"From Russia With Love" Crime And Espionage Series

A new series from Penguin Modern Classics entitled Crime and Espionage was released here in Australia this August.  The series comprises 33 titles from a selection of authors.  One inclusion is Ian Fleming's "From Russia With Love" featuring a cover, that I suspect, includes text only understandable by a Spektor cipher machine.

I've been monitoring local book shops for the arrival of these books and last weekend I visited the City on the hunt for this cover.

First stop was Readings Bookshop at The Emporium where I found one copy.

Next stop was Dymocks on Collins Street.  Dymocks had three copies as well as many other Ian Fleming titles.  There were also a couple of continuation novels by Anthony Horowitz and Charlie Higson.

 

The following day I arrived late in the City as my wife was attending the theatre with some friends.  Sadly the Hill Of Content Bookshop was already closed.

Just a few doors down though The Paperback Bookshop was still open, and this is where I found the copy I purchased.  One note about The Paperback Bookshop, it's still happily trading despite all the scaffolding surrounding its entrance.

After purchasing my new copy of "From Russia With Love", which will soon join the other covers on Special Releases page of the Piz Gloria website, I visited a cinema close by to watch the excellent and confronting thriller "Blink Twice".  Meanwhile my wife was enjoying "Beauty And The Beast" at the Her Majesty's Theatre (first photo below).

A view of the shot tower in Melbourne Central while we walked to Readings at The Emporium.

A newish building in the City.

And a construction site next to Young & Jackson's (near Flinders Street Station) which will eventually be a train station for the new Metro Tunnel.

Finally... As Promised !

Back in April of this year I promised to disclose the contents of a second parcel that had arrived while I was away for work in Sydney.   After the arrival of a similar parcel this week that completed the two sets of books shown below, here are those contents...

All books in this post were written by John Vincent based on the James Bond Jr cartoon series from the early 1990's.   To be honest I only became aware of these paperbacks after a fellow collector in New Zealand, John F., mentioned their existence several years ago and I've been hunting them ever since.

The first set above was published by Puffin Books (High Flyer) in the U.S.. and is comprised of six titles.  Obviously aimed at children and young adults the set includes #1 "A View To A Thrill", #2 "The Eiffel Target", #3 "Live And Let's Dance", #4 "Sandblast!", #5 "Sword Of Death" and #6 "High Stakes".

I found the last novel, "High Stakes", the most difficult to acquire of all the books shown in this post as it commands ridiculous prices online (see end of this post for an example).

The second set below was published by Fantail Books in the U.K..  For some reason it's comprised of only four titles, with "Sword Of Death" and "High Stakes" absent.   Despite these four paperbacks having been published over 30 years ago I found this set relatively easy to acquire in great condition for a reasonable price.

And finally, here's an example of the ridiculous prices currently being asked for a copy of "High Stakes".  Fortunately I purchased my copy for just US $15.99 !