Children and Young Adult
Flower Fables
New York: McLoughlin Bros. n.d. Comstock, Frances Bassett. Hardcover. Quarto size, 176 pp. Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888) was a feminist and writer best known for her children's novel "Little Women", which was published to great acclaim and led to two more sequels featuring the same characters. "Flower Fables" is a...... More
Morning Glories and Queen Aster
Boston: Little, Brown, and Company, (1904). Kennedy, J.W. Ferguson [Mrs.]. Hardcover. Duodecimo size, 48 pp., with scarce original dust jacket. Louisa May Alcott (1832-1888), author of the classic and much-loved "Little Women" books, abolitionist and feminist, grew up surrounded by many of the 19th-century literary lights of New England, including..... More
Fairy Tales
London: Hodder and Stoughton, [1924]. Nielsen, Kay. First Edition. Hardcover. First trade edition, quarto size, 197 pp., in original dust jacket. The fairy tales of Hans Christian Andersen (1805-1875) have been beloved by both children and adults ever since they were first published, with some tales appearing as early as..... More
Peter Pan; or, The Boy Who Would Not Grow Up
London: Hodder and Stoughton Limited, 1928. First Edition. Hardcover. First publication of the play, duodecimo size, 194 pp. Sir James Matthew Barrie (1860-1937) wrote numerous novels and plays for both children and adults, but he is best known for "Peter Pan", a hugely successful play set in the magical world..... More
Peter and Wendy
London: Hodder & Stoughton, [1911]. Bedford, F. D. First Edition. Hardcover. First printing, octavo size, 275 pp., with dust jacket, in a custom box. Sir James Matthew Barrie (1860-1937) wrote numerous novels and plays for both children and adults, but he is best known for "Peter Pan", a hugely successful..... More
J.M. Barrie's Peter Pan in Kensington Gardens; Retold by May Bryon for Little People with the Permission of the Author
London: Hodder and Stoughton Limited, [1929]. Rackham, Arthur. Hardcover. Octavo size, 123 pp. With Ex-Libris of J.M. Barrie which apparently is not unique, there being one other copy online as of this writing with the same plate. The ink looks genuine but the signatures are the same; interestingly, the library..... More
Stories from the Pentamerone
London: Macmillan and Co., Limited, 1911. Goble, Warwick. Limited Edition. Vellum. One of 150 copies, the Edition de Luxe, quarto size, 316 pp. The text of this book is based on John Edward Taylor's translation from 1847. Giambattista Basile (1566-1632) was an Italian poet, courtier, and fairy tale collector. The..... More
Jaglon and the Tiger Fairies
Chicago: The Reilly & Lee Co., (1953). Ulrey, Dale. First Edition. Hardcover. Quarto size, [39] pp. While L. Frank Baum's (1856-1919) stories of the land of Oz are his most popular and successful works, Baum wrote a number of animal stories in 1905, which he called "animal fairy stories", going..... More
Cautionary Tales for Children; Designed for the Admonition of Children between the ages of eight and fourteen years
London: Eveleigh Nash, [1907]. B. T. B. [Lord Basil Temple Blackwood]. First Edition. Hardcover. First printing, octavo size, 80 pp. This collection of verses, intended as a parody of cautionary tales written for children, was written by Hilaire Belloc (1870-1953), a prolific writer and poet as well as an avid..... More
Jane, Joseph & John; Their Book of Verses
Boston: The Atlantic Monthly Press, (ca. 1918). Day, Maurice E.; Hapgood, T. B. First Edition. Hardcover. Quarto size, 64 pp., with original glassine wrapper and publisher's box. Ralph Bergengren (1871-1947) was an American humourist and children's poet, who wrote charming poems for children with light-hearted rhyme and metre; this book..... More
The Tiger in the Teapot
New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1968. Pène du Bois, William. First Edition. Hardcover. First edition in book form and with Pène du Bois illustrations, duodecimo size, 32 pp. A charming story of a family and its tiger (who simply won't get out of the teapot), this children's story is..... More
Giovanni and the Other Children Who Have Made Stories
New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1892. Birch, Reginald B. First Edition. Hardcover. First US edition, octavo size, 224 pp. The work of Frances Hodgson Burnett (1849-1924) captured the imaginations of readers, with her enduring novels such as "The Secret Garden" and "Sara Crewe"; this collection of stories for children demonstrates..... More
Polly's Lion; A California Story for Children
San Francisco: Carnahan Publishing, 1902. Second Edition. Hardcover. Octavo size, 174 pp. Second edition (stated) of "probably the first novel set in the Fresno area." Likely the first story set in Fresno, although with much of the action being set in Yosemite where the family goes on several trips. The..... More
Improving Songs for Anxious Children
Chicago: A. C. McClurg & Company, ca. 1907. Hardcover. Oblong folio size, [40] pp. Utilising music to teach lessons to children, "Improving Songs" is a collaboration between married couple John Alden Carpenter (1876-1951) and Rue Winterbotham Carpenter (1876-1931). An American composer, John Carpenter created numerous modern and jazz-inspired compositions, and..... More
Through the Looking Glass and What Alice Found There
Philadelphia: Henry Altemus, [1899]. [Tenniel, John]. Hardcover. Sixmo size, 220 pp. Charles Lutwidge Dogson (1832-1898), known by his pen name Lewis Carroll, is known worldwide as the writer who created the renowned children's novels "Alice's Adventures in Wonderland" and "Through the Looking-Glass"; his work is filled with delightful and absurd..... More
A Child's Book of Abridged Wisdom
San Francisco: Paul Elder & Company / The Tomoye Press, 1905. 1st Edition. Hardcover. Duodecimo size, 28 pp., in scarce dust jacket. A charming book on manners for children, told in verse with humorous word-play, accompanied by line drawings that bring the verses to life - complete with walking flowers..... More
The Jolly Jump-Ups and Their New House
Springfield, MA: McLoughlin Bros., Inc., 1939. Clyne, Geraldine. Hardcover. Quarto size (oblong), [7] pp. "The Jolly Jump-Ups" is a pop-up book by Geraldine Clyne featuring the Jump-Up family and their escapades as they move to a new house. Showcasing charming illustrations by Clyne, each page contains a full-colour pop-up scene..... More
The Daughters of the Stars
London: Hatchard & Co., 1939. Dulac, Edmund. First Edition. Hardcover. First trade edition, quarto size, 198 pp. Written, as the author sets forth in the Foreword, to address the issue that, "Readers of fairy tales and other romantic fiction will have noticed before this that the Mothers of the heroines..... More
Fantastic Mr. Fox
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, (1970). Chaffin, Donald. First Edition. Hardcover. First U.S. edition, octavo size, 72 pp. Roald Dahl (1916-1990) has written stories to delight children generation after generation, and his heartwarming tales such as "Charlie and the Chocolate Factory" and "James and the Giant Peach" are avidly read..... More
Midnight Revels
San Francisco: Sunset Press, 1939. Kraemer, Xavier. 1st Edition. Hardcover. Octavo size, 85 pp., signed by Xavier Kraemer. A delightful fairy story told in poem form, of a dream wherein dolls come alive and dance and celebrate - until the dawn when the "dream" ends - the dream that the..... More
St. Nicholas: An Illustrated Magazine For Young Folks. Volume XXIX Part II, May 1902 To October 1902 [Includes first appearance of "The Cruise of the Dazzler" and "To Repel Boarders" by Jack London]
New York: The Century Co., 1902. First Edition. Hardcover. Octavo size , 582 pp. This volume includes six months of the wonderful St. Nicholas children's magazine, with the July issue containing the first published appearance of the short story "The Cruise of the Dazzler" (pp. 784-812). ___DESCRIPTION: Decorated red cloth..... More
Edmund Dulac's Fairy Book; Fairy Tales of the Allied Nations
London, New York, Toronto: Hodder & Stoughton, [1916]. Dulac, Edmund. First Edition. Hardcover. First English trade edition, quarto size, 180 pp., fifteen colour plates. This book received a lot of attention in New York with the illustrations forming the centrepiece of Edmund Dulac's (1882-1953) first American exhibition. The tales in..... More
The Sleeping Beauty
London: William Heinemann, (1920). Rackham, Arthur. First Edition. Hardcover. First trade edition, octavo size, 111 pp., in a custom binding by Katharine Pountney. One of the most beloved fairy tales of all time, "Sleeping Beauty" (sometimes titled "Little Briar Rose") was originally published by Giambattista Basile (1566-1632) in his "The..... More
The Play-Day Book: New Stories for Little Folks
New York: Mason Brothers, 1857. Coffin, Fred[erick] M. Hardcover. Sixteenmo, 292 pp. Early reprint of a children's book by Fannie Fern, the pen name of Sara Willis (1811-1872) who struggled as a young widow to provide for her children by writing, eventually becoming the highest-paid columnist in the United States..... More