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Koontz, Dean R.
WARLOCK
book-date: 1972
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GRADING:
Lancer
1972
1st
Paperback
Armand Weston
.95
VG+ or better
ex-ChUSFA: stamp on first inside page, page 85. MORE INFO

Lancer (#75386-095) 1972 paperback. ("A Lancer Science Fiction Original" / the first and only printing.) Cover by Armand Weston (signature at bottom), 221 pages, 95 cent cover price. Condition is VG+ or better: tight with mild tilt (1/16" to 1/8"); spine is "flat" - no lines, a raised wrinkle in middle (as printed) and has been reinforced with 2" non-yellowing library tape. Age tanning is amazingly light for a book this old - much less than expected. Stamp on first page and page 85 - no other marks or writing.

Some glue traces at top end of spine tells me this has been repaired. Lancer books of this vintage (and Berkley and Curtis Books) are notorious for having the glue fail - and then either the cover comes off or the pages fall out of the book. Careful repair with epoxy cures this, and I haven't seen a book so repaired lose pages (in the 25 years or more since I did such repairs for the SF lending library - in the early Eighties.)

Koontz started out as a Science Fiction writer, but didn't find much recognition until he worked out the kind of tale he does best - a mix of thriller, horror, and science fiction. Then he became a best-selling author, and his early novels (the first dozen under his own name and early ones under pseudonym) - are now rarities because they have not been reprinted.

Warlock, an early novel by Dean R. Koontz - in its first (only?) appearance.
[from the back cover]: THE BLANK was the time, near-forgotten but for the legends that remained as fancies, when the Earth's crust shifted mightily, and towering mountains rose where no mountains had existed before. New coastal lines were formed, while jungle became desert, and desert and grassy plain became the bottom of the new seas. The old world was gone... but the legends remained. And they told of marvels hard to believe, even among men who had mastered the powers of the mind. The stories told that before the Blank men possessed marvels almost unbelievable; it was even said that the old people had conquered the skies (and, in whispers, space itself.) Men like Shaker Sandow knew there was truth in the fancies.. and then a would-be master of the world uncovered a trove of pre-Blank treasures, and once more the world turned toward all-consuming war!

[first page blurb, quoting a segment of text]: THE FACE OF YESTERDAY...
A square of mirror-polished silver supplied the only illumination for the room. It glowed with the soft white warmth that shone on the faces of the Shaker and Gregor. Commander Richter and Belmondo stood in the shadows, hardly daring to breathe.
The Shaker said, "We have something."
The officers moved forward, stared down at the hazy outline of two faces on the plate. There were no discernable features; just dark circles for eyes, slits for mouths, whirls of dark hair. Fine lines began to crisscross the faces, and here and there small plastic squares that the watchers could not have identified as transistors.
The Shaker strained, bearing down with the power of his mind. "There does not seem to be the mind of a man in either of these..."
"Demons?" Belmonde asked, squeakily.
"Not demons... but something we cannot guess." There was a small puff of incandescent gas and the silver plate held only the reflection of their anxious faces...