RAFT [A Special Overseas Export edn.]

UK,12mo p/back.Special Overseas Export Edition,1st edn. [Wrapped and protected from day of issue/purchase as MINT,and now recently discovered in an old stock box.] NMINT. No owner inscrptn,and no price removal from cover.Bright,crisp,clean, sharp-cornered,glossy,colour pictorial artwork by Chris Moore,illustrated front card cover with capitalised,yellow-lettered author name, capitalised silver gilt lettering with thick black outline/ shadowing to title and a critic's capitalised, white-lettered review to front cover; a white background to spine/ backstrip with capitalised black-lettered author name and capitalised,red letters with thick black outline/shadowing to title and publisher's coloured colophon to foot of same, rear cover with glossy white background with synopsis and 2 critic's red+black-lettered reviews.Negligible shelf-wear to edges and corners - no nicks,tears or splits and no scoring/indents. Top+fore-edges with very light ageing/ toning despite it's storage hibernation but still clean without any foxing/spotting; contents bright.tight,clean, solid and sound - no dog-ear reading creases to any pages' corner tips,and NO reading creases to spine/ backstrip either,unread apart from my own collation. UK, 12mo p/back,Special Overseas Edition,1st edn,9-251pp [paginated] includes 16 chapters; plus [unpaginated] author's potted biography,pair of critics' reviews,a title page,a dedication,Acknowledgements,and to the rear 4pp blanks. Visually the exterior appearance is exceptional,and even internally,the book is also in an exceptional condition /state of preservation and presentation for a book of its 30+ year-old age and nature, i.e. an ephemeral p/back. It really is an exceptional,exemplary example for its cleanliness,brightness and lack of detracting faults. Author's debut novel and the first book in the Xeelee series. Imagine a universe where the force of gravity is one billion times stronger than on Earth.Where humans detectable gravity fields.Where stars are only a mile across and burn out within a year of their formation. Five hundred years after a spaceship acidently crossed into this universe the crew's descendants are struggling desperately to survive.Society is divided into two mutually dependent groups - the Miners,excavating the iron ore of a dead star,and the scientists who live on the Raft,made from the ramshackle wreckage of the ship.Raw materials are exchanged for food - this way their precarious survival is maintained. But for how long? Rees is a young boy Miner whose natural curiosity leads him to stowaway on a trade vessel to the Raft.Once there,he is luckily taken on as an apprentice scientist.What he learns is devastating - their world is dying and nobody seems sure how to stop it. Rarely has a first novel been so brillaintly conceived. Comparable to the best of Greg Bear or Larry Niven,'RAFT' is unique,wondrous,utterly strange and peopled with believable characters. Please contact seller,because of the lighter weight/value of this item,for correct shipping/P+p quotes - particularly ALL overseas buyers - BEFORE ordering through the order page! N.B. ALL buyers please note,stocks' actual shipping/P+p costs are adjusted and any difference is refunded,after order's receipt and before the order's despatch,especially if the item(s) are offered either P+p included/FREE. ** N.B. US/Canada customers please be aware: Standard AIRMAIL postage from UK to these destinations can now cost more than the price of the book! If speed is not of the essence, then Economy rate is recommended - at approx. anything from a 1/3rd to 1/2 of the standard US AIR quote/rate - sometimes arriving sooner than the 42 days - but not always. **