84, Charing Cross Road
by Helene Hanff
from Penguin (Non-Classics)
84, Charing Cross Road is a charming record of bibliophilia, cultural difference, and imaginative sympathy. For 20 years, an outspoken New York writer and a rather more restrained London bookseller carried on an increasingly touching correspondence. In her first letter to Marks & Co., Helene Hanff encloses a wish list, but warns, "The phrase 'antiquarian booksellers' scares me somewhat, as I equate 'antique' with expensive." Twenty days later, on October 25, 1949, a correspondent identified only as FPD let Hanff know that works by Hazlitt and Robert Louis Stevenson would be coming under separate cover. When they arrive, Hanff is ecstatic--but unsure she'll ever conquer "bilingual arithmetic." By early December 1949, Hanff is suddenly worried that the six-pound ham she's sent off to augment British rations will arrive in a kosher office. But only when FPD turns out to have an actual name, Frank Doel, does the real fun begin.
Two years later, Hanff is outraged that Marks & Co. has dared to send an abridged Pepys diary. "i enclose two limp singles, i will make do with this thing till you find me a real Pepys. THEN i will rip up this ersatz book, page by page, AND WRAP THINGS IN IT." Nonetheless, her postscript asks whether they want fresh or powdered eggs for Christmas. Soon they're sharing news of Frank's family and Hanff's career. No doubt their letters would have continued, but in 1969, the firm's secretary informed her that Frank Doel had died. In the collection's penultimate entry, Helene Hanff urges a tourist friend, "If you happen to pass by 84, Charing Cross Road, kiss it for me. I owe it so much."
Q's Legacy
by Helene Hanff
from Penguin (Non-Classics)
The Duchess of Bloomsbury Street
by Helene Hanff
from Moyer Bell
Apple of My Eye
by Helene Hanff
from Moyer Bell
A celebration of the author's lifelong love for New York, this may be the walking tourist's guide to the city. Readers visit the World Trade Center, Wall Street, Fraunces Tavern, Rockefeller Center, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and more. Maps, index.
Letter from New York: BBC Woman's Hour Broadcasts
The author of 84, Charring Cross Road compiles the best of her five-minute monthly BBC Woman's Hour Broadcasts about life in New York City into one volume that celebrates the Big Apple and all its inhabitants.
Queen of England;: The story of Elizabeth I (Doubleday signal books)
Letter from New York: A Journal of the City
by Helene Hanff
from Moyer Bell
Butch elects a mayor
by Helene Hanff
from Parents' Magazine Press
When his father runs for mayor, Butch almost ruins the election campaign by trying to help.
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