Search Results: Titles starting with U from ReadInk

Los Angeles: UCLA Film and Television Archive. Near Fine. [c.2001]. First Edition. Hardcover. (pictorial boards; no dust jacket, as issued) [nice clean copy, essentially as-new with just a slight bump at the top of the spine, faint rubbing to rear cover]. (B&W photographs) A nicely-produced tribute to the long-running series of dramatic TV productions, with a page devoted to each of 176 of its shows, beginning with "Amahl and the Night Visitors" (which gets two pages, and was actually presented five times from 1951 through 1954. Each of the covered programs is represented by a photo, a synopsis, a brief critical commentary, and the basic credits and broadcast data. (It's mentioned in the introduction that the number of productions in the series was then "well beyond 200," but there's no way of telling, from this volume, exactly how many were omitted, or what they were.) Also included: a timeline of the series; a list of awards won; and full title and… Read More

New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. Very Good in Good dj. 1968. First Edition. Hardcover. [book mildly shelfworn, a bit of soiling to edges, spine turned; jacket a little dog-eared/edgeworn, with a rather clumsily tape-repaired tear at bottom of front panel]. What is UNIAD (Universal Advisors, Inc.)? A "personal advisory guild" with limited membership, that promises it can and will change your life -- if you can meet the entrance requirements. (Imagine that -- a novel based on the idea that computers might play an important role in human social interactions. What a silly notion, eh?) .

New York: Samuel French, Inc.. Fine. (c.1966). Later Printing. Softcover. 0573617422 . [nice clean copy with no discernible wear]. (stage diagram) Farce about an aging actor who plots to kill his 94-year-old mother in order to use his inheritance to bankroll his return to the stage; his plot, however, comes to the attention of the organization UTBU, agents of which attempt to thwart him. (The roles were played by Tony Randall and Thelma Ritter in the original Broadway production, which received tepid reviews and ran for just seven performances.) .

New York: Eyecontact Publishing. Near Fine in Near Fine dj. (c.1981). First Edition. Hardcover. [no significant wear to book, just a teeny-tiny stain at the bottom right corner of the front cover; jacket slightly faded at spine, faint soiling to front panel]. Behind-the-scenes story of the production of the notorious Bob Guccione/ Penthouse feature CALIGULA, "by the young First Assistant Director who saw it all, did it all, and somehow lived to tell the tale. From the incredible start to the gory finish, from the shocking street scenes to the biggest orgies ever staged, it is the story of art surpassing reality. For in filming the story of Rome's most depraved Emperor who would do literally anything for thrills, the makers of CALIGULA created real scenes of horror, lust and depravity far exceeding anything the Roman Empire ever saw." Quite uncommon, this was apparently the only book ever issued by its publisher, and is of continuing interest as there are still people out… Read More

New York: E.P. Dutton & Company, Inc.. Very Good+ in Very Good dj. 1930. First Edition. Hardcover. [some wear to cloth at ends of spine, very slight bump to bottom front corner; fragile jacket is quite presentable, worn along edges and hinges, hinges split along several lengths but still holding together, about 1" paper loss from top of spine (no loss of text), tiny chip at bottom left corner of rear panel, a few little nicks along top of front panel]. (B&W plates) A memorandum from an imagined future time, in which centuries of slow-moving but cataclysmic climate change -- not global warming but rather global freezing -- have forced humans first to reconstitute their civilization far beneath the surface of the earth, and ultimately to develop "projectile cars" (rocket ships, essentially) to allow them to escape from an earth that's become "useless and dead." (The memo-writer has rejected an alternate plan to use "certain experiments in atomic… Read More

Boston: Houghton Mifflin Company. Near Fine in Very Good dj. 1973. First Edition. Hardcover. 0395171237 . (price-clipped) [solid copy, minor shelfwear and very light soiling to bottom edge, small green "BTP" label on front pastedown; jacket a little worn at extremities, a few small tears, small scrape mark on front panel (slightly affecting author's middle initial)]. (endpaper maps) Novel about "an American Indian hero," an Apache whose life is traced from infancy to adulthood, "and through forty years of war against both the Mexicans and the 'White Eyes.'" In telling this story, the author "has also told the story of the Chiricahua Apaches, their eventual surrender to the U.S. Army and their betrayal by the government." (This book would seem to be based on the same character and incidents as Robert Aldrich's film ULZANA'S RAID, released the previous year, although there is no apparent relationship between the film and the book.) .

New York: The Macmillan Company. Very Good+ in Very Good dj. 1958. First Edition. Hardcover. [light shelfwear to book, front endpaper is corner-clipped; the jacket is a little edgeworn, with a short closed tear and associated diagonal crease at top left corner of front panel, old internal tape-repair at top of spine, a couple of tiny nicks at edges of rear panel]. Novel about a female patient at a state mental hospital. The author, per the jacket blurb, was "one of the country's leading psychiatric nurses," and at the time of the book's publication was Director of Nursing Education at the Vermont State Hospital in Waterbury, Vermont (which had previously been known as the Vermont State Asylum for the Insane). In her Preface to the book (her first novel), she writes: "I believe in compassionate love as the healing balm for the gaping emotional wounds which have broken our mental patients. I believe in this over and above the 'mechanical' psychiatric… Read More

New York: Nutrend Publications, Inc.. Near Fine. 1961. (Vol. 10, No. 6). Magazine. [sharp-looking copy, minor edgewear and a few tiny edge-nicks to front cover]. (B&W photographs, advertisements) A typical issue of one of the numerous "Confidential"-inspired scandal mags of the era, purporting to supply "all the facts [and] all the names." The latter, in this issue, include: Red Skelton ("he rode a non-stop carousel of babes and bourbon"); Marlon Brando (about his purported romance with Rita Moreno); Marilyn Monroe (an article about "the hidden secrets behind [her] tragic bust-ups!"); and Loretta Young (her "uncensored" story, "a story you won't see any Sunday night!"). There's also a bit of "hard news," you might say, in the form of an article entitled "Rape of the Congo: The Story the United Nations Hushed," pitched as "A Preliminary Report on the atrocities committed by the Congolese Army… Read More

New York: Farrar & Rinehart, Inc.. Very Good in Fair dj. (c.1940). First Edition. Hardcover. (price-clipped) [partial exposure of webbing at front hinge but still a decent, well-bound book; light shelfwear and a bit of soiling to bottom edge, slight bumping at several corners; jacket is heavily edgeworn, internally tape-repaired at top of spine, light soiling and creasing to rear panel]. The chroncile of a year on the New England farm of William and Nancy Hayward and their nine children, plus "that lovable and kindly old sinner, Uncle Snowball," not a blood relative but an old geezer who has been "adopted" by the family: "A blizzard swooped down one day and literally blew Uncle Snowball into the Hayward front door -- and there he stayed." Uncle Snowball appears to be quite the fabulist, brimming over with stories and songs; he also drinks, swears, and has no respect for conventional amenities -- the Wacky Uncle Who Came to Dinner, essentially.… Read More

Los Angeles: Wetzel Publishing Co., Inc.. Very Good+ in Good dj. (c.1937). First Edition. Hardcover. [moderate bumping to bottom corners, otherwise a nice clean book with minimal shelfwear; jacket edgeworn (and possibly insect-nibbled along the right edge of the front panel), faded at spine, with various tiny nicks and chips]. Historical "novel of Romantic Ireland," set against the background of Ireland's struggle for independence from England in the 19th century. At first glance, the jacket illustration -- which appears to be the flag of Israel crossed with a version of the "Irish harp" flag dating back to the 17th-century Confederacy of Ireland -- seems like an utter historical dislocation, especially as Israel didn't come into existence as a sovreign nation until eleven years after this book was published! However, the rear jacket blurb begins to hint at what the author is up to, namely the task of positioning British Prime Minister Benjamin Disraeli as a… Read More

Clearwater FL: The World of Yesterday. Very Good. 1980. (No. 9). Magazine. [light soiling/staining to covers, diagonal wrinkle (binding flaw) at upper left corner of front cover]. (B&W photographs, facsimiles) Nostalgia-oriented publication devoted to Western films. In this issue: an article about entertainer/actress Texas Guinan; a feature about the "Renfrew of the Royal Mounted" B-pictures produced by Grand National and Monogram in the late 1930s and early 1940s; an article about the Western Writers of America; an article about a dedicated "Lone Ranger" fan, Frank Swain of Pulaski, Virginia; a career article on Tom Mix (with a filmography of his films through 1915 only; they ran out of room for the rest, "to be continued"). .

London: Macmillan and Co. Limited. Very Good+ in Good dj. 1935. Reprint. Hardcover. [modest shelfwear to book, a little dust-soiling and age-toning to the edges of the text block, one-time owner's initials plus date & place of purchase in ink along edge of rear pastedown (concealed beneath rear jacket flap); the jacket is edgeworn, with slight paper losses at several corners and a small array of scrape marks on the spine]. (Macmillan's Cottage Library) Series Hardy's second published novel, and the first of his Wessex novels; originally published anonymously in 1872. Small-format hardcover (about the size of a Modern Library book), in the publisher's "Cottage Library" series; uncommon in the Bip Pares dustjacket. .

New York: Henry Holt and Company. Fine in Near Fine dj. (c.1986). First Edition. Hardcover. 0030085144 . [nice tight clean book with no discernible wear; jacket a little rubbed, one small closed tear at bottom of rear panel]. The author's first novel, set in the bayou country of Louisiana, featuring police detective Rene Shade. .

New York: Coward-McCann, Inc.. Fair. 1931. First Edition. Hardcover. NOISBN . (no dust jacket) [solid reading copy, moderate external soiling, some deterioration to cloth on rear cover, 3-inch split to cloth along front joint; humorous contemporary gift inscription (non-authorial) on ffep, along with attractive vintage bookplate of one Marianna V. Hover]. Novel set in the Lake District of northern England (Cumberland, specifically), telling the tale of a couple of poachers, Red Ike and Will Moffatt, who run afoul of a powerful and not-very-nice landowner -- a situation complicated by the fact that Will and the landowner's daughter are in love. (And Red Ike is in love with a gypsy girl who might also turn out to be a daughter of the landowner.) In the words of a contemporary reviewer: "There are secret passages, caves, graves at full moon, elaborate gypsy staffs, and much other machinery of romance." Apparently the book's primary author, Denwood, had himself been a… Read More

New York: Robert M. McBride and Company. Near Fine in Very Good dj. (c.1938). First American Edition. Hardcover. [good sound copy, light shelfwear, very slight bumping to a couple of corners, generic vintage bookplate on front pastedown (with one-time owner's name blacked out); fold-out map in excellent condition; jacket is edgeworn, small tears at most corners, small puncture-wound in spine, shallow paper loss at top of spine]. (B&W photographs, fold-out map) The history of "La Libre Belgique," an underground journal operated by a group of Belgian patriots during the German occupation of their country during World War I. "Started soon after the Germans had closed down all the Belgian newspapers, it was one of the best kept secrets of the Great War," and is told here in "a powerful and dramatic account [using] facts which have been obtained by the author from the actual heroes of the enterprise." Originally published in England under the title… Read More

San Francisco: Donald S. Ellis / Creative Arts Book Company. Near Fine in Near Fine dj. 1984. First Edition. Hardcover. 0916870731 . [previous owner's signature at upper corner of front pastedown, otherwise a tight copy with no discernible wear; jacket has just the teensiest bit of wear at a couple of corners]. A woman in her late fifties, finding in difficult circumstances after a lifetime of misfortunes, recalls "her fabulous -- and not so fabulous -- glamorous life with 'the boys,' the big shot racketeers of 1940's Chicago, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Hawaii, Jamaica, Cuba and Florida [including' Ben [Bugsy] Siegel, Meyer Lansky, Johnny Reata and others." Errol Flynn pops up as a character, too. .

[Carbondale]: Southern Illinois University. Near Fine. 1976. Hardcover. (maroon buckram, gilt lettering; no dust jacket, as issued) [minimal shelfwear, lower corners lightly bumped]. Ph.D. dissertation submitted to the Department of History, Southern Illinois University, October 1976. [Photocopy of original typescript, 243 pages; solidly bound]. "Examines American-Liberian relations since the foundation of the settlement in 1820, but with special emphasis on the years 1923 to 1947." .

New York: The Macmillan Company. Very Good in Good dj. 1934. First Edition. Hardcover. [good sound copy, some foxing/spotting to top and bottom edges of text block, previous owner's notation about where he obtained the book written in ink on front endpaper (see notes); the jacket is a bit of a mess, with various chips and tears, but is substantially complete]. "Why should so small and lovely an island cause such agitation?" [When was this book written, again?] "Here is a land by nature peaceful and fertile. At times it has been rich, with a foreign trade of over a billion dollars; more often it has been poor, with a trade of less than one hundred million. At time there have been gayety and contentment; more often there have been bitterness and desperate rebellion. Whichever way the wind turned, the United States was affected. No other country has been so continuously a concern of our Department of State." The author was the U.S. Ambassador to Cuba from… Read More

New York: Brentano's. Very Good. 1912. First Edition. Hardcover. (no dust jacket) [moderate wear to extremities and bottom edge, faint bookseller's rubber-stamped name on front pastedown, white spine lettering somewhat rubbed but still fully readable, binding solid]. Novel set in British India. According to one contemporary reviewer, the book was "chiefly concerned with the same problem as 'Tess of the d'Urbervilles,' but the author gives it a different solution." Apart from the fact that her name appears as the author of four books in the British Library catalogue (including this one), all published between 1908 and 1916, I know nothing at all about Ms. Burn, although I think it's pretty safe to say she was no Thomas Hardy. It's also worth nothing that while print-on-demand or PDF editions of this title are available from numerous vendors, if you want a real vintage BOOK, this would appear to be the only one available online at the time of… Read More

New York: The Macaulay Company. Fair in Fair dj. (c.1933). First Edition. Hardcover. [apparently an ex-rental library book, although bearing no stamps as such; both book and jacket are worn and soiled, the jacket flaps are firmly affixed to the pastedowns, and the jacket appears to have been trimmed slightly, exposing about 1/8" of the covers at both top and bottom edges]. Scarce novel about two young internes who fall in love, but "consummate their love in secret" because hospital regulations forbid them from marrying. In the course of the story, which exposes "the human realities and the pitfalls of common-law marriage," the young couple are plagued by the "prying vindictiveness of hospital authorities," not to mention the meddling of "a shameless, wealthy nymphomaniac and her circle of wastrels." It ain't pretty (and neither is this beat-up book) -- but I just couldn't resist the cover image, of a lovely young woman holding up her… Read More