Archive for The Vortex Blaster

More free books online…

Posted in eBooks with tags , on February 16, 2012 by Aaron

I just spend some time trawling Project Gutenberg for Gnome Press books.  I uncovered The Vortex Blaster and Invaders from the Infinite which now appear on the Gnome Press books online For FREE page.  While cruising around there searching different authors, I found there are many GP contributors available.  As we know, quite a few GP books were ‘fix-ups’ or cobbled-together short stories to render novel length publications.  Many of these short stories are available on Project Gutenberg as stand-alone parts of serialized tales like they were originally published in the pulps.

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Back at work today

Posted in New Arrivals with tags , , , , , , on January 27, 2009 by Aaron

Well, all good vacations have to come to an end.  I’m back at work now and supposed to be preparing some vacation classes for later this month.  It’s a little hard to get motivated.  There were some goodies waiting for me though.  50 Brodart dust jacket covers, 3 books and some provenance.

The provenance relates to The Dawning Light which I picked up late last year.  Joe Wherle, Jr from whom I bought it sent me some scans of  Gnome Press related paraphernalia which I’ll talk about in more detail when I get around to covering that particular book.  Which might actually be a while because it’s the sequel to The Shrouded Planet, and I haven’t got that yet.  Many thanks Joe, much appreciated.

Just on the point of provenance, I try to ask all of the people I get the books from if they can supply any.  Anything.  Everything has a history and I enjoy knowing and sharing the anecdotes or interesting snippets or whatever about these books.  It gives them life and makes them real in a way that is different than the stories do.  Maybe I’m a bit strange, but I think that these books are special.  As artifacts – even if many aren’t particularly valuable in terms of money – they are rare, they are old and they deserve to have a character of their own.  Perhaps only a select few are worthy of being called historic in terms of literature, but as a whole they do occupy a special place in the history of science fiction publishing.

The three that were waiting for me were Sands of Mars, The Vortex Blaster and Agent of Vega.  I am very happy with Sands, but a little disappointed with the other two.  Not in terms of actually having them, but in terms of what I offered.  I think I offered a little too much for them, especially since subsequently what looked to be a nicer copy of Vortex went unbid on eBay.  It’s all swings and roundabouts I suppose, I picked up what looks to be an absolutely Fine copy of Starman’s Quest a couple of days ago for only $22. Regardless, I will be very happy to see them in the library when I get home and I was happy to (virtually) meet Geoff who was very pleasant to deal with and a good guy.  He sent me a copy of one of his CDs.  He is a recording artist and you can check him out at his website here.  Cheers Geoff.

Ric Binkley did the cover of Sands.  Had to mention it.

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Been back almost a week…

Posted in Uncategorized with tags , , , , , , on January 22, 2009 by Aaron

…and I’m busy.  I brought my eldest daughter Sonja over to Korea with me for a vacation.  She finished high school last year and this is a kind of gift for her for finishing 7th form and and an experience she will hopefully take a lot away from before she starts her degree in February.  Consequently my activity on the GP front has been a little meager lately.  HOWEVER.  I scored The Unpleasant Profession of Jonathan Hoag off eBay a couple of days ago.  My very first Robert Heinlein 1st edition.  Boy, am I excited about receiving that.  From what I could see on eBay, it looked in Near Fine condition too.  Also,  the very nice man Geoff Robson whom I got Sands of Mars off had a couple of other “Gnomes hiding in his bookshelf” (I have to credit Geoff with that witicism..).  Agent of Vega by James H. Schmitz and The Vortex Blaster by  Edward E. Smith, PhD. are on their way to me along with ‘Sands’.  Thank you very much Geoff.  Actually, I must get down to work to see if they have arrived already.

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