Vanity Dies Hard by Rendell, Ruth - 1966

New York: Coward-McCann, Inc, 1956. First Edition. Hardcover. 253pp. Burgundy cloth lettered in red on the spine. 1957 Edgar Award winner for best novel. Previous owner's name in pencil on the front free endpaper, barely a hint of wear to the lower edges. A bright, fine copy in very good dustjacket with mild wear to the edges, tiny chip and light fading to the spine panel. Dustjacket illustration by Rus Anderson. ; Octavo.

New York: Harper & Brothers, Publishers, 1868. First US Edition. Hardcover. 223pp. Brown cloth stamped in blind on the front and in gold on the spine. Illustrated with wood engravings. A few speckles to front panel, small spot to bottom edge, previous owner's name in pencil on front pastedown endpaper, mild toning and soiling to text block. A solid very good copy. A Haycraft-Queen cornerstone. In Hubin, 1994, p. 180. ; Octavo.

NY: Morrow, 1932. First edition. Hard cover in original cloth. Author's scarce first book. Published NY: William Morrow Company, 1932, first printing. 8vo., 266pp., purple cloth with yellow titles. Spine and cover edges sunned, pastedowns and a few pages have mild foxing, else clean and bright. Very good. Only eight copies in WorldCat. . 1st. Hard. Very Good/No Jacket. 8vo.

320 pages. Small octavo (7 1/2" x 5 1/4") bound in original publisher's maroon with silver lettering to spine in original pictorial jacket. Jacket design by Fritz Wegner. (Bruccoli A10.1.a.) First edition, first printing. The English edition preceded the American by a few months.Critics and writers, ranging from W. H. Auden to Evelyn Waugh to Ian Fleming, greatly admired the finely wrought prose of Raymond Chandler. Although his swift-moving, hardboiled style was inspired mostly by Dashiell Hammett, his sharp and lyrical similes are original: "The muzzle of the Luger looked like the mouth of the Second Street tunnel"; "The minutes went by on tiptoe, with their fingers to their lips", defining private eye fiction genre, and leading to the coining of the adjective 'Chandleresque', which is subject and object of parody and pastiche. Yet, Philip Marlowe is not a stereotypical tough guy, but a complex, sometimes sentimental man of few friends, who attended university, speaks some Spanish and, at times,… Read More

x+533 pages. Octavo (8 1/4" x 5 3/4") bound in original publisher's beige cloth with brown lettering to spine and cover in original pictorial jacket.The Simple Art of Murder is hard-boiled detective fiction author Raymond Chandler's critical essay, a magazine article, and his collection of short stories. The essay was first published in The Atlantic Monthly in December 1944. The magazine article appeared in the Saturday Review of Literature, April 15, 1950. The article, somewhat rewritten, served to introduce the collection The Simple Art of Murder, 1950 (Houghton Mifflin Co.), which contained eight of Chandler's early stories pre-dating his first novel, The Big Sleep. The essay is considered a seminal piece of literary criticism. Although Chandler's primary topic is the art (and failings) of detective fiction, he touches on general literature and modern society as well. Chandler reserves his praise for Dashiell Hammett. Although Chandler and Hammett were contemporaries and grouped as the founders of… Read More

New York: Coward-McCann, Inc, 1956. First Edition. Hardcover. 253pp. Burgundy cloth lettered in red on the spine. 1957 Edgar Award winner for best novel. Previous owner's name in pencil on the front free endpaper, barely a hint of wear to the lower edges. A bright, fine copy in very good dustjacket with mild wear to the edges, tiny chip and light fading to the spine panel. Dustjacket illustration by Rus Anderson. ; Octavo.

New York: Harper & Brothers, Publishers, 1868. First US Edition. Hardcover. 223pp. Brown cloth stamped in blind on the front and in gold on the spine. Illustrated with wood engravings. A few speckles to front panel, small spot to bottom edge, previous owner's name in pencil on front pastedown endpaper, mild toning and soiling to text block. A solid very good copy. A Haycraft-Queen cornerstone. In Hubin, 1994, p. 180. ; Octavo.

NY: Morrow, 1932. First edition. Hard cover in original cloth. Author's scarce first book. Published NY: William Morrow Company, 1932, first printing. 8vo., 266pp., purple cloth with yellow titles. Spine and cover edges sunned, pastedowns and a few pages have mild foxing, else clean and bright. Very good. Only eight copies in WorldCat. . 1st. Hard. Very Good/No Jacket. 8vo.

320 pages. Small octavo (7 1/2" x 5 1/4") bound in original publisher's maroon with silver lettering to spine in original pictorial jacket. Jacket design by Fritz Wegner. (Bruccoli A10.1.a.) First edition, first printing. The English edition preceded the American by a few months.Critics and writers, ranging from W. H. Auden to Evelyn Waugh to Ian Fleming, greatly admired the finely wrought prose of Raymond Chandler. Although his swift-moving, hardboiled style was inspired mostly by Dashiell Hammett, his sharp and lyrical similes are original: "The muzzle of the Luger looked like the mouth of the Second Street tunnel"; "The minutes went by on tiptoe, with their fingers to their lips", defining private eye fiction genre, and leading to the coining of the adjective 'Chandleresque', which is subject and object of parody and pastiche. Yet, Philip Marlowe is not a stereotypical tough guy, but a complex, sometimes sentimental man of few friends, who attended university, speaks some Spanish and, at times,… Read More

x+533 pages. Octavo (8 1/4" x 5 3/4") bound in original publisher's beige cloth with brown lettering to spine and cover in original pictorial jacket.The Simple Art of Murder is hard-boiled detective fiction author Raymond Chandler's critical essay, a magazine article, and his collection of short stories. The essay was first published in The Atlantic Monthly in December 1944. The magazine article appeared in the Saturday Review of Literature, April 15, 1950. The article, somewhat rewritten, served to introduce the collection The Simple Art of Murder, 1950 (Houghton Mifflin Co.), which contained eight of Chandler's early stories pre-dating his first novel, The Big Sleep. The essay is considered a seminal piece of literary criticism. Although Chandler's primary topic is the art (and failings) of detective fiction, he touches on general literature and modern society as well. Chandler reserves his praise for Dashiell Hammett. Although Chandler and Hammett were contemporaries and grouped as the founders of… Read More