The Great Gnome Press Science Fiction Odyssey

First book up is Iceworld by Hal Clement.  This is going to be a kind of photo-analysis of the book, documenting it’s condition.  I’m going to try to use a standard format that I can use over and over again for other books.  So I guess the format will be a sort of preamble outlining the price, circumstances of purchase and any other interesting bits of information, and then we’ll have a look at the pics.  I guess it’ll evolve over time.  Here we go…

This is the first Gnome Press publication I purchased, perhaps a couple of months ago now.  I got it (as I’ve gotten all the others so far) off eBay.  In the pics on eBay, I could see it wasn’t in the best of shape, but it was going for quite a low price so I picked it up.  When I received it I was a little disappointed.  It was Ex-Library, and that wasn’t mentioned in the item description.  I emailed the guy and pointed out to him that although I was pleased to receive it and I had got it at a reasonable price, he should in future mention that (significant) detail.  Anyway, the card pocket is still attached and a library transaction card is still in there.  The wrong one apparently as the serial on the card – 53204, doesn’t match the book – 5643979.  I wonder which book the card does belong to…  The book belonged to the Brooklyn Public Library, Kings Highway Branch – which, incidentally, closes for renovation in two days from the time of this post.  I wonder if this book was part of a pre-renovation clean-out…  Lets have a look at it.

Year: 1953
Paid: $22
Art: Ric Binkley
Quantity: 4000 copies
Binding: Jade boards with black writing on the spine, no writing or design on the front board.
GP Edition Notes: 1st edition so stated on the copyright page.
Comments: It’s not in good shape. The dust jacket is pasted to the boards and is well worn and chipped on all edges. The boards are likewise well worn on all edges. The book does sit nice and square and the spine is still in good shape. The text block shows some water staining and a couple of pencil marks internally.
Expand Upon: wikipedia.com, Internet Speculative Fiction Database

This copy is special to me since it was my first Gnome Press acquisition.  I’ll need to get one in better condition sometime, but that’s for the indeterminate future.

This entry was posted on December 24, 2008 at 10:04 am and is filed under 1953, Close Up with tags Hal Clement, Iceworld, Ric Binkley. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.