The Great Gnome Press Science Fiction Odyssey

Wilmar H. Shiras
1953

An in-demand Gnome Press title.  I got this as part of a package together with Heinlein’s Sixth Column and The Survivors by Tom Godwin.  I perhaps paid a little too much for all three, but was nevertheless satisfied with those acquisitions.  I have two dust jackets for this but we’ll compare them at a later date.  Here, we’ll look at the book in the jacket I received it in.  A few issues to inspect here, so lets check them out.
The general condition as you can see, is a bit on the poor side.  Minus the jacket though, this copy is still very good.
There is no Currey listing for this, so I don’t know about different bindings.  At a first edition printing of 5000 copies, it seems possible that there was more than one binding state.  Perhaps someone could help me out with regards to that.
You can see the general tatty nature of all edges of the jacket.  The spine is square though a little looser than I would like.  Nothing serious though.  The block shows some small dust-staining on the top, but the bottom is still nice and white.
Lets have a closer look at those issues.
General wearing and tearing at the head and tail of the spine, but the tail isn’t too bad.
The wrap-around on the top front shows a nasty tear and wear.
Let’s have a look further down the same edge.
A small hole there on the ‘s’ and note the tearing that is pretty consistent around the whole book.  Just above the hole is some black scuffing.
It’s taken a knock on the spine, two chips there with one completely out.
That’s probably my biggest disappointment with this jacket.  The back of the jacket is more or less the same as the front.
You can’t really make it out in the photo, but there is some discoloration on the jacket down the spine just next to where the front coloring starts.  But to finish on my favorite high with GP books, those lovely little touches.
See the little spheres??  Beautiful.

Year: 1953
Paid: $50
Art: Frank Kelly Freas
Quantity: 5000 copies.
Binding: Red cloth binding with darker lettering. No Currey listing.
GP Edition Notes: 1st edition so stated.
Comments: Nice to have this book, but shame about those chips and the general state of the jacket.
Expand Upon: wikipedia.com, Internet Speculative Fiction Database

This entry was posted on July 12, 2009 at 10:02 am and is filed under 1953, Close Up with tags Children of the Atom, Frank Kelly Freas, Wilmar H. Shiras. 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.