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The Woman in the Dunes -
Kobo Abé
1964 - Knopf Canada, New York - First Edition in English
‘Are you shoveling to survive, or surviving to shovel?’
Japan’s Kafka. Abé’s most celebrated novel. A brilliant, claustrophobic, mysteriously existential tale, remarkable for its hypnotic descriptions of the sand that dominates the book.
Published in 1962, to spontaneous acclaim, translated into 20 languages and adapted for a Cannes festival award-winning film directed by Hiroshi Teshigahara and scored by Toru, Abé wrote the screenplay.
Translated from the Japanese by E. Dale Saunders. With drawings by Machi Abé.
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1964 - Knopf Canada, New York - First Edition in English
‘Are you shoveling to survive, or surviving to shovel?’Japan’s Kafka. Abé’s most celebrated novel. A brilliant, claustrophobic, mysteriously existential tale, remarkable for its hypnotic descriptions of the sand that dominates the book.
Published in 1962, to spontaneous acclaim, translated into 20 languages and adapted for a Cannes festival award-winning film directed by Hiroshi Teshigahara and scored by Toru, Abé wrote the screenplay.
Translated from the Japanese by E. Dale Saunders. With drawings by Machi Abé.
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The Restaurant at the end of the Universe -
Douglas Adams
1980 - Arthur Barker Limited, London - First Hardback Edition
If you’ve done six impossible things this morning, why not round it off with breakfast at Milliways, the Restaurant at the end of the Universe?
Which is exactly what the crew of the Heart of Gold plan to do. There’s just the small matter of escaping the Vogons, avoiding being taken to the most totally evil world in the Galaxy and teaching a space ship how to make a proper cup of tea. And did anyone actually make a reservation?
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1980 - Arthur Barker Limited, London - First Hardback Edition
If you’ve done six impossible things this morning, why not round it off with breakfast at Milliways, the Restaurant at the end of the Universe? Which is exactly what the crew of the Heart of Gold plan to do. There’s just the small matter of escaping the Vogons, avoiding being taken to the most totally evil world in the Galaxy and teaching a space ship how to make a proper cup of tea. And did anyone actually make a reservation?
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The Five People You Meet in Heaven - SIGNED -
Mitch Albom
2003 - Hyperion, New York - First edition
‘At the time of his death, Eddie was an old man with a barrel chest and a torso as squat as a soup can.’
Part melodrama and part parable, Mitch Albom's The Five People You Meet in Heaven weaves together three stories, all told about the same man: 83-year-old Eddie, the head maintenance person at Ruby Point Amusement Park.
‘There's much wisdom here . . . An earnest meditation on the intrinsic value of human life.’ - Los Angeles Times.
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2003 - Hyperion, New York - First edition
‘At the time of his death, Eddie was an old man with a barrel chest and a torso as squat as a soup can.’Part melodrama and part parable, Mitch Albom's The Five People You Meet in Heaven weaves together three stories, all told about the same man: 83-year-old Eddie, the head maintenance person at Ruby Point Amusement Park.
‘There's much wisdom here . . . An earnest meditation on the intrinsic value of human life.’ - Los Angeles Times.
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The Wasp Factory -
Iain Banks
1984 - MacMillan, London - First Edition
A fine copy of the author's important first novel. A twisted story of incidents in the lives of Scottish islanders and one child in particular, highly controversial at the time of it's release:-
‘Brilliant’ - The New York Times.
‘Rubbish’ - The Times.
‘Macabre, bizarre, and impossible to put down’ - The Financial Times
‘A work of unparalleled depravity - The Irish Times
‘One of the top 100 novels of the century’ - The Independent
So there you have it, to be read with caution.
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1984 - MacMillan, London - First Edition
A fine copy of the author's important first novel. A twisted story of incidents in the lives of Scottish islanders and one child in particular, highly controversial at the time of it's release:-‘Brilliant’ - The New York Times.
‘Rubbish’ - The Times.
‘Macabre, bizarre, and impossible to put down’ - The Financial Times
‘A work of unparalleled depravity - The Irish Times
‘One of the top 100 novels of the century’ - The Independent
So there you have it, to be read with caution.
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Flaubert’s Parrot -
Julian Barnes
1984 - Jonathan Cape, London - First Edition
'Julian Barnes's wry and graceful book, part novel, part stealthy literary criticism, traces the marks Flaubert made on a forgetting world. The writing is unfailingly sharp and often very funny, and among the best prose I have read in years'. - Sunday Times.
‘A great success, humane and generous, full of insight and wit, rich and even prodigal in its verbal inventiveness: a book Flaubert would have scorned to write, a book well worth writing’ - New York Times.
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1984 - Jonathan Cape, London - First Edition
'Julian Barnes's wry and graceful book, part novel, part stealthy literary criticism, traces the marks Flaubert made on a forgetting world. The writing is unfailingly sharp and often very funny, and among the best prose I have read in years'. - Sunday Times.‘A great success, humane and generous, full of insight and wit, rich and even prodigal in its verbal inventiveness: a book Flaubert would have scorned to write, a book well worth writing’ - New York Times.
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Humboldt’s Gift - Signed by the Author -
Saul Bellow
1975 - The Viking Press, New York - First Edition
1976 Pulitzer Prize winning novel, and the book that contributed to Bellow's winning of the Nobel Prize in Literature the same year.
A self-described "comic book about death,"
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1975 - The Viking Press, New York - First Edition
1976 Pulitzer Prize winning novel, and the book that contributed to Bellow's winning of the Nobel Prize in Literature the same year. A self-described "comic book about death,"
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Henderson the Rain King -
Saul Bellow
1959 - Viking, New York - First edition, first issue, with top page edge stained yellow.
Bellow's classic novel of a dissatisfied American millionaire finding himself in Africa.
Searching to find his "more," Henderson goes on safari to the Dark Continent in search of self, or Ernest Hemingway. The novel is full of satire, extreme characterizations, and raucous jokes. It is a comic Heart of Darkness.
Jack Nicholson once said that the role he most wanted to play was Eugene Henderson.
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1959 - Viking, New York - First edition, first issue, with top page edge stained yellow.
Bellow's classic novel of a dissatisfied American millionaire finding himself in Africa. Searching to find his "more," Henderson goes on safari to the Dark Continent in search of self, or Ernest Hemingway. The novel is full of satire, extreme characterizations, and raucous jokes. It is a comic Heart of Darkness.
Jack Nicholson once said that the role he most wanted to play was Eugene Henderson.
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The Deep -
Peter Benchley
1976 - Andre Deutsch, London - First UK Edition, published same year as first US edition.
‘Every story Peter Benchley wrote was based on something that happened to him or something that he knew a great deal about. In JAWS he knew a lot about sharks. In The Deep, he had been lucky to learn about Bermuda and its many historic shipwrecks from Teddy Tucker, a great Bermudan treasure diver, while doing a story for the National Geographic on Bermuda. The Deep was based on a real shipwreck called The Constellation that was carrying a bunch of drugs during World War II.’ - Wendy Benchley.
‘On a perfect day in Bermuda a honeymooning couple dives into the offshore reefs. They are looking for the wreck of a sunken ship. What they find is surprising. It lures them into a mysterious and increasingly dangerous encounter, a relentless struggle for survival.’
The basis for the movie of the same name, with the stunning Jacqueline Bisset, the shambling Nick Nolte, together with a very large and helpful moray eel.
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1976 - Andre Deutsch, London - First UK Edition, published same year as first US edition.
‘Every story Peter Benchley wrote was based on something that happened to him or something that he knew a great deal about. In JAWS he knew a lot about sharks. In The Deep, he had been lucky to learn about Bermuda and its many historic shipwrecks from Teddy Tucker, a great Bermudan treasure diver, while doing a story for the National Geographic on Bermuda. The Deep was based on a real shipwreck called The Constellation that was carrying a bunch of drugs during World War II.’ - Wendy Benchley.‘On a perfect day in Bermuda a honeymooning couple dives into the offshore reefs. They are looking for the wreck of a sunken ship. What they find is surprising. It lures them into a mysterious and increasingly dangerous encounter, a relentless struggle for survival.’
The basis for the movie of the same name, with the stunning Jacqueline Bisset, the shambling Nick Nolte, together with a very large and helpful moray eel.
More details