Loot of the Week 07 October 2016

This week's loot is a galore of prize winners, vintage modernist renditions, and a newly published work by Adam Haslett, mostly from a recent book audition. I have a good feeling about Haslett this year.

In the foreground is a first edition of Viet Thanh Nguyen's "The Sympathizer" that won the Pulitzer this year, beating finalists Kelly Link's "Get in Trouble" and Margaret Verble's "Maud's Line".

Next to it is Wright Morris' first National Book Award winner in 1957, "The Field of Vision", beating the likes of Saul Bellow, John Hersey, Nelson Algren, A.B. Guthrie, Edwin O'Connor, and J.F. Power, all of whom won or would go on to win major literary awards. The dust jacket for this book has many states, and the finer details seem lost now, wand all I can gather are that firstly, the first state dust jacket is quite rare, is of a simple design and in blue and black and secondly, the design here is likely the second state and the same dust jacket with a square National Book Award sticker affixed is considered third state. But I'm not sure, and would love to hear from anyone who has a firmer idea. Interestingly, this first edition is also a review copy with publisher slip bind in.

Then we have, at the background, Wright Morris' National Book Award finalists, "The Huge Season" (1954) and "Love Among the Cannibals" (1957) that lost out to William Faulkner's "A Fable" and John Cheever's "The Wapshot Chronicle" respectively. We also have his earlier works, "Man and Boy" (1951) and "The Works of Love" (1952) plus a later work, "The Territory Ahead" (1958).

Following on, we have Ellen Glasgow's last novel, "In This Our Life", that won the 1942 Pulitzer and her penultimate novel, "Vein of Iron".

Lastly, we have Norman Mailer's debut novel and magnum opus, "The Naked and the Dead", generally considered one of the major work in 20th century American literature, in its full first edition glory.