You may remember these two previous Zelazny purchases. Well, Bob Pylant, the same guy I bought them from, wanted to sell off the reminder of his collection, so I went over to his house and cleaned him out of virtually all his remaining books, Zelazny and otherwise. I’ll be listing some over the next few days, while I’ll be selling others in the next Lame Excuse Books catalog, and still others (like his collection of Zelazny first magazine appearances) will have to wait until even later while I figure out how I want to store and display them.
My primary collecting focus has been on first editions, but Bob collected almost everything Zelazny related, from foreign editions, library market hardback reprints, got Zelazny to sign pristine book club editions, and to every anthology that reprinted a Zelazny story. (I think there are six of seven featuring “Home is the Hangman” alone). I’ll be incorporating the interesting ones into my own collection because, well, I’ve already paid for them, haven’t I?
Bob also did things that I wouldn’t have done, like adding aftermarket dust jackets to books that weren’t issued with them. And there’s one book in this batch he did something particularly odd to.
Here’s the first batch of Zelazny books, the only theme among these that they didn’t fit into any other themes.
Zelazny, Roger. The Doors of His Face, The Lamps of His Mouth, And Other Stories. Doubleday, 1971. First edition hardback, a Fine- copy with very slight bend at head and heel and a trace of foxing to inside front gutter, in a Fine- dust jacket with touches of wear and a tiny bit of age darkening to the spine and at top rear. With signed Zelazny bookplate laid in. Kovacs, V9a. Levack, 12a. Currey, page 570. Replaces an Ex-Library copy.
Zelazny, Roger. Gone to Earth. Pulphouse, 1991. First edition hardback, #40 of 50 signed, numbered copies bound in leather, a Fine copy, sans dust jacket, as issued. Author’s Choice Monthly #29. (Well, they say leather; I have my doubts. Also note that between volumes 18 and 19, the color of the “leather” edition went from a dark gray to a dark blue.) Supplements a signed “trade” clothbound hardcover in dust jacket. Kovacs, V13iv. Chalker/Owings (2002), page 728. I suppose that now I should look for one of the 10-copy red leather staff editions…
Zelazny, Roger. Lord of Light. Easton Press, 1994. Hardback, a Fine copy bound in decorated leather, sans dust jacket, as issued, with unused personalization bookplate sticker laid in (as issued), as well as a signed Zelazny signature plate. According to Kovacs, copies in aquamarine-colored leather like this one are reprints. Kovacs, I29m.
Zelazny, Roger. Manna From Heaven. DNA Publications/Wildside Press, 2003. Hardback, a Fine copy in non-decorated boards and a Fine dust jacket. The 1-59224-199-9 ISBN matches the first edition listed at the ISFDB, but Kovacs says this is the UK Lightening Source hardback reprint. Signed by publisher Warren Lapine. Kovacs, V18b. Supplements the first printing with pictorial boards.
Zelazny, Roger. This Immortal. Garland Publishing, 1975. First (and only) edition thus, a hardback reprint for the library trade, a Fine copy in a Fine- aftermarket dust jacket Bob created from a copy of the SFBC/Ace Books reprint from 1988 with Richard Powers’ cover art, and which has some faint creasing along the folds. Signed by Zelazny. This edition is reproduced from the 1973 Ace third paperback printing, as stated on the reproduced Ace copyright page. Part of the Garland Library of Science Fiction. Kovacs, I40c.
Zelazny, Roger and Jane Lindskold. Donnerjack. Avon Books, 1997. First edition hardback, either a Fine or a Poor copy (depending on how you count the annotations), in a Fine dust jacket. Novel started by Zelazny and finished by Lindskold after Zelazny’s death. Zelazny was a famously lean prose stylist, and Bob felt that Lindskold was not, so he has annotated the book by crossing out in brown or blue marker every section he felt was un-Zelazny-like from page 167 on. I passed on picking this up in the first bulk buys, but took it this time around because, well, it’s not like I can sell it to anyone else, and who else would know or appreciate the story behind it? Kovacs, I16b. Supplements a Fine/Fine copy inscribed to me by Lindskold.
