View From The Air (Inscribed)

Hugh Fosburgh

Published by Charles Scribners Sons, New York, 1953

About this Item

First Edition (Scribner 'A' on the copyright page). I think this is the fourth signed Hugh Fosburgh novel that I have listed for sale (includes two copies of The Hunter. One of those copies was inscribed to a cousin on his mother's side, Frank Whitney. This book (View From The Air) is inscribed but not signed. The inscription reads: 'To Frankie, who mows all my lawns for me.' As you can see from the photo there is an address sticker of the previous owner right above the inscription. The book no longer has a usable dust jacket. It was inside the book when I purchased it some years ago. So it is included with the sale. Parts of it are detached. Most of the spine is missing. Several pieces of tape are adhered to the jacket. Both flaps of the jacket are present, so you can read about the book. Here's a little bit of what is said: 'In his second novel Hugh Fosburgh has written about a group of airmen in the South Pacific (Fosburgh was a bomber pilot with the Air Force in the South Pacific during World War II) with the same tense, controlled excitement and clean, masterly writing that characterizes his first novel, The Hunter. The story centers around the crew of the bomber Upstairs Maid, taking them from their entrance into the Air Force, through flight training, until they finally are in combat sweating out almost daily missions over the hell-hole of Truk. The men of the Upstairs Maid are a varied lot: Gibson, the pilot, a writer and a man of sensitive imagination and courage attempting to prove something to himself and about himself; Flight Officer Homer Lovely, a giant, exuberant, innocent bear-cub of a man; Mike Luca, the peppery but perfect bombardier; and Chester Biggers, the 'good' boy who is a true-life coward. Like the language of the sea, the language of the air has already its own appropriate beauty, and the descriptions of flight, of the emotions it evokes, and of aerial combat as it is experienced by the men who take part in it are vivid and exciting. In a second novel, Hugh Fosburgh has fulfilled the promise of his first magnificently with a book that is memorable for its lean, taut prose and its study of men struggling with the severest test to which courage and nerves can be put.' The book is in quite decent condition. You can see the covers photos. There is some white discoloration on the front. The silver lettering spine is nicely bright. The cover edges look very good, no rubbing. The corners have only tiny spots of rubbing. The spine has a slight to moderate forward lean, but the book is very solidly bound from cover to cover with nicely tight pages throughout and nicely tight covers as well. There are two small scuff marks off each of the edges (top and bottom) of the front inside cover. The rear inside cover has one scuff mark off each edge (top and bottom). These scuffs were created by the tape on the dust jacket. The pages are very clean. I scroll through them the number of times and found no more than a handful of small tan spots. I'm not seeing any conspicuous creasing turned-down corners of placeholder creases. There are no markings. The only attachment is the little address label you see in the photo. And the only writing is the author's inscription.

Seller Inventory # 004847

Bibliographic Details

• Title: View From The Air (Inscribed)
• Publisher: Charles Scribners Sons, New York
• Publication Date: 1953
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Printing: 1st Printing
• Condition: Good
• Signed: Inscribed by Author(s)
• Seller catalogs:
  • Signed
  • Signed Novels, Fiction