The Collectible Lawrence Block

[Robert Fulman]

ISBN 0-87795-234-5
Cover Price: $9.25

Just like the "Burglars Can't Be Choosers" S/L above, this is a first edition of "Ariel" (Arbor House, 1980) with a limitation sheet pasted in. The text on the sheet reads:

"Ariel
a novel
by Lawrence Block

Being the curious story
of Ms. Ariel Jardell

One of five hundred copies
of the First Edition
serial numbered
&
signed by the Author
of which this Volume is
No. ___"

Yes, if you are paying attention, this is the second S/L I've listed for this book.

This is my first book to ever come with a COA from flatsigned.com. Given that the COA is simply a photocopied sheet of paper, I was unimpressed.

[Robert Fulman]

"Mystery Guild Gold Presents the Fifty Greatest Crime Writers of the Twentieth Century"
Printed in 1999, this has a faux leather cover and a blue riboon page marker. Kind of a little oddity. Nice and cheap, just like a like it.

[Robert Fulman]

This is an advance reading copy for "The Burglar Who Traded Ted Williams". It is a 6x9 trade paperback size, although the final book was a hardcover. What makes this one interesting, I think, is that is also a signed and limited to 650 copies. This is number 99:

Front:


Back:


Limitation page:

[Robert Fulman]

TOR first edition of "Random Walk". Copyright page states "First Edition: October 1988 0987654321"; Cover price $18.95.

[Robert Fulman]

A 1990 First Edition of "A Ticket to the boneyard", the Seventh Matther Scudder novel. DJ Flap says "FPT", which I assume indicated "First Print" and shows cover price of $18.95.

[Robert Fulman]

A first edition of the third Bernie Rhodenbarr book, "The Burglar Who Liked to Quote Kipling", published by Random House in 1979:


I'm significantly less picky than some, so I'm not (too) ashamed to show that my book has three glaring flaws:

[Robert Fulman]

"The Devil Knows You're Dead", the 11th Scudder Novel. This is the Morrow first trade edition:

[Robert Fulman]

"A Long Line of Dead Men", the 12th Scudder novel. This is the Morrow first trade edition:

[Robert Fulman]

"Even the Wicked", the 13th Scudder novel. This is the Morrow first trade edition:

[Robert Fulman]

"Everybody Dies", the 14th Scudder novel. This is the Morrow first trade edition:

[Robert Fulman]

"Hit List", the second Keller novel. This is the first trade edition:

[Robert Fulman]

"Tanner on Ice", the eighth Tanner novel. This book was published in 1998 after an 18 year break in the series; there hasn't been another since:

[Robert Fulman]

"The Burglar on the Prowl", the tenth and most recent book in the Bernie Rhodenbarr series. I hope the inspiration hits Mr. Block again soon, because I would love to read more about Bernie. However, I have found that the stories are so intentionally convoluted that re-reading them is a treat. Anyway, I bought this book without seeing pictures, and at first I was annoyed that the obvious condition issues were not disclosed. Now, however, I think it's neat that this signed book of a "former bestseller" sat on a remainder pile in some store (Barnes & Noble, most likely, based on the sticker):

[Robert Fulman]

"The Burglar Who Traded Ted Williams", the sixth Bernie book and the first to be published by Dutton.

[Robert Fulman]

"The Burglar Who Thought He was Bogart", the seventh Bernie book. Here's looking at you, kid:



The rare book (of mine, at least) that is signed in anything other than a blue pen:

[Robert Fulman]

"The Burglar in the Rye", the ninth Bernie book:

[Robert Fulman]

"Some Days You Get the Bear", a collection of short stories, including the Bernie story, "The Burglar Who Dropped in on Elvis":

[Robert Fulman]

Arbor House Advanced Reading Copy (made from Uncorrected Proofs) of "When the Sacred Ginmill Closes", the sixth Matt Scudder novel. The cover promises a $35,000 advertising campaign, which doesn't seem like all that much to me:

[Brice]

A $35, 000 ad campaign barely covers me telling one person this guy wrote a book. For another 35,000 i'll tell them the name of the book and who it is that actually wrote it.

[Robert Fulman]

Tanner lost the ability to sleep when he was wounded in Korea. He’s been awake ever since—learning languages, writing term papers and theses for lazy scholars, and supporting political lost causes and national splinter groups and irridentist movements. I wrote seven books about him in the late sixties—and an eighth just in time for the millennium.
THE THIEF WHO COULDN'T SLEEP. Fawcett Gold Medal, 1966. Tanner goes to Balekesir, in Turkey, chasing a hoard of gold coins stashed at the time of the Armenian genocide.

There was a signed limited hardcover issued by Otto Penzler in the 1990s, which I don't have yet, so here is the Fawcett Gold Medal paperback orginal from 1966:

[Robert Fulman]

TANNER’S VIRGIN. Fawcett Gold Medal, 1968. (originally Here Comes a Hero.) Set in Afghanistan, with Tanner rescuing an old girlfriend who's been abducted by white slavers. Based, believe it or not, on an overheard converartion in a Lyons Corner House in London…

This is the sixth book in the Evan Tanner series. Yes, the first book was published in 1966 and this one was published in 1968. Larry was a busy man, apparently. This is my favorite buy because the book is in excellent shape, and I only paid 29 cents for it:

[Robert Fulman]

Just like he did for his Dutton release of "The Burglar Who Traded Ted Williams", LB also issued a S/L proof/ARC/galley for the seventh Burglar book. My copy has a belly band around it announcing it as signed and limited. I honestly don't know if this was on the book originally or was added after the fact by a bookseller.

Front, with belly band:


Back:


Limitation Page:

[Robert Fulman]

Here is my copy of the second Burglar book, "The Burglar in the Closet", published in 1978 by Random House. This copy is not technically a first printing, as it lacks the words "First Edition" on the front page (I'll deal). Also, I think this book might be my first example of a fake LB signature, but I could be wrong. This book was the basis of the Whoopi Goldberg movie "Burglar"...

[Robert Fulman]

"All the Flowers are Dying", the sixteenth Scudder novel. This is the Morrow first trade edition:

[Robert Fulman]

"In the Midst of Death" is the third book in the Scudder series and was initially published as a paperback in 1976.

This is the third title in the Matthew Scudder series. Like the first two, it was originally published as a Dell paperback in 1976. In the early 90's, Dark Harvest published hardcover first editions of The Sins of the Fathers and Time to Murder and Create, but went belly-up before they could do the same for In the Midst of Death. In 1995, G&G did the honors, again under the Lawrence Block Library imprint. (This book, and Ariel, constitute the entire Lawrence Block Library. Make of that what you will.) As with Ariel, the book's nicely produced and the edition is small---500 signed and numbered copies, 26 lettered, and a dozen author's copies---but in this case the book is the first US hardcover edition.

My copy is lacking the limitation page, and is numbered "P.C. 14". I don't know exactly where that puts it with respect to the 538 copies described on his website: