Moonraker.

FLEMING, Ian.

Item Number: 120817

London: Jonathan Cape, 1955.

First edition, first issue with “shoo” for “shoot” on page 10 of the third novel in the James Bond series and what many critics to be his finest. Octavo, original black cloth. Association copy, inscribed by the author on the front free endpaper, “To Eric who kills me with his kindness! from Ian.” The recipient was lexicographer Eric Partridge who used to draw extensively on the crime and detective fiction of the likes of Fleming and Chandler for his linguistic studies of slang and criminal dialects. Both Partridge and Fleming both later contributed to The Concise Encyclopedia of Crime and Criminals (Andre Deutsch, 1961). Near fine in a near fine dust jacket with the spine panel bright and with light wear to the spine extremities. Jacket design by Kenneth Lewis. Housed in a custom half morocco clamshell box.

Noël Coward read Moonraker in proof in Jamaica and pronounced, ‘It is the best thing Fleming has done yet, very exciting His observation is extraordinary and his talent for description vivid" (Lycett, 253-54). It was later adapted to film in 1979, directed by Lewis Gilbert and starring Roger Moore as James Bond.