The Boy Next Door.
London: Newnes, 1945. Second edition. Hardcover. 184pp, with many illustrations in line. Contents clean and unmarked. Early ownership name to front pastedown. Faint impressions of erased pencil to front free endpaper, and Japanese tissue repairs to endpaper hinges. In the firm original binding of orange-red cloth titled in black. Lower board good, upper board mottled from former damp, plus a couple of pale marks to the lower board; spine has a small indentation near the middle and is puckered at the ends. In the protected unclipped wraparound pictorial dust jacket. The front panel is missing a centimetre near the foot of the spine, and the lower panel has a 9cm-long strip torn from the top edge, max 3cm deep, losing a little from the spine head. These chips (losing only foliage) have been professionally made good with plain paper, a few tears have been repaired, and creases have been smoothed, restoring the whole to an attractive condition. Bestall's setting of the children in the tree has much in common with some of his Rupert Annual covers. A good copy. G / VG. Item #19457040
Price: £165.00