FURROW'S END: AN ANTHOLOGY OF GREAT FARM STORIES - JIM THOMPSON'S COPY, SIGNED

New York: Greenberg: Publisher, 1946. First Edition. Thompson's own copy of Greenberg's anthology of farm stories, "gathered for those kindred spirits who have a lasting love affair with Mother Earth." Contributions include stories by Tolstoy, Louis Bromfield, E.B. White, William Saroyan, Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings, Jesse Stuart, O.E. Rolvaag, and others. It includes "Mr. Simpson Makes a Sale," an excerpt from Thompson's crime novel Heed the Thunder, also published by Greenberg in 1946, and hailed by the likes of Richard Wright, Millen Brand, and Louis Bromfield. Among 20th century American crime fiction authors, Thompson's signature is among the rarest; we note a single inscribed copy in the auction record (his 1972 paperback original Child of Rage), and can recall seeing fewer than a handful of other copies offered in the trade, most of them in similarly used condition. Provenance: Through the trade from Sharon Reed, Thompson's daughter and executor of his estate. Octavo (20.5cm); blue cloth, with titling and decorative elements stamped in green on spine and front cover; dustjacket; xii,307,[1]pp. Jim Thompson's copy, signed by him (in pencil) at upper front pastedown. Modest wear to extremities, sunning to upper board edges, upper corners bumped, with some discoloration to upper rear panel, and traces of paper from verso of dustjacket adhesed to upper spine and rear cover; small stain to upper left edge of textblock; faint stains to upper front hinge, rear endpaper, and Contents leaf, though remaining text is quite clean; still a Good, sound copy. Dustjacket is unclipped (priced $3.00), shelfworn and soiled, with shallow losses to spine ends and corners, short tears with attendant creases, and staining that begins at upper spine and extends across the upper half of the rear panel; Good. Housed in a custom clamshell case.