Published by Penguin Group, London, 2011
ISBN 10: 0141194197 ISBN 13: 9780141194196
Seller: The Print Room, Cockernhoe nr Luton, United Kingdom
First Edition
Hardcover. Condition: As New. Dust Jacket Condition: As New. Cover illustration by Jonathan Burton (illustrator). 1st Edition. First collected edition, first impression with '1' on copyright page. Very slight crease to spine, otherwise in 'as new' condition. Not price clipped (£25.00), no inscriptions, internally clean tight and square, looks unopened unread. 514pp. The short stories of Kingsley Amis - the great master of post-war comic prose - are dark, playful, moving, surprising and extremely funny. This definitive collection gathers all Amis's short fiction in a single volume for the first time and encompasses five decades of storytelling. In 'The 2003 Claret', written in 1958, a time machine is invented for the weighty task of sending a man to 2010 to discover what the booze will taste like. In 'Boris and the Colonel' a Cambridge spy is unearthed in the sleepy English countryside with the help of a plucky horse, while In 'Mason's Life' two men meet inside their respective dreams. The collection spans many genres, offering ingenious alternative histories, mystery and horror, satirical reflections and a devilishly funny attacks. Amis's stories reveal the scope of his imagination and the warmth beneath his acerbic humour, and they all share the unmistakable style and wit of one of Britain's best loved writers.