Hardcover. NY, Abbeville Press, 1st, 2010, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket. 336 pages illustrated in color. This authoritative yet accessible study begins with an overview of the aesthetics, meanings, functions, and techniques of Mesoamerican architecture, and then proceeds to survey the historical development of the builder's art in each of the region's cultural areas. As readers travel from the Maya heartland of Guatemala and the Yucatan to the Aztec stronghold of the Valley of Mexico, and all the way to the northern hinterlands of Mesoamerica, they will gain an appreciation of both the unity and the diversity of the region's architecture. Clean copy. DOMESTIC SHIPPING ONLY.
Hardcover. Philadelphia, Edward Stern, 1st, 1910, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover with no dust jacket. Illustrated cover boards. Author wrote "The Roosevelt Bears", 7 color plates by C. Twelvetrees. An adventure told in verse about a little boy, Prince Domino. He and his siamese cat, who is very smart indeed, travel to far-off lands where they are helped by a little black and a little Japanese boy (the depictions of whom are slightly stereotypical). Moderate wear to front and rear cover. Loose binding. Light soil. Rear hinge torn half way up from bottom.
Hardcover. Seattle, Fantagraphics, 1st, 2013, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, 120 pages in color. You might think that birth of Prince Valiant's son Arn at the end of the previous volume would have slowed down Val's adventuring, but you would be wrong. In Prince Valiant Vol. 7, after the baby has been christened, Valiant and Gawain are dispatched to investigate reports of black magic in Wales, ending up in pitched battle at the aptly named Castle Illwynde. Then it's off to Scotland to battle the Picts, and then home yet again for Val to visit his growing boy. Valiant now enters the 1950s: The Thule winter is hard and bleak, and a prince who has designs on Aleta must be dealt with. Then it's another epic-length story, "The Missionaries," in which Val and several of his fellow knights and crew travel to Rome on a quest for teachers who might bring Christianity to Thule. The story also features an escape through the Alps, far too many red-headed girls, and a tragic, life-changing event for the young squire Geoffrey (a.k.a. "Arf "). And Foster charmingly ends the book with "The Prince Arn Story," a three-week sequence narrated by the toddler.
Hardcover. Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum, 1st, 2012, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 164 pages. Like new in publisher's shrink-wrap. The high school prom is an American tradition, a rite of passage, and one of the most important rituals of youth in this country. The internationally recognized documentary photographer Mary Ellen Mark took on the extraordinary challenge of working with the Polaroid 20x24 Land camera to produce this fascinating look at dozens of young people from a diverse range of backgrounds on this memorable night in their lives.Traveling across the United States to complete the project from 2006 to 2009, Mark photographed prom-goers at thirteen schools from New York City to Charlottesville, Virginia, to Houston to Los Angeles. Mark's husband, the filmmaker Martin Bell, collaborated with her on the project to produce and direct a film, also called Prom, featuring interviews with the students about their lives, dreams, and hopes for the future. A DVD of the film is packaged with the book. The 127 large-format photographs are reproduced in rich detail, and quotations from the student interviews punctuate the book. Some of the students' statements are comical, while others are deeply touching. The result is a captivating and revealing document of American youth at the beginning of the twenty-first century.
Hardcover. Los Angeles, J. Paul Getty Museum, 1st, 2012, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, 164 pages. Like new in publisher's shrink-wrap. The high school prom is an American tradition, a rite of passage, and one of the most important rituals of youth in this country. The internationally recognized documentary photographer Mary Ellen Mark took on the extraordinary challenge of working with the Polaroid 20x24 Land camera to produce this fascinating look at dozens of young people from a diverse range of backgrounds on this memorable night in their lives.Traveling across the United States to complete the project from 2006 to 2009, Mark photographed prom-goers at thirteen schools from New York City to Charlottesville, Virginia, to Houston to Los Angeles. Mark's husband, the filmmaker Martin Bell, collaborated with her on the project to produce and direct a film, also called Prom, featuring interviews with the students about their lives, dreams, and hopes for the future. A DVD of the film is packaged with the book. The 127 large-format photographs are reproduced in rich detail, and quotations from the student interviews punctuate the book. Some of the students' statements are comical, while others are deeply touching. The result is a captivating and revealing document of American youth at the beginning of the twenty-first century.
Hardcover. Philadelphia , John Wanamaker, 1st, 1899, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, green cloth with gilt and black decoration, 147 illustrations by Joseph Pennell and others. Folded Map laid In. Covers with light edgewear and chipping. Top edge gilt.
Softcover. Cambridge UK, Cambridge University Press, reprint, 2014, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, like new. 371 pages. Written by noted quantum computing theorist Scott Aaronson, this book takes readers on a tour through some of the deepest ideas of maths, computer science and physics. Full of insights, arguments and philosophical perspectives, the book covers an amazing array of topics. Beginning in antiquity with Democritus, it progresses through logic and set theory, computability and complexity theory, quantum computing, cryptography, the information content of quantum states and the interpretation of quantum mechanics. There are also extended discussions about time travel, Newcomb's Paradox, the anthropic principle and the views of Roger Penrose. Aaronson's informal style makes this fascinating book accessible to readers with scientific backgrounds, as well as students and researchers working in physics, computer science, mathematics and philosophy.
Softcover. Sheffield UK, Vertebrate Publishing Ltd , 1st, 2019, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 425 pages, color photos. In 1965 Tony Howard made the first British ascent of Norway's Troll Wall. He went on to found Troll Climbing Equipment but never stopped exploring. Quest into the Unknown, his autobiography, covers his extensive travels in North Africa, the Middle East, Scandinavia, Canada and much more. Clean copy.
Hardcover. Berkeley, University of California Press, 1st, 2004, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket, 390 pages, b&w illustrations. From the stony desolation of Jordan's desert, it is but a step through a doorway into the bath house of the Qusayr 'Amra hunting lodge. Inside, multicolored frescoes depict scenes from courtly life and the hunt, along with musicians, dancing girls, and naked bathing women. The traveler is transported to the luxurious and erotic world of a mid-eighth-century Muslim Arab prince. For scholars, though, Qusayr 'Amra, probably painted in the 730s or 740s, has proved a mirage, its concreteness dissolved by doubts about date, patron, and meaning. This is the first book-length contextualization of the mysterious monument through a compelling analysis of its iconography and of the literary sources for the Umayyad period. It illuminates not only the way of life of the early Muslim elite but also the long afterglow of late antique Syria. Clean copy.
Softcover. NY, Rizzoli, 1st, 2005, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Softcover, 160 pages, illustrated in color. Celebrating the culture and design of the railroad from its beginnings in the Industrial Revolution through its 20th-century heyday, Railroad is a loving tribute to the unique aesthetic of trains. With hundreds of archival and contemporary photographs, it examines the glamorous early days, when train travel meant sumptuous, luxurious interiors with formal black-tie dining cars and private sleeping-suite cabins, up to the present with the sleek, streamlined design and record-breaking speeds of modern trains around the globe. Touching on every aspect of railroad design, from the interiors and exteriors of the trains, to railroad stations, signage, and trestles and tunnels, Railroad also abounds in such train ephemera as tickets, conductor uniforms, timetables, and advertisements, and is sprinkled with trivia and anecdotes illuminating railroading's colorful history. As both harbinger of modern engineering and nostalgic symbol of an earlier age, the railroad continues to exert a fascination over all those interested in travel, engineering, and design. Clean, bright copy.
Hardcover. London, Charles Knight, 1st, 1844-45, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, marbled boards with red leather spine and corners. Two volumes bound in one, 244 pages & 254 pages. Gilt designs and lettering on spine. Profusely illustrated with woodcuts from the author's drawings. Mild wear to spine, tight, clean copy.
Hardcover. NY, Crowell, 1st, 1957, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Good, Hardcover in a worn, chipped dust jacket. Roger Rasmussen travels to the Boy Scout Jamboree in Southern California. 180 pages, b&w drawings by Henry Pitz. Clean copy.
Hardcover. London, Haus Publishing Limited, 1st, 2010, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 160 pages. Like new in publishers shrink-wrap. Xavier Roy's breathtaking photographs of Egypt offer us a haunting vision of a country and its people.
Hardcover. New York, Wise-Parslow Company, Reprint, 1930, Book: Good, Dust Jacket: None, 96 pages. Hardcover. Full color and black & white illustrations by Alexander Key. Pages 15-51 with shallow bump to top right corner of pages. Front cover with 2 quarter size stains, standard wear. Clean, tight copy.
Hardcover. Lannoo Publishers , 1st, 2010-06-16, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Like new in publishers shrink-wrap. 144 pages, color photography of the USSR. Text in Dutch and English.
Hardcover. NY, Harcourt, Brace And Company, 1st, 1937, Book: Fair, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, terra-cotta cloth with orange lettering. Beautiful full page illustrations done in khaki, black, rust and green by the author. Forward by Frank Boas. A tale based on the author's own knowledge of life in the South American jungles of a ten year old boy who goes deep into the jungle looking for honey. He forgets how his father always marks his trail, and so gets lost. This is the story of how he escapes the dangers of the jungle and finds his way back to the river and his family. Author Elizabeth K Steen (1886-1938) was an explorer and anthropologist who traveled in South America. Ex-lib. Worn at corners and spine ends. Top of spine torn, frayed.
Hardcover. NY, Knopf, 1st, 2009, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 352 pages. In this chatty, self-absorbed memoir told with a hefty dose of name-dropping and a devout reverence for fame and fortune, British interior decorator Haslam proudly reveals his intimate connections with many members of British and American high society from the 1950s to the present, from his distant relation to Princess Diana to his brief but adoring encounters with Tallulah Bankhead, Mick Jagger, the Beatles, Joan Crawford, and many more. Indeed his busy social life started young; for most of the first hundred pages he is a fairly wide-eyed ingenue at Eton, followed by stints in London, New York, California, and back to London as a magazine editor, interior designer, and columnist. His has been a life where everyone and everything is darling and divine; in his world, elevator doors open to reveal Salvador Dali, and Andy Warhol is a frequent and amusing dinner companion. While claiming to be telling all, Haslam hides most of what makes many memoirs truly personal and affecting; in exchange readers get a chance to feel as if they are on a first-name basis with the stars. His superficial obsession with high society is, still, highly entertaining and refreshingly honest, and will delight those who travel in international circles of design and fashion.
Hardcover. NY, Harper & Brothers, 1st, 1957, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, 205 pages. Hardcover. Color and b/w illustrations throughout. Decorated endpapers. Some tanning from age to edges, otherwise pages clean. Cover boards bound in blue, marbled cloth, red quarter cloth (some fading at spine, fraying at top and bottom). Binding tight, spine straight. In great shape for its age. Clarke explores a reef and the people of southern Sri Lanka. No dust jacket.
Hardcover. NY, Rizzoli, 1st, 3009, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 288 pages. Like an around-the-world vacation through resort locations and timeless fashions, the history of resort clothing is fashion at its most fun. Crossing continents, styles, and generations, the book travels through the tradition of vacation style, taking a visually stunning trip from early beach pajamas by Chanel and Schiaparelli to sailor stripes, to Pucci and Pulitzer prints, and, of course, to the bikini. Resort Fashion features rare photographs and never-before-published images by photographer legends, including Louise Dahl-Wolfe, Toni Frissell, Norman Parkinson, Jacques-Henri Lartigue, Helmut Newton, and Scavullo. The fashions showcase renowned designers from the past and present who have contributed their unique touch to resort wear, including Claire McCardell, Michael Kors, Rodarte, and many more. From Palm Beach to Montego Bay to St. Tropez, this book celebrates resort wear's vibrant history with an allure that extends beyond runways to the most exotic, far-flung destinations.
Hardcover. NY, Rizzoli, 1st, 3009, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover, 288 pages. Like an around-the-world vacation through resort locations and timeless fashions, the history of resort clothing is fashion at its most fun. Crossing continents, styles, and generations, the book travels through the tradition of vacation style, taking a visually stunning trip from early beach pajamas by Chanel and Schiaparelli to sailor stripes, to Pucci and Pulitzer prints, and, of course, to the bikini. Resort Fashion features rare photographs and never-before-published images by photographer legends, including Louise Dahl-Wolfe, Toni Frissell, Norman Parkinson, Jacques-Henri Lartigue, Helmut Newton, and Scavullo. The fashions showcase renowned designers from the past and present who have contributed their unique touch to resort wear, including Claire McCardell, Michael Kors, Rodarte, and many more. From Palm Beach to Montego Bay to St. Tropez, this book celebrates resort wear's vibrant history with an allure that extends beyond runways to the most exotic, far-flung destinations.
Hardcover. NY, Knopf, 1st, 1980, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright dust jacket. 227 pages. Previous owner's signature on front fly leaf, else a clean, tight copy. Naipaul presents here four essays about the "half-made" societies, those still suffering from the profound deprivations of colonialism and prey to corruption." He examines the role of Eva Peron as the catalyst for violence in Argentina, with its yearning for a European culture and the physical, historical, cultural reality of the land in which the native Indians were wiped out and the colonialists took over. He writes of the infamous Michael X in Trinidad whose pretensions to power and destiny led to the man's insanity and execution following two pointless murders. Shorter essays address nihilism in the Congo and Naipaul's take on Joseph Conrad and the Heart of Darkness.
Hardcover. NY, Harcourt Brace, 1st, 1993, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: Very Good, Hardcover in a bright, unclipped dust jacket. The painter, writer, and political activist returns to his native South Africa, where he was once imprisoned for working for the African National Congress, and reflects on the decline of apartheid and his own attachment to the Boer state. He describes the travail of his country riven by racial conflict. He recounts his seven-year imprisonment for treason and shares the passionate love of an exile--he resides in Paris--for his native land. In the recent period of "stability laced with blood" as De Klerk and Mandela's forces struggle to maintain a precarious political equilibrium, Breytenbach has been allowed to return for visits with his Vietnamese wife. Part travelogue and part memoir, this account offers frequent political discussions about the rivalry between the African National Congress and the Inkatha Freedom Party. A careful observer of people, their surroundings, fauna and flora, Breytenbach weaves richly colored narrative history, local lore and personal allusions. Clean copy.
Hardcover. Boston, Houghton Mifflin , 1st, 1950, Book: Very Good, Dust Jacket: None, Hardcover, putty color cloth stamped in red and blue, 277 pages. To write this, his third book, the author lived in Sicily itself for several months on a Guggenheim Fellowship. There he found the humor and romance, the places and the people that figured in the legends of his childhood. During his extensive travel on the island, he also discovered some of the realities of post-war and post-fascism reconstruction. Mild shelf wear, dust jacket flaps laid in.