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20th Century Classics

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  • The Lake Frome Monster – Arthur Upfield – First edition

    The Lake Frome Monster – Arthur Upfield – First edition

    A first edition of Arthur Upfield’s last novel. Incomplete at his death it was crafted into publication by J L Price and Dorothy Strange.

    Published by Heinemann, London in 1966.

    Octavo, 184 pages, all in pretty good condition. Edges a little aged, the strikingly scary jacket with some creases but as good as they come if you can find one.

    The last Napoleon Bonaparte novel (obviously). Lake Frome is in South Australia, it’s large but rarely fills with water. A roving photographer is found dead … the monster?

    Bony sets about resolving the unusual murder disguised as workman tending the very long dog-proof fence. His life is in danger … but our Bony is no coward!

    Bony … out in the dirt solving the weirdest of murders.

    $70.00

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  • Little Ragged Blossom  and more about Snugglepot and Cuddlepie – May Gibbs – First Edition c 1920

    Little Ragged Blossom and more about Snugglepot and Cuddlepie – May Gibbs – First Edition c 1920

    Published Sydney: Angus Robertson no date but 1920 and a First Edition.

    Quarto. Cloth backed pictorial boards with a colour vignette of Little Ragged Blossom pasted on with some wear. The odd mark – on the whole a very good copy.

    The wonderful fantasy world of the gum-nut babies portrayed in glorious detail. Illustrated by Gibbs with two full colour plates and twenty wonderful sepia plates as well as pictorial end papers and many line illustrations in-text. Scarce in any condition. Reference the authority Muir 2752.

    Little Ragged Blossom a May Gibbs Delight

    $240.00

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  • Our Man in Havana – Graham Greene – First 1958

    Our Man in Havana – Graham Greene – First 1958

    Graham Greene’s masterpiece and a fine encouragement to all vacuum cleaner salesmen.

    Published by Heinemann. London a first edition 1958. Octavo, 273 pages. Foxing to page edges, jacket very good, the odd minor chip.

    A super spy story and a put down of the big wigs back at the Circus. Blatantly (self confessed) copied by Le Carre in his Tailor of Panama. We prefer this and you must see the old film starring Alex Guinness.

    Graham Greene First – Humour and Spying in Havana

    $60.00

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  • Maigret in Society – George Simenon

    Maigret in Society – George Simenon

    Published by the Thriller Book Club, Charing Cross, London in collaboration with and in the same year as the Hamish Hamilton first.

    Octavo, 160 pages, very good condition.

    The 78-year-old Comte Armand de Saint-Hilaire is found dead. A former Ambassador to Rome. Washington and London. All his acquaintances are elderly and Maigret is given little to work on other than the discovery of letter which suggest a long-standing love for Princess de V_____. Strange goings on are exposed.

    Maigret not out of his depth in High Society.

    $35.00

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  • Green Hills of Africa – Ernest Hemingway

    Green Hills of Africa – Ernest Hemingway

    Hemingway’s Green Hills was first published in 1936. This is a 1962 edition of the desirable Jonathan Cape format.

    Octavo, 284 pages with the super decorative illustrations by Edward Shenton. Green cloth covered boards with “game’ gilt design to front. Top edge stained green as required of this edition. A few dust jacket light chips and age otherwise a very copy of a hard to find item.

    A piece of non-fiction regarding Hemingway’s safari to Africa in December 1933 with his wife Pauline. First criticised by reviewers and then lauded as the best African safari book ever written … Hemingway never forgave them as he thought they had killed the book.

    Set in Tanzania and up the Great Rift Valley. Hemingway describes the lure of the hunt, the landscape and beauty of the wilderness like never before. Intermingled with conversations and views on writers and his writing. It is in this book that he set Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain as the greatest piece of American literature … but not without qualification.

    Carries a special appreciation for “J P” i.e. Jackson Philip who was Philip Hope Percival who was his guide. Percival was the inspiration behind the character Robert Wilson in his later short story “The Short Happy Life of Francis Macomber”

    Green Hills of Africa – true Hemingway

    $70.00

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  • Jamaica Inn – Daphne Du Maurier – 1951 Edition

    Jamaica Inn – Daphne Du Maurier – 1951 Edition

    Daphne du Maurier’s Jamaica Inn vies with Rebecca as her best work… this “Cheap Edition” has become iconic.

    Jamaica Inn was first published in 1936 … this is effectively the 21st impression, of 1951, with many more to come

    Octavo, 208 pages, with the publisher Gollancz’s iconic yellow jacket. This is the cleanest and best early copy we have come across.

    If you are in that beautiful part of England make sure you visit Jamaica Inn and read the book. Daphne gives us a useful introductory note … “Jamaica Inn stands to-day, hospitable and kindly, a temperance house on the twenty-mile road between Bodmin and Launceston” … you can get a nice drop there now and a heavy lunch!

    “It was a cold grey day in November …”

    $40.00

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