fiction history

Hardcover. Burlington VT, Vermont Historical Society, 1st, 1941, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, green cloth with gold lettering, design on front cover, 62 pages. Dean was a Professor at the University of Vermont who taught ceative writing. He was the author of many works of historical fiction, including stories about Vermont heroes John Stark and Ethan Allen, and was the founder of the Green Mountain Folkore Society. Two small notations on prelim pages, bookplate on front fly leaf.

Hardcover. Dallas TX, Taylor Publishing, 1st, 1993, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. 168 pages. A brief history with some 300 color and b&w illustrations of covers, posters, publicity shots of detective and spy stories, TV, and cinema.

Hardcover. NY, Doubleday & Company, reprint, 1963, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Good, Hardcover in a lightly worn, price-clipped dust jacket with fading to spine. 408 pages with b&w illustrations. Classic work by the famed science fiction author and engineer, providing a fascinating account of pyramids, aqueducts, catapults, fortifications, ships, and technology from the ancient world to the Renaissance. No First Edition indicated on copyright page so assumed early reprint.

Hardcover. NY, G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1st US, 1873, Book: Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, brown cloth stamped in black and gilt, 442 pages. While a fictional story based on actual events, the author relates a wealth of information on the history, customs and political divisions in the Arab world at the time. Hinges weak but holding, bookplate on inside front cover. Light shelf wear.Originally published in England in 1850.

NY, Oxford University Press, 1st, 1929, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 134 pages. Color, black & white illust. Previous owner's signature front fly-leaf. Tri-color decoration on front cover. Light soil to back cover.

NY, G.P. Putnam's Sons, 2nd pr., 1904, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardccover, red cloth binding, with stamped titles and decoration to upper board and spine, and pastedown illustration in corner of upper board. Color frontis. and 8 b&w plates by Peter Newell. Eight tales of a man and his relationship with various animals. Hinges cracked, binding solid. No markings.

Hardcover. Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 2nd pr., 1979, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 211 pages. Number line starts with "2". Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, Harper and Brothers, reprint, 1860, Hardcover in embossed maroon cloth with gilt lettering on the spine, 505 pages plus publisher's ads. First published in 1849, a Victorian novel that follows the Caxton family: scholarly Austin working on his grand history, his wife Kitty, his brother Roland the Captain, and Austin's son Pisistratus who narrates. Their quiet country life shifts when young Pisistratus becomes secretary to a parliamentary leader, falls for his employer's daughter, and faces heartbreak alongside his father's financial troubles. This gentle, humorous family portrait marked a turning point in Victorian fiction. A light tan stain at the very corner tip of the pages, small price on front fly leaf, otherwise a tight, clean copy.

Softcover. McGill-Queen's University Press, reprint, 1987, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 913 pages, b&w illustrations, maps. Trigger's work integrates insights from archaeology, history, ethnology, linguistics, and geography. This wide knowledge allows him to show that, far from being a static prehistoric society quickly torn apart by European contact and the fur trade, almost every facet of Iroquoian culture had undergone significant change in the centuries preceding European contact. He argues convincingly that the European impact upon native cultures cannot be correctly assessed unless the nature and extent of precontact change is understood. His study not only stands Euro-American stereotypes and fictions on their heads, but forcefully and consistently interprets European and Indian actions, thoughts, and motives from the perspective of the Huron culture. The Children of Aataentsic revises widely accepted interpretations of Indian behaviour and challenges cherished myths about the actions of some celebrated Europeans during the "heroic age" of Canadian history. In a new preface, Trigger describes and evaluates contemporary controversies over the ethnohistory of eastern Canada.

Hardcover. Winchester UK, St. Paul's Bibliographies, 1st, 1987, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 142 pages. Mary Elliott (then Mary Belson) began writing for children in 1809, at a time when increasing literacy and wealth and more progressive understanding of the reading needs of children were creating a growing demand for more and more books for young people. Beginning with two books in verse - one a lively tale about town and country mice, the other, an anthology including many of her own poems - she went on to produce a stream of books on a variety of subjects. Her stories, some eventful and exciting, were mostly about real children learning to tackle the everyday circumstances and difficulties which they encountered in the world around them. These books were made all the more attractive by her publisher, William Darton, who provided them with entertaining illustrations, many of them interesting today for their depiction of contemporary scenes and fashions. Mary Elliott's books soon spread across the Atlantic, and American publishers reissued many of them, sometimes adapting the text to local circumstances. Although her books are now forgotten, they cannot be disregarded by researchers into the history of childhood and of children's literature. This bibliography contains about 470 entries. Clean.

Hardcover. NY, G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1st, 2001, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. 48 pages illustrated in color by S.D. Schindler. Clean copy.

Hardcover. Franklin Center PA, The Franklin Library, 1st, 1987, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, rich maroon leather boards with decorations in gold on front and rear boards. Title in gold on spine between raised leather bands. All edges are gilt. Text is clean and crisp. Satin ribbon marker. SIGNED BY PLIMPTON on a blank prelim page. In April 1985, Sports Illustrated published an article that stunned the sports community. George Plimpton's 13-page profile of Sidd Finch, a mysterious pitcher who had been signed by the New York Mets and reportedly threw 168 mph, came complete with photos from spring training, scouting reports, and interviews with Mets players and management. A week later, SI apologized to readers around the world for their role in what is generally regarded as the greatest hoax in the history of sports journalism. The magazine had teamed up with the legendary author and Paris Review bon vivant for an April Fool's Day prank of unprecedented proportions. After the success of the article, Plimpton decided to turn the story into a novel -- a rousing baseball fairy tale that is considered one of the most memorable sports novels of the last half-century.

Hardcover. NY, Macmillan, 1st, 1987, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket, 275 pages. In April 1985, Sports Illustrated published an article that stunned the sports community. George Plimpton's 13-page profile of Sidd Finch, a mysterious pitcher who had been signed by the New York Mets and reportedly threw 168 mph, came complete with photos from spring training, scouting reports, and interviews with Mets players and management. A week later, SI apologized to readers around the world for their role in what is generally regarded as the greatest hoax in the history of sports journalism. The magazine had teamed up with the legendary author and Paris Review bon vivant for an April Fool's Day prank of unprecedented proportions. After the success of the article, Plimpton decided to turn the story into a novel -- a rousing baseball fairy tale that is considered one of the most memorable sports novels of the last half-century. Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, Henry Holt and Co., 1st, 1997, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. Rikki Ducornet's boldest imaginative act yet-a brilliant novel about the Marquis de Sade that will forever change the way we regard one of history's most notorious men. Picture a dramatic courtroom scene: during the French Revolution a fan-maker is on trial because of a manuscript seized in her rooms and her friendship with the Marquis de Sade, the notorious author of Justine, who has already been condemned and imprisoned by the same court for his sexual transgressions. Not only has she made exquisite and sexually provocative fans for her friend, but she has also coauthored with the Marquis a book about the infamous Spanish missionary, Bishop Landa, accusing him of massacres and other hideous abuses against the native population of the New World. The men of the court are so consumed with punishing the authors of this scandalous book that they are blinded to the folly of their own accusations against the Marquis. 212 pages, clean copy.

Hardcover. New York, Franklin Watts, 1st, 1959, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 83 pages. Black & white illustrations by Douglas Gorsline. Dust jacket has light edgewear. Dust jacket is protected by a mylar cover.

Hardcover. NY, Printed for I. Riley and Co, 2nd Ed., 1806, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, The First Settlers of Virginia, an Historical Novel, Exhibiting a View of the Rise and Progress of the Colony at James Town, a Picture of Indian Manners, the Countenance of the Country, and its Natural Productions. Hardcover, Second edition, considerably enlarged. Contemporary calf over boards. Octavo. xii, [13]-284 pages. PLEASE NOTE: No frontispiece engraving of Pocahontas rescuing John Smith. No signs of extraction, so probably never bound in. A reproduction of the frontis laid in. This is one of the earliest American romantic novels about Native Americans. Davis was an English immigrant with literary aspirations who lived in Philadelphia at the beginning of the 19th century. He was acquainted with the likes of Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr. He originally adapted this material from his 1803 "Travels of Four Years and a Half in the United States of America" and published it in 1805 as "Captain Smith and Princess Pocahontas: An Indian Tale." This expanded version includes Davis's autobiography, "A Memoir of the Author" (pp. {275]-284). Includes "Errata" on page [274]. Clean, no markings.

Hardcover. NY, Doubleday & Co., 1st, 1962, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Fair, Hardcover in a worn and chipped dust jacket. A volume in the Mainstream of Americas Series, edited by Lewis Gannett. Between the period of settlements in colonial America and the time of the Revolutionary War, English and French interests clashed in a struggle to determine who would rule the New World. It was a time from which a great deal of fiction draws inspiration, an exciting and dramatic period well~salted with the Washingtons, Johnsons, Frontenacs, Amhersts, Wolfes, and Montcalms who so greatly influenced the early growth of our land. Edward Hamilton has reconstructed this absorbing story of wilderness, forts, and weapons with a scholarly respect for minute detail. Name on half-title page, otherwise clean copy.

Softcover. Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1st, 2014, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 223 pages. Over the course of a fifty-year career, Donald E. Westlake published nearly one hundred books, including not one but two long-running series, starring the hard-hitting Parker and the hapless John Dortmunder. In the six years since his death, Westlake's reputation has only grown, with fans continuing to marvel at his tightly constructed plots, no-nonsense prose, and keen, even unsettling, insights into human behavior. With The Getaway Car, we get our first glimpse of another side of Westlake the writer: what he did when he wasn't busy making stuff up. And it's fascinating. Setting previously published pieces, many little seen, alongside never-before-published material found in Westlake's working files, the book offers a clear picture of the man behind the books-including his thoughts on his own work and that of his peers, mentors, and influences. The book opens with revealing (and funny) fragments from an unpublished autobiography, then goes on to offer an extended history of private eye fiction, a conversation among Westlake's numerous pen names, letters to friends and colleagues, interviews, appreciations of fellow writers, and much, much more. There's even a recipe for Sloth a la Dortmunder. Really. Rounded out with a foreword by Westlake's longtime friend Lawrence Block, The Getaway Car is a fitting capstone to a storied career and a wonderful opportunity to revel anew in the voice and sensibility of a master craftsman.

Hardcover. NY, Scholastic, 1st, 1994, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. "Those shackles didn't rob us of being black, son, they robbed us of being human."This is the story of one family. A family whose history saw its first ancestor captured, shackled, and brought to this country from Africa. A family who can still see remnants of the shackles that held some of its members captive -- even today. It is a story of pride, determination, struggle, and love. And of the piece of the land that holds them together throughout it all. Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, Doubleday & Co, 1st, 1967, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. Return to the thrilling days of yesteryear when the most exciting people having the most exciting adventures came to us in our own homes through radio. Little Orphan Annie, Superman and others paraded through our ears and our homes in that wonderful time when our imaginations were ignited by fictional characters. Harmon provides reminiscences of the heyday of radio programming, with insights on such radio dramas as I Love a Mystery, Gangbusters, The Shadow, Inner Sanctum, Batman and Robin, Superman, Tom Mix, The Lone Ranger, The Green Hornet, Adventures by Morse and a couple of dozen more. Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, Dodd, Mead & Company, 1st, 1893, Book: Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, 190 pages. Frontis illustration loose but present. Illustration and gold embossed title on cover. Some discoloration to spine, otherwise good. Black & white Illustrations by J.O.B.

Hardcover. Taschen, 2nd pr., 2021, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Huge oversized hardcover, 16x11", 596 pages. The full, fascinating story of this fabled company, written and designed by EC-expert Grant Geissman. Even the most die-hard EC Fan-Addicts will find something new within these pages, with the Gaines family archives providing over 100 rarities that have never seen print. Cover images are reproduced from Gaines file copies. 1,000 illustrations include the rarest and most notorious covers, interior pages and panels, rare photos, vintage original artwork, and some of the most celebrated stories ever to be printed in four colors. Author Grant Geissman was a customer in Bud Plant's San Jose comic book store in 1968-69, long before he became a recording star and EC expert. Grant has written several books on EC and, in my mind, is the foremost authority on both Mad and EC. He generously did a special bookplate for us, which reproduces a "fantasy" cover for Incredible Science Fiction that he commissioned from Angelo Torres. It's in full color and signed by Grant.

Hardcover. NY, Celadon Books, 1st, 2022, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. It begins quietly on a balmy Southern night as some locals gather at Bo Peep's, one of the town's favorite watering holes. Within an hour, however, a man will be murdered and his companion will be "disappeared." An unlikely detective, Morgana Musgrove, doyenne of Savannah society, is called upon to unravel the mystery of these crimes. Morgana is an imperious, demanding, and conniving woman, whose four grown children are weary of her schemes. But one by one she inveigles them into helping with her investigation, and soon the family uncovers some terrifying truths-truths that will rock Savannah's power structure to its core. Moving from the homeless encampments that ring the city to the stately homes of Savannah's elite, Green's novel brilliantly depicts the underbelly of a city with a dark history and the strangely mesmerizing dysfunction of a complex family. Clean copy.

Hardcover. NY, Schwartz & Wade Books, 2nd pr, 2008, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 180 pages. Profusely illustrated in b&w. Here are the extraordinary lives of Abraham and Mary, from their disparate childhoods and tumultuous courtship, through the agony of the Civil War, to the loss of three of their children, and finally their own tragic deaths. Readers can find Mary's recipe for Abraham's 'favorite cake' and bake it themselves; hear what Abraham looked like as a toddler; see a photo of the Lincoln's dog; discover that the Lincoln children kept goats at the White House; see the Emancipation Proclamation written in Lincoln's own hand. Perfect for reluctant readers as well as history lovers, The Lincolns provides a living breathing portrait of a man, a woman, and a country. Clean copy.