The author's debut novel

Carr, J. L. ~ A Day In Summer : Signed By The Author

First UK Printing : Barrie & Rockliff, London : 1963

8vo., titles in white to spine separated by star devices; publisher’s own device to foot; complete in the original unclipped pictorial dust jacket designed by S. R. Boldero (18s. net); with photograph of the author to the lower flap; THE BOOK essentially a near Fine copy, a little pushed to foot of spine; in the Very Good++ WRAPPER lightly creased to edges; a little darkened and rubbed along spine, particularly at the head; some light shelf wear to the lower panel with a minor cup stain affecting the lower portion. The wrapper is protected in a removable Brodart archival cover. First edition of the author’s first book, this copy inscribed by Carr to the front free endpaper: “J. L. Carr, written in Kettering in early mornings and late nights”. The reference is to his working in teaching at the time of writing. Carr began teaching in 1930 as a supernumerary teacher at South Milford Primary School in Yorkshire, before training at Dudley college and further teaching stints in Hampshire, Birmingham, and even South Dakota. After travelling to Japan, China and Malaya (now Malaysia), he joined the RAF and served in the war predominantly in West Africa. In 1943, he was commissioned as an intelligence officer at RAF bases in Kent, Norfolk and Scotland, and it was these experiences which predominantly influenced the subject of A Day in Summer. It was after the war, when he had married and moved to Kettering, that he began writing the novel, in between long hours as headmaster of Highfields Primary School in Kettering. In what can be seen as a semi-autobiographical work, the plot follows Peplow, a mild-mannered bank clerk and RAF veteran who arrives in the fictional village of Great Minden seeking retribution for the death of his son. Armed with a hidden service revolver, he seeks to track down the fairground ruffian who he believes mowed down his ten year old son. One reviewer writes that the debut work contains “an amused, sympathetic fascination with small, self-contained communities; the inability of men and women to understand each other; the unnerving backwash of memory experienced by those who have fought in a war; the decline of organized religion in the face of an indifferent world; and the way in which the past can enmesh us”. (Ursula Buchan, Slightly Foxed). In 1989 the book was adapted into film, starring John Sessions and Ian Carmichael, among others. Rare indeed with these attributes.

BINDING: Hardcover
CONDITION: Near Fine
JACKET: Very Good++