Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Spy novelists continue to attract interest at auction.

At Bloomsbury's December 10th auction, spy novelists continued to garner buyer interest. Below are pertinent mystery-related results.
  • Agatha Christie, first editions of A Murder Is Announced (1950); Destination Unknown (1954); Hickory, Dickory Dock (1955); and four other unspecified novels, £480 (approx. US$781).
  • Arthur Conan Doyle, 2nd ed. of The Sign of Four (1892), £120 (approx. US$195); 1st ed., The Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes (1894), £110 (approx. US$179); 1st ed., The Hound of the Baskervilles (1902), £320 (approx. US$520); 1st ed., The Return of Sherlock Holmes (1905), £460 (approx. US$748); 2nd issue, The Lost World (1914, which includes photos of Conan Doyle disguised as Professor Challenger), £260 (approx. US$423).
  • Ian Fleming, first editions of You Only Live Twice (1964), The Man with the Golden Gun (1965), and Octopussy (1966), £380 (approx. US$618).
  • Graham Greene, 2nd issue of Stamboul Train (1932), with two other works, £240 (approx. US$390); 1st ed., The Third Man and The Fallen Idol (1950), £190 (approx. US$309); 1st ed., The Spy's Bedside Book: An Anthology (1957, ed. Graham Greene and Hugh Greene), £10 (approx. US$16).
  • John le Carre, 1st ed., The Looking Glass War (1965), with 13 other books, £140 (approx. US$228).
Sadly, Edgar Wallace's Captain Tatham of Tatham Island (1909), est. between £200–250, went unsold.

(Hat tip to PhiloBiblos.)

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