New Secondhand Bookshop Open

It's not uncommon for me to write about an oft visited book store that has just permanently closed.  So it was great to recently discover a new secondhand book shop in Prahran.

Snailfish Independent Book Store on Greville Street, just off Chapel, has been trading for a few months now.   I spoke to the owner, Nathan, and he was very enthusiastic about his books and business.  He explained that he plans to concentrate on stocking political, art and fiction titles while also saving books from ending up in landfill.

After a brief chat I had a wander through the two rooms of book shelves.  I managed to find two Ian Fleming titles, a nice Pan Books - Raymond Hawkey series copy of "Thunderball" from the 1960's and a 2019 copy of "Casino Royale" from Arcturus Publishing Group. 

I wish Nathan every success with Snailfish and I plan to visit again soon.

The James Bond Collection Boxset

In 2019, Arcturus Publishing Group in the UK released a set of five Ian Fleming - James Bond titles for the Canadian market.  I managed to purchase these five books last year however the set also came with a slipcase which had evaded me.  A few weeks ago a friend of mine in New Zealand, John F, messaged saying he'd acquired a spare set of these books still in its slipcase and asked if I wanted to buy it from him.  The set arrived in the post a couple of weeks ago.

I'm still unclear on the logic behind the five titles included in the set as Ian Fleming's James Bond novels were published annually.  The original publication dates of these five novels are: 1953 ("Casino Royale"), 1954 ("Live And Let Die"), 1957 ("From Russia, With Love"), 1959 ("Goldfinger") and 1961 ("Thunderball") so as you can see they're pretty random titles.  Perhaps they were deemed the most iconic Bond titles, or perhaps the favourite five of the person who was asked to select them.  Who knows ?

But it's the slipcase I was really after, and it looks pretty cool.  Among the images there's even the silhouette of Daniel Craig from the "Casino Royale" film poster of 2006.

Here's a couple more photos of the boxset:

And finally, here's the ISBN for anyone else trying to hunt down this set: 9781789506624. Thanks again John, much appreciated.

Five Canadian Bond Novels Arrive

Ian Fleming's literary works entered the public domain in Canada in 2015.  In most countries this copyright exists until 2034, but in Canada it's possible to re-publish all of the James Bond novels without owing any royalties to the copyright owners.

To my knowledge only five Ian Fleming titles have been re-printed in Canada since 2015, and today I received copies of them, sourced by a fellow Bond book collector.  The titles are "Casino Royale", "Live And Let Die", "From Russia, With Love", "Goldfinger" and "Thunderball" and were published by Arcturus Publishing Group in 2019.

The covers are uniform in design and while the artist/designer is not credited I think they've done a pretty good job.  Hopefully the other nine will also be printed soon.

Ps. It's about time I had some new James Bond covers to add to www.PizGloria.com !