Softcover. London, Hard Case Crime, 1st thus, 2017, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, colorful wraps with a retro-style illustration by Robert McGinnis. Memphis, 1975. "Raunchy" doesn't begin to describe Max Climer's magazine, Climax, or his all-hours strip club, or his planned video empire. Evangelists, feminists, and local watchdog groups all want him out of business. But someone wants more than that, and has hired a killer to end Max's career permanently. Only another hit man--the ruthless professional known as Quarry can keep Climer from becoming a casualty in the Sexual Revolution. Like new.
Softcover. London, Hard Case Crime, 1st, 2011, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 224 pages. Even the enigmatic hit man called Quarry had to start somewhere. And for him that was the day he returned stateside from Nam to find his young wife cheating. He'd killed plenty overseas, so killing her lover was no big deal. And when he was recruited to use his skills as a contract killer, that transition was easy, too. He survived in this jungle as he had in that other one--by expecting trouble. What he didn't expect was ever running into her again. Remainder line to bottom edge, otherwise like new.
Softcover. London, Hard Case Crime, 1st thus, 2015, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, colorful wraps with a retro-style illustration by Robert McGinnis. When the man he worked for abruptly exits the business, Quarry finds himself in the crosshairs as a rival tries to take over. But what does Quarry have that the new man wants? And how did the beautiful blonde in the swimming pool become a target? Like new.
Softcover. London, Hard Case Crime, 1st thus, 2015, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, colorful wraps with a retro-style illustration by Robert McGinnis. When the man he worked for abruptly exits the business, Quarry finds himself in the crosshairs as a rival tries to take over. But what does Quarry have that the new man wants? And how did the beautiful blonde in the swimming pool become a target? Like new.
Softcover. London, Hard Case Crime, 1st thus, 2015, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, colorful wraps with a retro-style illustration by Robert McGinnis. The assignment was simple: stake out the man's home and kill him. Easy work for a professional like Quarry. But when things go horribly wrong, Quarry finds himself with a new mission: learn who hired him, and make the bastard pay. The longest-running series from Max Allan Collins, author of Road to Perdition, and the first ever to feature a hitman as the main character, the Quarry novels tell the story of a paid assassin with a rebellious streak and an unlikely taste for justice. Once a Marine sniper, Quarry found a new home stateside with a group of contract killers. But some men aren't made for taking orders--and when Quarry strikes off on his own, god help the man on the other side of his nine-millimeter. Like new.
Hardcover. Berkeley CA, Counterpoint, 1st, 2013, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. Dr. Crandall Taylor--or rather the actor who plays him--is enjoying a cushy new life in the City of the Lights where his now-cancelled American soap opera has become a prime time retro cult hit. This newfound stardom isn't wasted on him. Anxious to keep his brutal past a secret from fans, he's enjoying all the fruits that fame has to offer: adulation, entree into the trendiest clubs, and sex. What he really wants is to fund a feature film. Crandall uses his charm and intellect to draw into his narcissistic web four women: a horny network executive; an internet porn star; a bookish university student with a nasty bent; and the fetching starlet wife of an arms dealer. Crandall accepts both the crime lord's cash and his beautiful wife's advances. Big mistake. Now Crandall must channel his violent, megalomaniacal dark side just to stay alive--and on the run.
Hardcover. NY, Library of America, 1st, 1995, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket, 1199 pages, ribbon marker. In Raymond Chandler's hands, the pulp crime story became a haunting mystery of power and corruption, set against a modern cityscape both lyrical and violent. Now Chandler joins the authoritative Library of America series in a comprehensive two-volume set displaying all the facets of his brilliant talent. In his first novel, The Big Sleep (1939), the classic private eye finds his full-fledged form as Philip Marlowe: at once tough, independent, brash, disillusioned, and sensitive--and man of weary honor threading his way (in Chandler's phrase) "down these mean streets" among blackmailers, pornographers, and murderers for hire. In Farewell, My Lovely (1940), Chandler's personal favorite among his novels, Marlowe's search for a missing woman leads him from shanties and honky-tonks to the highest reaches of power, encountering an array of richly drawn characters. The High Window (1942), about a rare coin that becomes a catalyst by which a hushed-up crime comes back to haunt a wealthy family, is partly a humorous burlesque of pulp fiction. All three novels show Chandler at a peak of verbal inventiveness and storytelling drive. Stories and Early Novels also includes every classic noir story from the 1930s that Chandler did not later incorporate into a novel--thirteen in all, among them such classics as "Red Wind," "Finger Man," The King in Yellow," and "Trouble Is My Business." Drawn from the pages of Black Mask and Dime Detective, these stories show how Chandler adapted the violent conventions of the pulp magazine--with their brisk exposition and rapid-fire dialogue--to his own emerging vision of twentieth-century America. Clean copy.
Hardcover. Philadelphia, J. B. Lippincott , BC Ed., 1952, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Good, Hardcover in a worn, chipped dust jacket. A Book Club printing of the first (and only) Dr. Coffee full length mystery. Doctor Daniel Webster Coffee, pathologist demonstrates that scientific knowledge is deadly to crime. 222 pages, no marking.
Hardcover. NY, Doubleday , 1st US, 1976, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket. Val Leary is handsome, charming and broke. On the morning of April Fools' Day 1871, while walking through one of London's wealthiest districts, he notices a young maidservant scrubbing the steps of 53 Northbourne Park Villas. In that instant he conceives the idea for a remarkable case of burglary. The set-up seems perfect, but chance intervenes in a succession of coincidences that place the jewels further and further beyond the reach of Val and his cronies - until...Set in the Upstairs, Downstairs world of Victorian England, this is an ingenious and gripping tale by the acknowledged master of the English crime novel.
Softcover. NY, Mahlon Day, 1824, Book: Fair, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 64 page booklet with string binding. A report proposing building a institution to house and reform juvenile delinquents. Laid in is a tattered cover note signed by C.D. Colden/President and R.F. Mott/ Secretary. Overall fair with chipped edges, paper tanned but complete.
Hardcover. Toronto, Trafalgar Press, 1st, 1986 , Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright "(Skillfully traces the causes of the Crimean War and sketches a vivid picture of an age which made possible 'the world's most curious and unneccesary struggle'. Troubetzkoy ingeniously weaves together the varied developments in diplomacy, trade, nationalistic expression and personality conflict in the decade which led to the hostilities. The armies of the belligerents are described (and the) reader is introduced to the principal personages of the drama - Napoleon III, Marshal St. Arnaud, Lord Raglan and the great Russian engineer, Todleben, who, apart from Florence Nightingale, was the only one to earn true distinction during the War. Vividly described are Nicholas I and the Russian Empire." Clean copy.
Hardcover. NY, Berkley Prime Crime, 1st, 1995, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. SIGNED BY AUTHOR on title page. Driving out to Rosemary's house on an errand, China discovers her accountant has been murdered. With one abusive ex-husband and plenty of former clients in the picture, there's no shortage of suspects. And with a vengeful ex-convict on the loose, there's plenty for China to worry about. Clean copy.
Softcover. NY, Little, Brown & Company, reprint, 2014, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 204 pages. Originally published by Lion Books as a paperback in 1954. By the time Jim Thompson was sixteen years old, he had been a newspaper boy, a burlesque show hawker, a plumber's helper, a comedian in two-reel pictures, a night bellboy in a luxury hotel and over a dozen other occupations. By the time he was eighteen, he was driving across America in a broken-down Ford without a penny to his name and his mother and his kid sister Freddie in tow, looking for just one more paycheck to keep them all alive. A bittersweet comedy of a hard-won American life, ROUGHNECK chronicles the many jobs, near-criminal escapades, and downright unlawful grifts of the man who would become one of crime fiction's most enduring writers, in a larger-than-life literary memoir--or wildly entertaining tall tale--as only Thompson could tell it. Hard times have never sounded so good. Clean, unread copy.
Softcover. NY, Mysterious Press, reprint, 1989, Softcover, mass market paperback, 163 pages. By the time Jim Thompson was sixteen years old, he had been a newspaper boy, a burlesque show hawker, a plumber's helper, a comedian in two-reel pictures, a night bellboy in a luxury hotel and over a dozen other occupations. By the time he was eighteen, he was driving across America in a broken-down Ford without a penny to his name and his mother and his kid sister Freddie in tow, looking for just one more paycheck to keep them all alive. A bittersweet comedy of a hard-won American life, ROUGHNECK chronicles the many jobs, near-criminal escapades, and downright unlawful grifts of the man who would become one of crime fiction's most enduring writers, in a larger-than-life literary memoir--or wildly entertaining tall tale--as only Thompson could tell it. Hard times have never sounded so good. Clean, bright copy.
Hardcover. NY, Atheneum, 1st, 2003, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. Escaping into the fantasy world of the movies, where fathers don't disappear, mothers have no secrets, and little brothers don't cry over missing stuffed animals, twelve-year-old Ruby Miller, while performing community service for a crime she didn't commit, is forced to face the reality of her life. Clean, like new.
Hardcover. Cloverdale CA, Buti Publications, 1st, 1996, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 355 pages illustrated with b&w drawings, not credited. GENERIC INSCRIPTION & SIGNATURE BY AUTHOR on the front fly leaf. Bruno Buti, (pronounced "booty") born to immigrant Italian parents May 23, 1922, in San Bruno, California, the youngest of three children. Nursed to an age he can still remember, then weaned on wine for lack of a cow, he was raised in an era when milk pails runneth over with fresh made alcohol. Growing up underfoot of tough bootleggers, he spent his childhood experiencing unpleasant run-ins between them and crooked lawmen. Haunted by memories of the involvement that his father, relatives and colleagues had in bucking prohibition, their ups and downs in the struggle to make it in a society hostile to immigrant minorities, the author finally dares to unload the burden he carried for so long. His tale attempts to bring out the characteristics and qualities of this particular group of people by depicting them the way they were during those fabulous Twenties. Clean copy.
NY, Harper Collins , 1st, 1993, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. Color illustrations by the author. Book review laid in. SIGNED BY JOYCE WITH A DOODLE OF AN ELF'S FACE. "Art Atchinson Aimesworth--inventor, crime fighter, and all-around whiz kid--receives a mysterious summons from Santa Claus and shares a Christmas adventure with his sister Esther that brings them closer together." Clean copy.
Hardcover. London, Andre Deutsch, 1st, 1954, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, blue cloth covers with gilt lettering on spine somewhat faded. 256 pages, b&w illustrations. INSCRIBED BY BILL HUGHES, Special Branch, New Scotland Yard, to John Isham, American serviceman who served there in the 1940s. Otherwise a clean, tight copy.
Softcover. London, Hard Case Crime, 1st thus, 2013, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, colorful wraps with a retro-style illustration by Glen Orbik. COMIC BOOKS ARECORRUPTING AMERICA'S YOUTH! Or so the esteemed Dr. Werner Frederick would have people believe--people like the Congressmen holding hearings on banning violent crime and horror "funny books." And when the crusade provokes a most un-funny murder, Jack Starr--comics syndicate troubleshooter--has no shortage of suspects. Was it the knife-wielding juvenile delinquent or the naked seductress? Perhaps a frustrated publisher or an outraged cartoonist. Or was it a comic book reader...? Inspired by the real-life 1950s witch-hunt against Tales From the Crypt publisher EC Comics, SEDUCTION OF THE INNOCENT pulls back the curtain for an insider's view of the history of comics--and features more than a dozen brand new illustrations in the classic EC style by comic book legend Terry Beatty. Like new.
Softcover. London, Hard Case Crime, 1st thus, 2013, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, colorful wraps with a retro-style illustration by Glen Orbik. COMIC BOOKS ARECORRUPTING AMERICA'S YOUTH! Or so the esteemed Dr. Werner Frederick would have people believe--people like the Congressmen holding hearings on banning violent crime and horror "funny books." And when the crusade provokes a most un-funny murder, Jack Starr--comics syndicate troubleshooter--has no shortage of suspects. Was it the knife-wielding juvenile delinquent or the naked seductress? Perhaps a frustrated publisher or an outraged cartoonist. Or was it a comic book reader...? Inspired by the real-life 1950s witch-hunt against Tales From the Crypt publisher EC Comics, SEDUCTION OF THE INNOCENT pulls back the curtain for an insider's view of the history of comics--and features more than a dozen brand new illustrations in the classic EC style by comic book legend Terry Beatty. Like new.
Softcover. New York, Avon Book, 1st, 1961, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 144 pages. Paperback. Avon Book #T-491. Previous owner's ink notation on first page. Light wear to paper wrappers. Spins cocked lightly.
Softcover. NY, Vintage Crime/Black Lizard, reprint, 1991, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 245 pages. Eight months after being horribly disfigured in a car accident, Dan Marriott has his face rebuilt by plastic surgery, but he must still struggle with an amnesia that could mean his death as he is stalked by an unknown killer. Originally titled "The Plastic Nightmare". Clean copy.
 "QUARRY'S CHOICEby: Max Allan Collins")
 "QUARRY'S LISTby: Max Allan Collins")
 "QUARRY'S LISTby: Max Allan Collins")
 "QUARRYby: Max Allan Collins")
 "Remarkable Case of Burglary, Aby: Keating, H.R.F.")
 "SEDUCTION OF THE INNOCENTby: Max Allan Collins")
 "SEDUCTION OF THE INNOCENTby: Max Allan Collins")
 "Shake a Crooked Town: A New Johnny Killain Crime Novelby: Marlowe, Dan")
