It was back in 2016 that I first made contact with Rog Peyton and in spite of numerous emails since, usually letting me know I had made a ‘typing’ error, we’ve only recently got together. Rog had got a couple of advertising boards for book signings by Peter F. Hamilton and was I interested? Although they were for titles a little later than my usual cut off date I said “Yes” and so we met up at Rog’s house. We both agreed it was good to be able to talk about books as so many others tend to switch of when they become the subject of a conversation.
Wikipedia states, rightly or wrongly; Roger “Rog” Peyton (born 1942) is an English science fiction fan, bookseller, editor and publisher from Birmingham. Peyton has been an active member of science fiction fandom since 1961, when he co-founded the Birmingham Science Fiction Group. From 1964 to 1966, he served as editor for the British Science Fiction Association’s critical magazine Vector. He also started the British Science Fiction Association’s fiction magazine Tangent. He began a long tradition of working on science fiction convention organizing committees with work for Brumcon 2, the 1965 Eastercon. Since then he has attended over 150 science fiction conventions including being one of only six (The Magnificent Six) who have attended all 45 Novacons and in 1979 won the Doc Weir Award for his services to fandom.
In 1971 Peyton and business partner Rod Milner launched a part-time bookselling business, Andromeda Book Company, in Old Hill, a few miles outside of Birmingham. Moving into the city centre to Suffolk Street in 1973, Peyton gave up his job in the building industry to sell books full-time, which was to last until 2002 when the businesLs went into voluntary liquidation. Following the demise of Andromeda, Peyton went solo selling on the internet as Replay Books. During the Andromeda years, their ventures included co-editing the Venture SF series of reprints of classic adventure science fiction from Arrow Books (1985–1989). Peyton and Milner also ran the small press Drunken Dragon Press, which published four titles amongst which was the 1988 collection of parodies ‘The Dragonhiker’s Guide to Battlefield Covenant at Dune’s Edge: Odyssey Two’ by David Langford.
Rog also very kindly gave me a copy of ‘The Time-Lapsed Man’ which is a 1990 hardback reprint by his Drunken Dragon Press of a title by Eric Brown and originally published by PAN in 1989. These days Rog spends part of his time compiling list of book cover artists for different publishers including PAN and also walking his dog, Nellie.
PS Did you recognise Terry Pratchett and Neil Gamain in the photo?
Adrian Harrington, booksellers of Tunbridge Wells, is well know for selling James Bond related material, often with a John Gilbert connection. I myself have bought items from them not only from Tunbridge Wells but also when the shop was in Kensington. I was just looking what they currently have in stock and was interested to see an item, namely four DIY volumes of Bond stories and related titles including one with ‘The Book of Bond’ and ‘The Bond Dossier’ and yours for only £650.
Going off at a tangent I recently picked up a couple of later Picadors which are signed limited editions and published in association with Goldsboro Books but I’m not quite sure why. The one is a hard back edition in a slipcase of ‘The Kills’ by Richard House and the other is ‘Selection Day’ by Aravind Adiga.