The Neon Wilderness by Algren, Nelson - 1947

NY: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1947. First edition. 288pp. Light green cloth, dark yellowish brown spine lettering, dark yellowish brown top-stain, deckled fore-edge. Dust jacket price 2.50. [Bruccoli A3.1.a.] First state dust jacket with list of Doubleday's fiction titles. Book has [typical] minor spine age-toning [from dust jacket verso?] o/w Fine; Dust jacket has [typical] age-toning to spine and white flap hinges, a few small closed tears to edges, small open tear to top spine/front panel hinge, a little wear to corner tips. Book is tight and very square; dust jacket's white, yellow, brown, and light green colors are exceptionally bright. Great looking copy of a scarce title signed. SIGNED BY AUTHOR to half-title. Nelson Algren was one of the most authentic writers of the 20th century. He wrote things as he saw and heard them. "Poet of the Chicago Slums" - Malcolm Cowley. First collection of Short Stories. Third Book. Only 3000 copies printed of the first edition, first printing. The [twenty-four] stories in 'The Neon Wilderness' established Algren in the pantheon of American writers and formed the vein that he mined for all his subsequent novels and stories. Included are "A Bottle of Milk for Mother," about a youth being cornered for a murder, "The Face on the Barroom Floor," in which a legless man nearly pummels someone to death, and "So Help Me," Algren’s first published story. "Algren’s short stories are now generally acknowledged to be literary triumphs." - The New York Times. . Signed by Author. First Edition. Hard Cover. Near Fine in Very Good+ DJ/Very Good+. 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall.