Search Results: Authors starting with L from ReadInk

Englewood Cliffs NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc.. Near Fine in Very Good dj. (c.1973). First Edition. Hardcover. (price-clipped) [minimal shelfwear to book; jacket is a bit edgeworn and lightly soiled, with a teensy chip at the top of the front panel, but quite a bit of dog-earing (and a short closed tear) at the top of the rear panel]. (B&W photographs) INSCRIBED fulsomely and SIGNED by the author on the front endpaper: "To my friend / & buddy Fil Perell. / Here's to our / friendship may it / continue to grow with / each passing year. / Thanks for all your / kindness toward me / Gratefully / Jack." An exercise/health maintenance book targeted for "today's modern businessman [who] leads a life of constant stress and aggravation. [This book presents] a complete, sound, sturdy conditioning program of physical exercise and controlled dieting for the man who just doesn't have the time." (The inscribee was a Los Angeles restaurant critic and publisher.)… Read More

Albany: State University of New York Press. Very Good. 1st printing. Softcover. [surface rubbing/scuffing along bottom edge of front cover, slight ripple in text block, previous owner's name in ink at top of front endpaper but no markings in text]. (Intersections: Philosophy and Critical Theory) Series Trade PB Originally published in France in 1978, this is "the first authoritative study of the emergence of the modern concept of literature in German romanticism. [It] situates the Jena romantics' 'fragmentary' model of literature -- a model of literature as the production of its own theory -- in relation to the development of a post-Kantian conception of philosophy as the total and reflective auto-production of the thinking subject. Analyzing key texts of the period, the authors articulate the characteristics of romantic thought and at the same time show historical and systematic connections with modern literary theory. Thus, [the book] renews contemporary… Read More

[Paris]: Éditions Seghers. Near Fine. 1970. First Edition. Softcover. [a nice clean copy, light external wear only, old price label affixed to rear cover]. (Cinéma d'aujourd'hui, no. 66) Series Trade PB (B&W photographs) French-language monograph on the great American film comedian, published the year before his death. Following the typical format of this popular series, the book includes a critical survey of Lloyd's oeuvre (thematically-organized rather than film-by-film), numerous comments on his work by critics and other filmmakers, a filmography and a bibliography. .

London: Elek Books. Very Good+ in Very Good+ dj. 1957. 1st U.K. edition. Hardcover. (price-clipped) [minor shelfwear, spine a bit turned; jacket quite nice, would rate Near Fine but for the somewhat clumsy price-clipping (which removes just a tiny corner of the jacket flap text)]. Comic novel about "Fiérot Le Pou" (get it?), a gangster who "had risen -- over forty years and via Sing Sing and Alcatraz -- to control PRA, the largest criminal combine in France." Yep, he's a big shot, all right, but he's also got a big problem: his only son, Frankie, despite being "born with a silver flick-knife in his fingers and with all the promise of a golden future as a killer," wants no part of the family business, having designs on becoming a poet and a schoolmaster. His old man decides to break his spirit by sending him for "training" in Marseilles, Palermo, London and New York, and Gallic hilarity ensues. Published in France in 1954 as "Le… Read More

Boston: Little, Brown and Company. Good+. 1910. "New Illustrated Edition" Later Printing. Hardcover. (no dust jacket) [reading copy; shelfworn but intact, slight fraying to cloth at most corners, minor external soiling, spine lettering rubbed to near-unreadability; internally clean and all 29 plates present]. (B&W plates) Classic of Swedish literature, and the basis for Greta Garbo's most famous pre-Hollywood film, directed by Mauritz Stiller in 1924. .

London: Bloomsbury. Near Fine in Very Good+ dj. 2001. First Edition. Hardcover. (price-clipped) [minimal shelfwear, just some mild age-toning to the edges of the text block; jacket is similarly unblemished (except for the price-clipping), but has a "Signed at Book Soup" sticker affixed to the front panel (removable upon request)]. SIGNED (no inscriptions) on the half-title page by Tynan's daughter Tracy Tynan (who was the driving force behind the book's publication) and her half-sister Roxana. "Irreverent, indiscreet, wildly funny, sad, shocking and inspiring, the legendary diaries of Kenneth Tynan are above all compelling literature. For over three decades, on both sides of the Atlantic, Tynan was at the hot center of the theater and film worlds. He knew everybody; and everybody wanted to know him. His diaries -- so resplendent with griefs and gossip -- bear superb witness to the fame he courted and the price he paid for it." In the years following… Read More

Los Angeles: The Angelus Press. Very Good in Good dj. 1933. First Edition. Hardcover. [modest shelfwear, some exposure of boards along lower edge and at upper corners; the jacket is somewhat age-toned and has a handful of small edge-chips, but both the front-panel illustration and the rear-panel text are unaffected]. (B&W photographs) "Technocracy" in its broadest sense is a philosophy of government and society that calls for experts in various scientific, technical and economic disciplines to run the world, as opposed to leaving matters to the messy business of representative democracy and the rancorous partisan politics it often engenders. It arose in a serious way in the U.S. and Canada during the 1920s, but was given new currency in the early days of FDR's New Deal -- but to the average American (per the jacket blurb) it came across as a vague slogan "with some sort of scientific background that is largely beyond his comprehension." Hence, this book, an… Read More

Garden City NY: Double & Company, Inc.. Near Fine in Near Fine dj. 1980. First Edition. Hardcover. 0385156324 . [nice clean copy, tiny dent in bottom edge of front cover, no other discernible wear; jacket similarly nice, with just a bit of crinkling along top edge]. Memoir by a Bozeman, Montana, housewife who had some big-time psychiatric and drug-and-alcohol-related troubles, and finally found help at Dr. Lechler's psychosomatic clinic in Bad Herrenalb, West Germany. Her story is presented in alternate chapters by Mrs. Lair and Dr. Lechler. .

New York: Longmans, Green and Co.. Very Good+ in Very Good dj. 1951. First American Edition. Hardcover. [a good sound copy, slight bumping to the upper corners, minor soiling to edges of text block, tiny bookseller's name rubber-stamped on front endpaper (Farrow's Bookshop, Waterville, Maine); the jacket shows some wear along the top and bottom edges and the spine folds, and some surface scuffing on the lower right area of the front panel]. (line drawings) The title characters are a pair of brothers, with a quite satisfactory domestic situation -- except that it's taken a markedly unsatisfactory turn, as "their domestic staff, a pair of humans by the name of Thompson, [who] in their humble way were happy and contented, considering themselves fortunate in the service of two such gentlemanly employers as James and Macarthur. Yet, of late, there had been a distinct falling-off in the quality of the service," to which household crisis the feline brothers are discussing… Read More

New York: Grosset & Dunlap. Very Good in Poor dj. (c.1929). First Edition. Hardcover. NOISBN . [minor wear at extremities, light dampstain surrounding base of spine; jacket heavily worn, with a big chunk missing from top of front panel, plus various tears, scrapes and whatnot]. (8 B&W film stills) Photoplay Edition (and true first edition, a G&D original), a novelization of the backstage musical film that won the year's Academy Award as Best Picture. Depicting a thinly-veiled Ziegfeld Follies (the book's impresario is named "Joseph Zanfield," changed to "Francis Zanfield" in the film), this version of the yarn benefits from author Lait's breezy, proto-hardboiled prose style, which ages a little better on the page than the early-talkie creakiness of the film has on the screen. Illustrated with eight black-and-white stills from the M-G-M movie, which starred Charles King, Anita Page and Bessie Love, with the ever-popular Jed Prouty (later father… Read More

New York: The Archer Press Corporation. Good in Good+ dj. (c.1931). Triangle Monthly Books. Hardcover. [decent copy of a cheaply-manufactured book, spine turned and book slightly twisted on its axis, light soiling to top edge, browning to pages (not brittle), one-time owner's signature and date in blue ink at top of title page; jacket has one tiny chip at upper right-hand corner of front panel, short tear at bottom of rear panel, dampstaining to rear panel along spine]. "Gertrude was young, only seventeen, and beautiful -- a very dangerous combination when mixed with inexperience in the business world. Jerrold Scott of Scott & Son was wealthy. He was also a lover of beauty -- especially in young women, and none too scrupulous. Gertrude was desperate for a job and Jerrold Scott was kind." Uh-oh. Lait's original play of that name had a Broadway run in 1914, was filmed in 1915, and was novelized (by a writer named Webster Denison) in 1916; whether this particular… Read More

New York: Plume. Very Good+. 1992. First Edition. Softcover. [modest edgewear to covers, some browning/discoloration around inside edges of covers]. Trade PB INSCRIBED by Elaine ("La La") LaLanne on the front endpaper, and SIGNED by her and "Jack"; in addition, a handwritten letter (ALS) from the pair to the inscribee is laid in, signed by both Elaine and Jack. This book "explores the special nutritional needs of everyone over 50. It explodes common myths about the way we eat and drink and explains how good dietary habits help reduce the risk of cancer, depression, diabetes, high blood pressure, and other dangerous diseases. In addition, Elaine LaLanne provides 175 great recipes that can reduce dierary fat, dairy, sugar, and salt, plus tips on cooking techniques, suggested menus, a health and fitness diary, and more." Signed by Author .

[n.p.]: Bartholomew House. Near Fine in Near Fine dj. 1966. 4th printing. Hardcover. [nice tight copy, bottom front corner bumped but otherwise a nice clean book with a solid binding; the notoriously fragile thin-paper jacket (now in protective mylar) shows just a bit of scuffing to the rear panel and some minor edgewear]. (B&W photographs) In retrospect -- although I haven't done a scientific survey -- this seems perhaps the first of the modern-era movie-star memoirs, which is to say that its author focuses, in large measure, on her off-screen sex life. (All the more sensational, I suppose, in that Ms. Lamarr rose to stardom in Hollywood's "Golden Age," during which era the depiction of ON-screen sex was carefully regulated by the Production Code Administration watchdogs.) It would be a mistake, however, to dismiss the book as trashy and titillating -- it is, rather, refreshingly candid and occasionally quite insightful about how sexuality fueled and informed the… Read More

Norwood: The Plimpton Press. Very Good. 1910. First Edition Thus. Hardcover. (no dust jacket) [some bumping and wear at top corners, slight discoloration along spine, minor cracking at top of spine]. "The Plimpton Press take pleasure in issuing separately this famous essay and in presenting it to their friends this Yuletide - MCMX - with heartiest good wishes for a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year." An adorable little book (about 40 pages, 6-1/2" tall), full of gems like: "Books of quick interest, that hurry on for incidents, are for the eye to glide over only. It will not do to read them out. I could never listen to even the better kind of modern novels without extreme irksomeness. A newspaper, read out, is intolerable." Hear, hear! .

London: Magnum Books / Eyre Methuen Ltd. Very Good+ in Very Good+ dj. 1978. First Edition. Hardcover. [slight bump and tiny crack to lower corner of front cover, age-toning to edges of text block; jacket is a bit scuffed on the rear panel, otherwise quite nice], The editor, in his introduction, assures us that these dozen stories "have been out of print for many years, most of them since they first appeared. Not because they have been considered unworthy of reprinting -- but because they have literally been forgotten." Contents: "The Fear from the Lake" (Oswell Blakeston); "The Cadaver of Bishop Louis" (Frederick Cowles); "Smeath" (Barry Pain); "The Murder of the Hunchbacked Boy" (C.D. Pamely); "The Reconciliation" (Lafcadio Hearn); "The Moon Stricken" (Bernard Capes); "The Chippendale Mirror" (E.F. Benson); "The Haunted Bungalow" (Charles Duff); "The Third Eye" (Robert W. Chambers);… Read More

New York: Taplinger Publishing Company. Near Fine in Near Fine dj. 1977. First American Edition. Hardcover. [nice copy with minimal shelfwear, faint age-toning to fore-edge and endpapers, one-time owner's name plus date & place of purchase in ink at top of front endpaper, small check-marks next to about half the titles in the table of contents; the jacket shows just the faintest surface wear, mostly to the rear panel]. Editor Lamb's "third expedition into the uncharted depths of the Victorian era fromwhich he has returned with a wealth of strange and haunting tales." Contents: "The Devil of the Marsh" (H.B. Marriott-Watson); "A Tragic Honeymoon" (G.R. Sims); "The Battle of the Monsters" (Morgan Robertson); "The Return" (R. Murray Gilchrist); "The Corpse Light" (Dick Donovan); "The Ship That Saw a Ghost" (Frank Norris); "A Bottomless Grave" (Ambrose Bierce); "One Summer Night" (Bierce);… Read More

New York: Taplinger Publishing Company. Very Good+ in Very Good+ dj. 1975 (c.1974). First American Edition. Hardcover. [book is lightly worn at the extremities, some discoloration around edges of endpapers, small ink check-marks next to all titles in table of contents, previous owner's initials + date & place of purchase written in ink along edge of rear pastedown (concealed beneath rear jacket flap); the jacket is lightly rubbed, with just a bit of wear along the top and bottom edges]. "Fifteen rare supernatural tales from the days of gaslight and gore, hansoms and horrors, music halls and mayhem." Contents: "Xélucha" (M.P. Shiel); "The Black Veil" (Charles Dickens); "The Mystery at Fernwood" (Elizabeth Braddon); "The Black Lady of Brin Tor" (Guy Boothby); "The Mother of Monsters" (Guy de Maupassant); "The Murderer's Violin" (Erckmann-Chatrain); "The Mask" (Richard Marsh); "The Dead Man… Read More

New York: Taplinger Publishing Company. Good in Very Good dj. 1974. First American Edition. Hardcover. [shelfworn ex-library book (although only marking is a stamp on the top edge), spine turned, hinges a little weak, small tape marks on covers, light soiling/staining in gutters, one-time owner's name plus date & place of purchase in ink at top of front endpaper, small check-marks next to all titles in table of contents; the jacket is fairly nice-looking, with a rectangular label-removal scar near the bottom of the spine, a bit of wrinkling along the top edge, and a small internal tape-reinforcement at the base of the spine]. Another of Lamb's well-chosen anthologies, this one with the avowed aim of providing "a broad cross-section of the ghost and horror story writers, both known and unknown, of the last eighty years." Contents: "The Child" (L.A. Lewis); "Celui-la" (Eleanor Scott); "A Resumed Identity" (Ambrose Bierce);… Read More

New York: Taplinger Publishing Company. Very Good+ in Very Good+ dj. 1977. First American Edition. Hardcover. (price-clipped) [tiny dent in bottom edge of front cover near spine, no other significant shelfwear, light age-toning to edges of text block, tiny stain at right edge of front endpaper, one-time owner's name plus date & place of purchase in ink at top of front endpaper, small check-marks next to most title in table of contents; the jacket shows only a touch of surface wear, and has a very short diagonal crease at the upper corner of the rear flap, but would grade as Near Fine but for the price-clipping)]. Anthology of horror stories about the dead rising from their graves to torment the living. Contents: "Waxworks" (W.L. George); "Ingredient X" (H.R. Wakefield); "In the Tomb" (Arthur Porges); "Roxana Runs Lunatick" (R. Murray Gilchrist); "The Sistrum" (Alice Perrin); "The Coffin of Lissa" (August Derleth);… Read More

New York: Viking. Near Fine in Near Fine dj. 1996. First Edition. Hardcover. [tight, clean, unread book with just the teensiest bit of shelfwear; jacket similarly nice, with light surface rubbing]. This author's second mystery featuring attorney Whitney Logan, this time getting involved with murder and dark doings in L.A.'s Koreatown. .