Search Results: Authors starting with A from Ed Smith Books

New York: McGraw-Hill, 1968. First edition. Hardcover. Nearly fine with minor rubs at corners and light darkening to spine. Peter Parnall. An autobiographical work by American writer Edward Abbey (1927-1989) originally published in 1968. His fourth book and his first book-length non-fiction work, it follows three fictional books (Jonathan Troy, The Brave Cowboy, and Fire on the Mountain). Novelist, essayist, white-water rafter, and self-described "desert rat," Abbey wrote of the wonders and beauty of the American West that was fast disappearing in the name of "development" and "progress." Often angry, frequently funny, and sometimes lyrical, Abbey recreated for his readers a region that was unique in the world. The American West was perhaps the last place where solitary selves could discover and reflect on their connections with wild things and with their fellow human beings. "This is not primarily a book about the desert " writes Edward Abbey in his introduction. "In recording my impressions of… Read More

New York: Random House, 1995. First edition. Hardcover. A near fine copy in a very good plus dust jacket. Ackerman journeys in search of monarch butterflies and short-tailed albatrosses, monk seals and golden lion tamarin monkeys: the world's rarest creatures and their vanishing habitats. She delivers a rapturous celebration of other species that is also a warning to our own. Traveling from the Amazon rain forest to a forbidding island off the coast of Japan, enduring everything from broken ribs to a beating by an irate seal, Ackerman reveals her subjects in all their splendid particularity. She shows us how they feed, mate, and migrate. She eavesdrops on their class and courtship dances. She pays tribute to the men and women hwo have deoted their lives to saving them. 184 pages with index.

New York: Simon and Schuster, 1987. First edition. Hardcover. A nearly fine copy, one small spot to foredge, in a fine jacket. What do a dead cat, a computer whiz-kid, an Electric Monk who believes the world is pink, quantum mechanics, a Chronologist over 200 years old, Samuel Taylor Coleridge (poet), and pizza have in common? Apparently not much; until Dirk Gently, self-styled private investigator, sets out to prove the fundamental interconnectedness of all things by solving a mysterious murder, assisting a mysterious professor, unravelling a mysterious mystery, and eating a lot of pizza - not to mention saving the entire human race from extinction along the way (at no extra charge). To find out more, read this book (better still, buy it, then read it) - or contact Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency. ‘A thumping good detective-ghost-horror-whodunnit-time travel-romantic-musical-comedy epic.'.

New York: Aperture, 1994. First edition. Hardcover. A very good plus copy in a clean very good plus dust jacket. Oblong 4to. A celebration of anonymous places where we can still find nature's beauty. Robert Adams first visited these particular locations as a boy, when the West seemed unchanging. Now, many years later, he returns to them with the affection of a longtime acquaintance. Adams has chosen twelve poems by William Stafford to accompany the pictures. Both photographer and poet observe a practice of quiet in the out-of-doors, and both discover there a promise. 112 pages.

New York: Charles Scribner, 1990. First edition. Hardcover. A very good plus copy in a very good plus dust jacket. Small 4to. When Ray Carver passed in August of 1988, all too early at 50, he left behind a remarkable legacy--eleven books of short stories and poems--that clearly establishes him as one of the finest American writers. It was Bob Adelman, the photographer, who sensed that he could capture the world of Carver in the companion art of photography. This book was conceived before Carver passed. Presented here is the stark but human reality of one man's world, a man who was generous in his spirit and in his gifts, and who rose above his beginnings. Illustrated from photographs.

New York: Scribner's, 1990. First edition. Hardcover. A near fine copy in a near fine dust jacket. Bob Adelman. Small 4to. Photographs by Bob Adelman. Introduction by Tess Gallagher. When Raymond Carver died in August of 1988, all too early at 50, he left behind a remarkable legacy - eleven books of short stories and poems - that clearly establishes him as one of the finest of American writers. Carver Country presents the stark but human reality of one man's world, a man who was generous in his spirit and in his gifts, and who rose above his beginnings - but Raymond Carver never left his native ground or gave up his love for its terrain and its people. Raymond Carver's gritty texts, including his poems, short stories and unpublished letters, combined with Bob Adelman's photographs of Carver's people and haunts, re-create the world of this major writer, bringing to life the bleak, blue-collar towns, people, and places that became the inspiration for much of his work. Includes 113 duotone photos. 159 pp.

Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1968. First edition. Hardcover. A fine copy bound in black cloth with silver lettering in a clean, very good dust jacket with sunning (browning) to spine. James Agee received the fame he deserved only after his tragically early death, of a heart attack, in a New York taxi, at forty-five. Two years later, in 1955, his Pulitzer prize-wining novel, A Death in the Family, appeared and readers began to discover Agee's earlier work; his first novel, The Morning Watch; his volume of poetry, Premit Me Voyage; and most importantly Let Us Now Praise Famous Men, his study of the Depression South which combined journalism and art and has become a kind of classic. This book contains Agee's previously uncollected prose: pieces ranging from Harvard days to his last years. In addition to short stories, there are notes for motion pictures (a medium that held deep fascination for him), scenarios, and plans for projected works which reveal the dizzying way in which fresh ideas competed for… Read More

Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2016. First edition. Hardcover. A near fine copy in a near fine dust jacket. Joel Sackett. Signed on the title page by the author. As friends began "going back to the land" at the same time that a health issue emerged, Kathleen Alcalá set out to reexamine her relationship with food at the most local level. Remembering her parents, Mexican immigrants who grew up during the Depression, and the memory of planting, growing, and harvesting fresh food with them as a child, she decided to explore the history of the Pacific Northwest island she calls home. In The Deepest Roots, Alcalá walks, wades, picks, pokes, digs, cooks, and cans, getting to know her neighbors on a much deeper level. Wanting to better understand how we once fed ourselves, and acknowledging that there may be a future in which we could need to do so again, she meets those who experienced the Japanese American internment during World War II, and learns the unique histories of the blended… Read More

San Francisco: Chronicle Books, 1997. First edition. Hardcover. A near fine copy in a near fine dust jacket. This copy inscribed by the author to a "Writer's Community" on Bainbridge Island, Washington, "For Field's End! / K. Alcala / 4 December / 2003." Bookplate of 'Field's End' pasted to the front free endpaper. This is the author's first novel. When the tale opens in the 1870s in a village in northern Mexico, the Caraval family has long been clandestine Jews. To the dismay of his parents, however, Zacarias abandons religion and wanders in the desert, searching for gold. At home in Saltillo, his wife Estela takes the rare and bold step of declaring herself independent from her husband and raises their children on her own. But as she takes a lover and tries to make her own path, she learns that the time-honored traditions of Saltillo can be tested only so far. Her young brother and sister, androgynous twins with unsettling powers, have already been banished north of the border, where many of the… Read More

New York: Little, Brown & Co, 2017. First edition. Hardcover. A near fine copy in a near fine dust jacket. Signed by Alexie on a sheet tipped in by the publisher. Family relationships are never simple. But Sherman Alexie's bond with his mother, Lillian, was more complex than most. She plunged her family into chaos with a drinking habit but shed her addiction when it was on the brink of costing her everything. She survived a violent past but created an elaborate facade to hide the truth. She selflessly cared for strangers but was often incapable of showering her children with the affection they so desperately craved. She wanted a better life for her son, but it was only by leaving her behind that he could hope to achieve it. It's these contraditions that made Lillian Alexie a beautiful, mercurial, abusive, intelligent, complex, and very human woman. 457 pages.

Garden City: Doubleday, 1968. First edition. Hardcover. A very good plus copy in a very good plus to near fine dust jacket wiht light wear to extremities. This thrilling sequel to The Guns of Navarone reunites members of the Allied team that silenced the giant guns of Navarone and sends them on a desperate bid to assist a ragtag band of Partisan forces trapped by two armoured divisions of the German army in the rugged mountains of Yugoslavia.

Boston: Little Brown, 1989. Second Paperback Printing 1991. Paperback. A very good to near fine copy in the original perfect bound photo illustrated wrappers. Small Oblong 4to. A volume in the 'American Photographer Master Series, Henry Horenstein, Editor. Allard is the perfect choice for an inaugural volume, for the photographers in this series share an independence of vision and character--something Allard has in abundance. 84 illustrations, 78 in color.

Boston: New York Graphic Society/Little Brown, 1982. First printing. Hardcover. A near fine copy in a near fine dust jacket. The laid-in print is near fine. Oblong 8vo. This is the first edition in hardback and dust jacket, not the signed limited edition. However, a print is laid in (same print as the front panel of the dust jacket). The print is not signed by Allard but it has the copyright info and title printed at the bottom. Measures 11 1/2 x 8 1/4. Photographer's first book with a foreword by Thomas McGuane. A photographic tribute to the American cowboy captures the hardships and loneliness of this vanishing way of life and reveals the spectacular natural beauty of the West. The magnificent photographs of cowboys and the West, sensitive, lonely, beautiful and real, are superbly matched with short anecdotal material that makes wonderful reading.

Yonkers: Gazette Press, 1998. First edition. A near fine copy in a near fine dust jacket. Inscribed by the author and dated 4/14/03. The story of a brave American who served nobly was a paratrooper in WWII. He died for his patriotic ideals in a Chinese prison camp. 188 pages with a few photographs.

New York: Harper & Row, 1967. Long Galley (6 1/2 x 24 inches). Paperback. Folded in half with some edgewear to first two pages, else very good solid copy. Rare long galley. Svetlana Alliluyeva, subject of Rosemary Sullivan's critically acclaimed biography, Stalin's Daughter, describes the surreal experience of growing up in the Kremlin in the shadow of her father, Joseph Stalin. Svetlana Iosifovna Alliluyeva, later known as Lana Peters, was the youngest child and only daughter of Joseph Stalin and Nadezhda Alliluyeva, his second wife. In 1967, she fled the Soviet Union for India, where she approached the U.S. Embassy for asylum. Once there, she showed her CIA handler something remarkable: A personal memoir about growing up inside the Kremlin that she'd written in 1963. The Indian Ambassador to the USSR, whom she'd befriended, had smuggled the manuscript out of the Soviet Union the previous year and returned it to her as soon as she arrived in India. Structured as a series of letters to a friend… Read More

Chapel Hill: Algonquin, 2004. First edition. Hardcover. A near fine copy in a near fine dust jacket. A self-professed candy freak, Steve Almond set out in search of a much-loved candy from his childhood and found himself on a tour of the small candy companies that are persevering in a marketplace where big corporations dominate. From the Twin Bing to the Idaho Spud, the Valomilk to the Abba-Zaba, and discontinued bars such as the Caravelle, Marathon, and Choco-Lite, Almond uncovers a trove of singular candy bars made by unsung heroes working in old-fashioned factories to produce something they love. And in true candy freak fashion, Almond lusciously describes the rich tastes that he has loved since childhood and continues to crave today. Steve Almond has written a comic but ultimately bittersweet story of how he grew up on candy-and how, for better and worse, the candy industry has grown up, too. Candy freak is the delicious story of one man's lifelong obsession with candy and his quest to discover… Read More

New York: Random House, 2010. First edition. Hardcover. A fine copy in a fine dust jacket. With a life that's spanned the phonographic era and the digital age, Steve Almond lives in Rawk. Like you, he's secretly longed to live the life of a rock star, complete with insane talent, famous friends, and hotel rooms to be trashed. Also like you, he's content (sort of) to live the life of a rabid fan, one who has converted his unrequited desires into a sort of noble obsession. This book traces Almond's passion from his earliest rock criticism to his eventual discovery of a music-crazed soul mate and their subsequent production of two little superfans. Along the way he reflects on the delusional power of songs, the awkward mating habits of drooling fanatics, and why Depression Songs actually make us feel alive.

New York: Grove Press, 2002. First edition. Hardcover. A fine copy in a fine dust jacket ('Authographed Copy' sticker to front cover). Author's first book. Twelve passion-fueled stories. Signed by the author on a tipped-in page before the half-title page. 205pp.

New York: Viking Press, 2014. First edition. Hardcover. A near fine copy in a near fine dust jacket. For the past five years Hayley Kincain and her father, Andy, have been on the road, never staying long in one place as he struggles to escape the demons that have tortured him since his return from Iraq. Now they are back in town where he grew up so Hayley can go to a proper school. Perhaps, for the first time, Hayley can have a normal life, put aside her own painful memories, even have a relationship with Finn, the hot guy who obviously likes her but is hiding secrets of his own. Will being back home help Andy's PTSD, or will his terrible memories drag him to the edge of hell, and drugs push him over?

Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1993. First edition. Paperback. A near fine clean copy. This copy, in the original tall perfect bound wrappers, is signed by Chris Anderson. A selection of the American Land & Life Series. Buying his dream house several years ago on the forest's edge near Corvallis, Oregon, essayist Chris Anderson hoped to find the joys of rural living. Despite interminable Mr. Blandings experiences, he lived embowered by 12,000 acres of seemingly endless fir trees. But not for long. The McDonald-Dunn Forest was about to become the site of a disturbing research project. Little did Anderson know when he bought his house that, in addition to studying the ecological effects of clear-cutting, the researchers wanted to see how urban fringe dwellers might be affected too. The shock of that harvest compelled the essays in this vibrant, graceful record of the relationship between the forest and Anderson's life on its boundary. 185 pages.