This Book Tip of the Month is brought to you by Jeremy Davies, Senior Editor at And Other Stories.
Mark Valentine’s Sphinxes & Obelisks is just out from the extraordinary Tartarus Press. If you don’t know them, do check out their authoritative editions of Robert Aickman’s stories and memoirs, then move on to their likewise extraordinary volumes of Arthur Machen, Sarban, and even Edith Wharton.
But much as I do enjoy–often prefer–the company of the dead, Tartarus also publishes writers whose hearts still pump, bless ’em. Among these stands Mark Valentine, for whose newest collection of essays and remembrances I plunked down my devalued dollars the instant it was announced. This is the fourth of Mr. Valentine’s such collections at Tartarus, if my count is correct, and each amounts to an invaluable gazetteer of obscure, forgotten, wonderful, and sometimes disreputable authors and books. More, these appreciations are sometimes bundled with the stories of how Mr. Valentine first scared these curious volumes up at this or that church jumble sale or now-shuttered back-alley book dealer. This is strong catnip indeed to such as me, and perhaps to such as you as well.
Having been asked to provide a picture of my tip, I can’t help but notice that a few other titles have photo-bombed my snapshot, including:
- The Cheap-Eaters by Thomas Bernhard, Spurl Editions;
- Minerva the Miscarriage of the Brain by Johanna Hedva, Sming Sming Books;
- Forget Thee by Ian Dreiblatt, Ugly Duckling Presse;
- An Ideal Presence by Eduardo Berti, Fern Books;
- The Burning Court by John Dickson Carr, Langtail Press;
- Abel Ferrara: The Moral Vision by Brad Stevens, FAB Press;
- Looking Back by Norman Douglas, Harcourt, Brace and Co.;
- Trotsky in Exile by Peter Weiss, Athenium;
- Hölderlin by Peter Weiss, Seagull Press.