Alnilam

by James Dickey (1923-1997) [*Award winning author of: Deliverance]

Price: $50.00

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Description

Doubleday & Company, Garden City NY (1987) HC w/ DJ, Stated First Edition/Stated First Print (Copyright date on Title page and Copyright page, Copyright page states: First Edition, jacket's back inner flap states: 0687, jacket's front inner flap has letter A just above price, Copyright page Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data numbers read: PS3554.132A78 1987 813'.54 86-19699), very stout 8vo, 682 pages; Book: F/VF, clean, tight and sound, near as new, appears a once read or an unread, mild thin line of tannish patina to top and bottom edges, inner binding has uniformly eased away a bit from outer cloth on spine due to weight of pages but inner binding is completely secure and intact and outer cloth is perfect in shape with no flat spots, ridges, creases or wrinkles, elsewise nothing derogatory of note, blue cloth boards and, bright gilt lettering impressed to spine, author's replicate signature flat stamped to front board in bright gilt; Pages: F/VF, clean, white and secure, nothing derogatory of note, fancy blue and white checkered endpapers and pastedowns,; DJ: F/VF, clean and bright, mild tannish patina to white background areas, elsewise nothing derogatory of note, original jacket illustration by Stanislaw Fernandes, not clipped, price still showing on front inner flap (not a remainder/not a book club ed./not a Library ed.) Synopsis: In his quintessential modern era class, Deliverance, award winning author James Dickey took us on a fateful odyssey into the heart of the American backwoods. Now, in his first work of fiction after, Deliverance, he takes us on a very different journey. A startling rite of passage through the worlds of darkness and sight, Alnilam, is a stunning portrait of one man's encounter with the truth about his son, and in turn, himself. Early in Word War II, Frank Cahill learns his son, whom he has never met, has crashed in an Air Corps training accident and is presumed dead. Though recently blind due to adult diabetes, Frank travels to the camp and learns of his son, Joel's mysterious demise and enigmatic life. It is not certain that Joel is dead and his fellow cadets think they have seen him or sensed his presence. For them, Joel is a hero, the center of a secret group called Alnilam, named after the a middle star of Orion, the "hunter" constellation. As the cadets follow Joel's doctrines -- or what they believe happened to him -- they are in quest of complete knowledge of the air, the ultimate flight as "precision mysticism", to join the mechanical with the physical and the spiritual. Through passages as brilliant and memorable as Saint-Expéry, Dickey writes about the exhilaration of flying, using air symbolically as Melville used water in Moby Dick. Dickey has chosen to tell part of the story from the point of view of Dark and Light. In the Dark portions we learn what is going on from the heightened perceptions of Frank Cahill, the blind father; in Light, we observe the action from the point of view of those who can see --- the world of inner visions as opposed to the apparent world. Together they form, Alnilam, Another James Dickey masterpiece. This was James Dickey's 22nd work; including fiction, poetry, prose, critical works, and belles-lettres.