First Editions from Lightholder Books

Pale View of Hills by Kazui Ishiguro. 1982 Putnam, first U.S. edition, 183 pages. Ishiguro is a Nobel-winning Japanese-British novelist and writer works have been adapted for acclaimed films. Pale View was his debut novel and in a review in the New York Times: "A delicate, ironic, elliptical novel, ''A Pale View of Hills'' means much more than it says.… Read more about this item

The Gypsy's Curse by Harry Crews. 1975 Secker & Warburg, first U,K, edition, 208 pages. According to Publishers Weekly "Crews, one of the most inventive practitioners in modern American letters, returns to a milieu that has long fascinated him: the seedy world of fighters and musclemen.... A brilliant specialist in black humor, Crews delivers the goods once again. His deadpan… Read more about this item

Break It Down by Lydia Davis. 1986 FSG, first edition, 177 pages. Lydia Davis is one of the most idiosyncratic short-story writers in America today, sometimes containing an entire arc in a single sentence. Break it Down was her first major collection. "In all: strong, seemingly effortless, and haunting work."-Kirkus Reviews Condition: Near fine "And yet mothers are always seen, always talked… Read more about this item

Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera. 1984 Harper & Row, first U.S. edition, 314 pages. Kundera was a Czech and French novelist so lived in exile in France, his novels condemned for being anti-Soviet and anti-communism. Unbearable was his most famous work, an instant success. Condition: Near fine "What does this mad myth signify?"

The Land Surveyor's Daughter by Ellen Gilchrist. 1979 Lost Roads, first edition, 46 pages. Gilchrist is a Southern author who won the National Book Award for her story collection Victory Over Japan. Her work is steeped in the Southern tradition, witty and wise. Land Surveyor's Daughter was her first book, a collection of poetry, with a small print run. Condition: Good,… Read more about this item

Blue Movie by Andy Warhol. 1970 Grove Press, first edition, 123 pages. "The complete dialogue with over 100 photos." Blue Movie was the first erotic film to receive wide theatrical release in 1969, and was an influence for Last Tango in Paris. Condition: VG

voices/I hear/voices by William Packard. Illustrated by Steffan. 1972 Barlenmir House, first edition. Packard was a novelist, playwright, and poet who founded the poetry magazine New York Quarterly, known for publishing poems and interviews by the likes of Sexton, Ashbery and Bukowski. Voices was his third book of poems. Condition: Inscribed by the author. Jacket in good- condition with stain on… Read more about this item

An Academic Question by Barbara Pym. 1986 Dutton, first American edition, 182 pages. Pym was an English novelist, forever forgotten and rediscovered. In a retrospective in the New York Times: "However remote her themes may seem — a churn of parish politics and petty romances — beneath the gentle surfaces of her novels is a slow-building comedy, salt wit… Read more about this item

The Land Surveyor's Daughter by Ellen Gilchrist. 1979 Lost Roads, first edition, 46 pages. Gilchrist is a Southern author who won the National Book Award for her story collection Victory Over Japan. Her work is steeped in the Southern tradition, witty and wise. Land Surveyor's Daughter was her first book, a collection of poetry, with a small print run. Condition: Good,… Read more about this item

The Crazy Ladies by Joyce Elbert. 1969 New American Library, first edition, 438 pages. Elbert, who died in 2009, had a slight resurgence recently with the release of a book of eight essays. In an article for the Star Tribune, Kathleen Rooney starts her review of A Tale of Five Cities : "A contemporary of Jacqueline Susann, credited by Cosmopolitan… Read more about this item

Sweet Desserts by Lucy Ellmann. 1989 Viking, first U.S. edition, 145 pages. Ellman most recently has had success and acclaim with her beast of a novel Ducks, Newburyport, a stream of consciousness, nearly single-sentence novel on the banalities of motherhood told in more than a thousand pages, shortlisting her for the Booker Prize. Sweet Desserts was Ellman's debut and won… Read more about this item

Vera by Elizabeth von Arnim (Author of Elizabeth and Her Gardens). 1921 Doubleday, first U.S. edition. Cousin of Katherine Mansfield, von Arnim was a literary success in her time, writing more than twenty books. Her first marriage made her a Countess, and this novel is based on that disastrous relationship. Condition: Acceptable. No DJ, wear and soiling to boards, head of… Read more about this item

Confessions of Love by Uno Chiyo. 1990 Peter Owen, first UK edition (c/r 1935),157 pages. Chiyo was a Japanese author, magazine founder, and kimono designer who shocked Japanese society with her public love affairs and short bobbed haircut. Later in life she was recognized as a legend and her novels recognized as masterpieces. Confessions was her debut novel and depicts… Read more about this item

Cliffs of Fall and other stories by Shirley Hazzard. 1963 first U.S. edition, 192 pages. Hazzard was an Australian-American author and essayist best known for her novels Transit of Venus and the Great Fire. Cliffs was her debut, a short-story collection in which all but one of the stories was published in the New Yorker (she was one of the… Read more about this item

An Excursion to the Sky by Grozdana Olujic. 1961 Dutton, first U.S. edition, 156 pages. Olujic was a Serbian author of novels, essays, fairy tales, and children's books. Excursion was her debut novel, published when she was twenty-four years old and inspired comparisons to Francoise Sagan (but make it bleak) and criticism from the "socialist realism" school of thought. Condition: Jacket… Read more about this item

Green Song by Edith Sitwell. 1946 View Editions, first U.S. edition, 49 pages. Sitwell was a British critic and poet, known for her lavish costumes, which became the butt of many jokes, and for her wit and support of other writers. The Green Song was published in the middle of her career. Condition: Jacket acceptable with chips and tears, book in… Read more about this item

Seven Ages by Louise Gluck. 2001 Harper Collins, first edition, 68 pages. Gluck is a Nobel-winning poet and essayist. This was Gluck's ninth volume. According to Kirkus Reviews: "The genius of her poems lies in their ability to sear the summertime onto our souls in such a way that its 'light will give us no peace.'" Condition: Near fine. "It came to… Read more about this item

The Heir by V. Sackville-West. 1922 George H. Doran, first U.S. edition, 250 pages. Rebecca Dinerstein Knight in The Paris Review starts a wonderful biographical essay on Sackville-West thusly: "How preposterous is it that Vita Sackville-West, the best-selling bisexual baroness who wrote over thirty-five books that made an ingenious mockery of twenties societal norms, should be remembered today merely as… Read more about this item

The Seagull on the Step by Kay Boyle. 1955 Knopf, first edition, 247 pages. Boyle was an antiwar activist and prolific short-story writer, who wrote alongside the modernists and expats of her time. She won the Guggenheim and two O'Henry awards, and was widely published in the New Yorker, although was fired from her staff position and blacklisted for a… Read more about this item

New Directions in Prose & Poetry. Edited by James Laughlin IV, 1966 New Directions. This was the first publication by the legendary publisher, and includes work by Ezra Pound, Gertrude Stein, Henry Miller, Kay Boyle, Elizabeth Bishop, and more. According to Triolet Rare Books: "Gallup states that 513 copies total were printed, of which 204 were in boards." Condition: Book in… Read more about this item