jpatterson, Author at The Vintage Contemporaries Bibliography

Robert Olmstead – River Dogs (1987)

Bibliographical Description

87.03.W031: Olmstead – River Dogs

River Dogs | STORIES | ROBERT OLMSTEAD | Vintage Contemporaries | VINTAGE BOOKS • A DIVISION OF RANDOM HOUSE • NEW YORK

128 leaves, pp. [10] 1–2 3-13 14 15-21 22 23-35 36 37-45 46 47-59 60 61-71 72 73-109 110 111-240 [6]

A Vintage Contemporaries Original, March 1987, First Edition

Contents: π1a author photo with excerpt, π1b blank, π2a half-title, π2b blank, π3a title, π3b imprint, π4a dedication, π4b blank, π5a contents, π5b blank, 1 fly-title, 2 blank, 3-240 River Dogs: 3-13 ‘River Dogs’, 14 blank, 15-21 ‘A Good Cow’, 22 blank, 23-35 ‘A Place to Stay’, 36 blank , 37-45 ‘What To Do First’, 46 blank, 47-59 ‘Cody’s Story’, 60 blank, 61-71 ‘Onions’, 72 blank, 73-109 ‘The Mason’, 110 blank, 111-122 ‘A Pair of Bulls’, 123-171 ‘Bruno and Rachel’, 172 blank, 173-188 ‘The Boon’, 189-232 ‘In This Life’, 233-240 ‘How to Bury a Dog’; χ1a about the author, χ1b blank, χ2a Vintage Contemporaries order form, χ2b Vintage Contemporaries list, χ3a blank, χ3b blank.

Cover design by Lorraine Louie; cover illustration by Rick Lovell; interior author photo by David Tobin.

Copies: JDP 1.1

Blurbs

(front cover) An original…Olmstead writes like a man who won’t speak til he’s got something to say. – Jay McInerney
In River Dogs and eleven other stories, Robert Olmstead transports readers into the raw, uncompromising, often bitterly funny landscape of rural New Hampshire. With relentless power and an ever-sensitive eye and ear for eerily realistic detail, Olmstead spins tales of country living proud and fallow. Wily dairymen, onion planters, small-time hunters, and drifting hustlers populate River Dogs—characters deflecting pain and rich in humanity.
Robert Olmstead is a nation unto himself, or at least a province in revolt; an original in the American grain, shrewd, funny, interested in convention only for what he can get out of it….From the world of his work—muscular, male, generally unremunerative work—he has fashioned a fresh and vital language. – Tobias Wolff
Hilarious, sad, gritty, true-to-life and original. – Howard Frank Mosher
A stunning debut…these are terrific stories by a terrific writer. – Ernest Hebert
In reading Olmstead, we may hear the echo of ancient tales traded in the flicker of firelight…the gnarly wisdom of generations of New Englanders finds expression in these remarkable stories. – Jay McInerney

Pete Davies – The Last Election (1987)

Bibliographical Description

87.01.W030: Davies – The Last Election

128 leaves, pp. [10] 1 2 3-52 53 54-73 74 75-104 105 106-188 189 190-209 210 211-233 234 [12]

First Vintage Books Edition, January 1987

Contents: π1a author photo with blurbs, π1b blank, π2a title, π2b imprint, π3a dedication, π3b blank, π4a epigraph, π4b blank, π5a fly-title, π5b blank, 1-234 The Last Election: 1-2 ‘PROLOGUE’, 3-53 ‘FRIDAY’, 54-74 ‘MONDAY’, 75-105 ‘TUESDAY’, 106-189 ‘WEDNESDAY’, 190-210 ‘THURSDAY’, 211-234 ‘GOOD TELEVISION’; χ1a about the author, χ1b blank, χ2a Vintage Contemporaries order form, χ2b Vintage Contemporaries list, χ3a blank, χ3b blank, χ4a blank, χ4b blank, χ5a blank, χ5b blank, χ6a blank, χ6b blank.

Cover design by Lorraine Louie; cover illustration by Rick Lovell; interior author photo by Jerry Bauer.

Copies: JDP 1.1

Blurbs

(front cover) If Brazil were based on a novel, it might well have been The Last Election. – Terry Gilliam
At the time of the last election, who rules England? Nanny does. For what party? The Money Party. Who are “the jobless”? The general public. And what keeps them happy, more or less? A stultifying mix of pop music, pool tournaments and broadcasts by Wally Wasted—prepared by executives who live in precarious high-tech luxury, fueled by booze and cocaine. / Grief is one of them. He invented the government-subsidized Dance Barns, and still runs the biggest—a palce of sex and rock intended to keep the young happy and harmless. His lover, Milla, is an advertising phenom on the brink of collapse. Both Grief and Milla loathe the government, but both are compromised by their success on its behalf…until they discover the ultimate purpose of the latest street drug. As the aged are severely taxing the government’s ability to provide for them financially, this drug hurries things along, so to speak… / The Last Election gives to the distinguished tradition of such “political” novels as 1984 and A Clockwork Orange a compassionate, human face, and possesses as well the imaginative futurism of such films as Brazil and Blade Runner. Already acclaimed in Great Britain, Pete Davies has made a stunning debut.
Vivid, nasty, brutish, and paranoic…a prophecy of the urban apocalypse. – The Times (London)
A fast, inventive and funny thriller which holds us to the last. – The Observer

Vintage Contemporaries in the Wild: Aaron Burch’s Watercolour Covers

Undoubtedly, a strength of Lorraine Louie’s classic Vintage Contemporaries design was its adaptability. It provided a consistent and instantly recognizable frame to signal the imprint while allowing the cover art to convey to unique spirit of each individual title. Author and artist Aaron Burch has fun playing with the early-era design to reimagine a children’s book classic, a 90s comic property, and the greatest television series an eleven-year-old could imagine. That shopping cart is inspired.

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Burch also produced a VC-inspired watercolor as a header for Evan Williams’s essay, “Nicholson Baker’s U and I in 3 Days“.

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Burch’s debut novel Year of the Buffalo was published this year. Check it out.

Thomas McGuane – Nobody’s Angel (1986)

Bibliographical Description

86.11.W029: McGuane – Nobody’s Angel

120 leaves, pp. [8] 1–3 4-78 79 80-86 87 88-118 119 120-142 143 144-149 150 151-153 154 155-171 172 173-227 [5]

First Vintage Books Edition, November 1986

Contents: π1a author photo with blurbs, π1b “BOOKS BY THOMAS MCGUANE”, π2a title, π2b imprint, π3a dedication, π3b blank, π4a epigraph, π4b blank, 1 fly-title, 2 blank, 3-227 Nobody’s Angel, χ1b blank, χ2a about the author, χ2b blank, χ3a Vintage Contemporaries order form, χ3b Vintage Contemporaries List.

Cover design by Lorraine Louie; cover illustration by Marc Tauss; interior author photo by Paul Dix.

Copies: JDP 1.1

Blurbs

(front cover) McGuane’s best book so far. – The New York Times Book Review
Skewed comic vision, rakish wit, recklessly zany invention…a writer of great extravagance whose elegance of style is laced with sarcasm, wisecracks, and wry irony….McGuane can also write with grace and with a poignance commingled with gallows humor….a novel of considerable compassion, strength and resonance, from an author who’s among the most arresting and fascinating of his generation. – San Francisco Chronicle
Nobody’s Angel is a masterpiece, not only McGuane’s best, but arguably one of the best serious novels of recent time….a mastery of style and invention, delighting the reader with his pure command of the language. – Indianapolis News
The thinking man’s Western….McGuane is meticulous with his metaphors, as precise and witty as a Renaissance poet. – Los Angeles Times
McGuane’s prose is witty and evocative….Montana, where he lives most of the time, it to McGuane what Yoknapatawpha County was to Faulkner, a mythic place [of discovery]. This is a rewarding book full of small truths. – People

Janet Hobhouse – November (1986)

Bibliographical Description

86.11.W028: Hobhouse – November

A Vintage Original, November 1986, First Edition

104 leaves, pp. [6] 1–2 3-198 [4]

Contents: π1a author photo with book-title, π1b “ALSO BY JANET HOBHOUSE”, π2a title, π2b imprint, π3a dedication, π3b blank, 1 fly-title, 2 blank, 3-198 November, χ1a about the author, χ1b blank, χ2a Vintage Contemporaries order form, χ2b Vintage Contemporaries List.

Cover design by Lorraine Louie; cover illustration by Rick Lovell; interior author photo by Jerry Bauer.

Copies: JDP 1.1

Blurbs

(front cover) A new novel by the author of Dancing in the Dark, “one of the most acute and serious novels on the theme of modern relationships in the last decade. – The Philadelphia Inquirer
Through Janet Hobhouse’s third novel we follow Zachariah Quine, who at the age of forty—deserted by both his wife and his ambitions as a musician—flees New York City and its fragmented, bohemian lives, seeking to “crawl back into the camp of the human tribe.” His destination is London, where he stays with his expatriate brother and his “English” family—and meets Anne, whom his brother describes as “a walking disaster, alcoholic, manic-depressive, accident-prone, kleptomaniac, just what you need right now.” She crystallizes everything he yearns for, caught as he is between regret and desire, with only the illusion of freedom to sustain him. November is about the nature of love and loss, and the difficulties of making new ties when the old ones still hurt. Janet Hobhouse redefines our notions of freedom, change and escape, and examines the wariness with which all but the very young are bound to carry through life, in a narrative of clear and affecting power.
Janet Hobhouse writes in a beautiful and mannered style, full of glimmering and special lucidity, full of moments of instant and complete awareness. – The Los Angeles Herald Examiner
Janet Hobhouse is an original; yet whole paragraphs could have been written by Henry James—a Henry James who had taken a deep breath and entered his own sexual jungle….She employs English as if it were a dangerous power-tool. – Victoria Glendinning, The London Sunday Times