Back in 2019 I mentioned I had got a set of six James Herriot titles in a slip case from Canada. The interesting part was that they were still sealed in the plastic wrapper and I was debating whether or not to open them. Well I haven’t but luckily I spotted a similar set on eBay being sold by The Air Ambulance in this country. When they arrived I was really pleased to see they were all Canadian printings plus, and this is a rare occurrence, the edges of all volumes were green. Now there is much specualtion as to why this was done but no definitive answer but maybe it does make the cheap paper look more expensive especillaly when it starts to go brown as is suggested most often. I’ve added an update to the page so you’ll need to scoll to the bottom which can be found by clicking HERE
Peter Mayle, who was born on the 14th June 1939 and died on the 18th January 2018, was awarded a ‘Golden PAN’ (or ‘Golden PEN’ as the label on the back says!) in 1993 for selling a million copies of ‘A Year in Provence’ I have a photo of him receiving the award and have added it to the ‘Golden Pan Awards’ page. Mayle is also well know for the series oublished by PAN ‘Wicked Willie’ a humorous British cartoon character personified as a talking penis. He first appeared in the book ‘Man’s Best Friend’, published in 1984.
After deciding not to pay the asking price for a first edition of ‘Owls in the Family’ by Farley Mowat with cover by Hans Helweg on eBay in Australia I then bought several for a penny off Amazon and as luck would have it one was actually a first.
