{"product_id":"to-2026-009","title":"Once There Was a War","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSTEINBECK, John.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eOnce There Was a War.\u003c\/strong\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eFIRST EDITION, FIRST PRINTING.\u003c\/strong\u003e New York: The Viking Press, 1958.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eOctavo. xxi, [3], 233 pp. Quarter taupe cloth spine stamped in red over brown paper boards, top edge stained red; in the original first-issue dust jacket, $3.95 price intact and unclipped to the front flap, the jacket illustration by Don Freeman. Goldstone \u0026amp; Payne A37a. Book very good — square and tight, cloth and boards clean, text block crisp and unmarked, the top stain bright, with bumped corner tips and a slight forward lean. Dust jacket good-plus — the spine sunned and toned (lettering dimmed but legible), light edge wear, the front and rear panels bright with colors intact, no chips or tears; in a mylar sleeve.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eSteinbeck's collected wartime journalism. From June through December 1943 he filed dispatches for the New York Herald Tribune from England during the Blitz, from North Africa, and from Sicily and Italy — written not from the battle lines but from troopships, London pubs, and behind-the-lines quarters, among paratroopers and bomber crews. He gathered the pieces in 1958 with a new introduction that looks back on the whole project as a kind of fairy tale grown impossibly distant from the atomic-age present.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003eThe Don Freeman dust jacket — Freeman is better known for \u003cem\u003eCorduroy\u003c\/em\u003e and his New York theater drawings — captures soldiers crowded around a pub table in his loose, affectionate line. A handsome copy; the unclipped $3.95 price on the front flap is the key first-issue point.\u003c\/p\u003e\n\u003cp\u003e\u003cstrong\u003eSKU\u003c\/strong\u003e TO-2026-009\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Steinbeck, John","offers":[{"title":"Very Good","offer_id":46459950858401,"sku":"TO-2026-009","price":110.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0729\/7001\/0785\/files\/TO-2026-009_01.jpg?v=1785778196","url":"https:\/\/twoorangesbooks.com\/products\/to-2026-009","provider":"Two Oranges Books","version":"1.0","type":"link"}