THE NIGHT OF THE SCORPION

First American edition, first printing. Inscribed association copy. Publisher's original blue paper covered boards, purple cloth spine with silver titles, in the Tom Kidd illustrated dustwrapper. A better than very good copy, the binding square and firm, with a little fading to the upper edge. The contents with the paper label of The Maggie Noach Literary Agency to the bottom edge of the front endpaper are otherwise clean throughout. Complete with the lightly rubbed dustwrapper which has had the price clipped from the upper front flap with a $12.95 sticker added to the upper left corner of the rear panel.

Inscribed by the author in blue ink on the front endpaper "For dear Ma, / but when do I get a shelf / to myself? / love, / Anthony / 4.7.85 xx". The second adventure of The Pentagram chronicles. An important presentation copy from the author to his beloved mother. Horowitz has made no secret of the fact that his wealthy but largely unhappy and brutal childhood compelled him to write for children as it allowed him to relive the formative years he never had. His father, a businessman and political fixer, who despite a love of literature and assembling an extensive library himself, ridiculed the commercial viability of his son's desire to become a writer. Sadly he died [and with him the whereabouts of the family fortune, never to be recovered] the year before his son's first book was accepted for publication. Horowitz describes his mother as an extraordinary woman whom he adored, encouraging his interest in reading and writing, and in his teens introducing him to classic horror novels such as Bram Stoker's Dracula and Mary Shelley's Frankenstein. The bestselling author has gone on to become one of the UK's most successful and sought after genre novelists and screenwriters creating new adventures for Ian Fleming's James Bond, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes and writing for Agatha Christie's Hercule Poirot!