A Box Of James Bond Box Sets

My previous post mentioned a box that I'd recently received in the mail containing two English second language James Bond books.  Well there were three other items in the same box and these were considerably more exciting.  

All three are Bond box sets.  The first is the rarest, a slipcase containing four titles published by Pan Books in 1973.  The books are part of the Still Life series.  The slipcase reads "Four Famous James Bond Thrillers".  The titles are "Casino Royale", "From Russia With Love", "Dr No" and "Goldfinger".   The slipcase does not have an ISBN.

The second and third box sets were released by Triad.  The set in the left of the photo contains six Triad Panther titles - "Live And Let Die", "From Russia With Love", "Goldfinger", "You Only Live Twice", "The Man With The Golden Gun" and "Octopussy And The Living Daylights".  The set on the right contains four Triad Granada titles - "Live And Let Die", "Goldfinger", "The Man With The Golden Gun" and "Octopussy And The Living Daylights".  Both sets are part of the Girls On Guns series and the slipcases read "Bond 007".  The six book set has an ISBN 0 586 04820 0.  The four book set has an ISBN 0 586 05691 2.

All three box sets are difficult to find.  In fact I've been looking for the Pan Books slipcase for over 20 years, so it's great to finally add them all to my collection.  More details can be found here along with the other box sets I own.

Great Pan Director Series

When I first starting collecting James Bond novels it wasn't easy to find out the names of each book series.  There was no internet nor Ian Fleming Bibliography for reference.  So series titles were either little known or perhaps even untitled.  Now Bond series titles like "Still Life", "Raymond Hawkey" or "Girls On Guns" are well known to collectors.

One series whose title I was unclear about for many years was published by Great Pan in the early 1960's.  The series had "painted" covers and featured an impression of James Bond (pre Sean Connery era) at the base of each cover holding a gun.  That figure was based on Ralph Vernon-Hunt who worked for Pan at the time.

There were seven Ian Fleming titles released in this series.  Click here to see them all.  When I was first collecting this series it took me years to find the copy of "Moonraker" shown.  I'm not sure why but this was definitely the hardest title to find in this series.  When I created the PizGloria.com website I had no idea what this series was titled, so I named it "Ralph Vernon-Hunt", but collectors (and experts like Jon Gilbert) now refer to it as the "Director" series.

As time's gone on I've seen less books featuring Mr. Vernon-Hunt in secondhand bookshops or for sale online.  They're definitely becoming scarce and those available often demand premium prices.  That's why when I saw this copy of "Live And Let Die" online for $10 the other day I had to snap it up.  Let's see if it's still possible to collect this series for a second time without paying a premium.

And finally, the excellent Pan Paperbacks website has further details on Mr. Vernon-Hunt.  Please click here to read more. 

The Great Collectors Heaven Fair 2018

The Great Collectors Heaven Fair took place a couple of weeks ago.  So early that Sunday morning I lined up outside the Malvern Town Hall with tens of other people on the hunt for collectables... in my case James Bond books.

While scouring the stalls I noticed many Bond toys, swap cards and even daybill posters for sale. Fortunately there were three stalls selling Bond paperbacks.  Here's some photos of the books:

Yes, those books are on the floor in the last photo.  But fear not because the Still Life series version of "Moonraker" on the right was in such good condition that I purchased it anyway.  It was a slightly better version than the copy I already had in my collection.