Kingdom in the Cactus
Garden City: Doubleday, Doran & Company, Inc., 1936. Very Good / Good. Item #000517
Garden City: Doubleday, Doran & Co., Inc., 1936. Stated First Edition. Octavo; 272pp. Illustrated dust jacket with advertising blurbs for du Maurier, Graham Greene, and others on backside. Mango cloth with front panel stamp of cowboy and horse jumping, in hunter green; hunter green title cartouche on spine. Dust jacket unclipped, chipped with small tears at corners and spine edges; lightly soiled with water stain on back bottom. Boards slightly soiled. Spine shows vertical indentation, soiling at crown and foot, and binding is somewhat rolled. Endpapers and pages lightly tanned; textblock unmarked.
The opening is all macho moralism: "Captain Luke Hardin . . . had never lied to a man or woman, and he would not lie to himself. He was disgusted with life." The novel ends, nonetheless, with an embrace between our hero and Judith Randolph, the most beautiful girl he had ever seen. Strong stuff.
Price: $60.00