reference works, this, an attempt to update Bleiler’s Checklist with modern works, limited only to those published in hardback, is generally not numbered among them, as it was largely superseded by Currey and Reginald the same year of publication. Chalker/Owings (1991), page 178, are not kind: “Alas, it’s useless, one of the most worthless pieces of bibliography in the past 20 years or so.” There was a hardback, but Chalker/Ownings says it was just attaching a premade casing to the paperback. Not in Keith L. Justice’s Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror Reference.
Wake, Paul, Steve Andrews and Ariel (yes, just “Ariel,” no last name; I can only assume it’s edited by the mermaid from that Disney movie). Waterstone’s Guide to Science Fiction, Fantasy and Horror. Waterstone Guides, 1998. First edition trade paperback original, a Fine copy. There are some good contributors in here (like John Clute), but the author entries are distributed somewhat randomly. Waterstone’s is a UK bookstore chain, and I imagine these are pretty common on the other side of the pond. Here? Not so much.
Tags:Alfred Hitchcock, Books, C.M. and Muriel E. Eddy, Cold Tonnage, H. P. Lovecraft, Movies, Science Fiction, science fiction bibliography, science fiction criticism, Terry Carr
Posted in Books, Fantasy, Horror, Science Fiction | 1 Comment »
Tuesday, February 16th, 2016
Cold Tonnage Books had a sale where all £10 books were £5, so I picked up a fair number. This post covers fiction titles.
Aylett, Steve. The Inflatable Volunteer. Phoenix House, 1999. First edition hardback, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket, with a publicity postcard signed by Aylett laid in.
Aylett, Steve. Toxicology. Gollancz, 2002. First edition hardback, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket, with a postcard laid in.
Blish, James. A Dusk of Idols and Other Stories. Severn House, 1996. First edition hardback, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket.
Constantine, Storm. The Monstrous Regiment. Orbit, 1989. Trade paperback original, a Fine- copy with a touch of edgewear at head and heel, signed by Constantine.
Ellison, Harlan. Edgeworks 2: Spider Kiss/Stalking the Nightmare. White Wolf, 1996. First edition hardback omnibus thus, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket. When the Edgeworks series first came out, I didn’t pick them up because I already had all the individual works they contained. But at £5 it’s worth picking up for title variant completeness…
Newman, Kim. Moriarty: The Hound of the D’Urbervilles. Titan Books, 2011. Fine, signed by Newman.
Tags:Books, Cold Tonnage, First Edition, Harlan Ellison, James Blish, Kim Newman, Science Fiction, signed, Steve Aylett, Storm Constantine
Posted in Books, Science Fiction | 3 Comments »
Wednesday, February 10th, 2016
I finally got my copy of Toby Buckell’s Xenowealth collection, a Kickstarter project I first backed in November of 2014.
Buckell, Tobias S. Xenowealth. Self-published, 2016. First edition hardback, one of an unspecified number signed by the author, a Fine copy in a Fine dust jacket. Short story collection set in the same universe as Crystal Rain. There were only 63 backers of the hardback level, so it’s possible the total print run for this edition is under 100 copies. Due to an error, my name was not listed among the backs on the acknowledgements page, but Toby sent me an extra copy each of the hardback and the trade paperback to make up for it.
Tags:Books, First Edition, Kickstarter, Science Fiction, signed, Tobias Buckell
Posted in Books, Science Fiction | 3 Comments »
Monday, February 8th, 2016
I picked up two nice Gnome Press anthologies from a National Book Auction at quite a reasonable price.
Greenberg, Martin. Journey to Infinity. Gnome Press, 1951. First edition hardback, a Fine- copy with a tiny bit of bend at head in a Fine- second state (30 titles) dust jacket with a few small traces of wear, and a few pinhead spots on the front cover, otherwise extremely bright and attractive. Chalker/Owings (1991), pages 198-199. Kemp, 204. Bought for $25 with buyer premium.
Greenberg, Martin. All About the Future. Gnome Press, 1954. First edition hardback, a Fine- copy with slight dust soiling to page block edges and one small indention to very bottom of from board, in a near Fine- dust jacket with a 1″ closed triangular tear at bottom front along spine, a semi-closed 1/8 tear at head, and shallow chipping at points. Chalker/Owings (1991), page 202. Kemp, 204. Note that Kemp calls for black boards with red lettering; my copy is gray boards with a reddish cloth spine with silver lettering, and Chalker/Owings doesn’t report on the binding state at all, which would make this a previously unrecorded binding variant. (Edited to add: Some fellow collectors believe that this is in fact the primary binding state, and that Kemp got it wrong and the black boards/red lettering state is the variant.) Bought for $20 with buyer premium.
Tags:Books, First Edition, Gnome Press, Martin Greenberg (Gnome Press), Science Fiction
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