CHRISTOPHER, John / YOUD, Sam
The Death of Grass
The Death of Grass
London: Michael Joseph, [1956]
Illustrated by
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The Death of Grass, by John Christopher [Sam Youd's pen name]. London: Michael Joseph, 1956. First edition, first impression of this post-apocalyptic science fiction novel, with a plot concerning a virus that kills off grass species, including rice and wheat. With unclipped dust wrapper.
Publisher's original black cloth, white titles to spine, plain endpapers; with unclipped dust jacket (priced 10s 6d net to front flap) with a design by Trevor Denning. A good-only, ex-library copy, binding secure but lightly cocked, with cloth marked and worn in places, spine tips and corners rubbed and bumped, and edges tanned and worn. Inside, ex-library plates and labels to front paste-down, penned inscription and offsetting to front endpaper, a couple of small penned dots to the list of fiction titles opposite the title page, and sporadic marking and staining throughout, not affecting legibility, and mostly minimal, with a handful of worse occurrences, all pictured. In a worn dust wrapper with spine tips slightly nibbled, extremities and joints darkened and lightly marked, and slightly discolouration to spine and foxing.
The tale of a family’s desperate journey across a collapsing Britain after a virus wipes out all forms of grass, including wheat and rice, triggering mass starvation and social breakdown. First published in 1956, Sam Youd's chilling novel was one of the earliest works to depict ecological catastrophe with such realism. A landmark of British post-apocalyptic fiction.
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