New York: Simon & Schuster, 1997.

A re-typeset edition, beautifully bound and designed, of Jewett’s most acclaimed novel. Accompanied by striking black and white photographs, the story is narrated from the perspective of the Bostonian woman writer, and the resulting sketches of ordinary life paints a profound picture of life in coastal town in America at the turn of the 19th century.

Episodic in nature, the book is narrated from the perspective of the unnamed writer, who relays the story of various inhabitants within the coastal town she is visiting for the summer. Among the characters featured are the narrator’s landlady Mrs Todd, along with Todd’s mother, and brother, the latter of whom the narrator meets when she sails to Green Island, on which a circle of pointed firs grow. Jewett’s skills as a writer beautifully capture the idiomatic language, customs, mannerisms, and humour peculiar to Down-Easters.

A special edition of a book loved by writers such as Henry James and Ursula K. LeGuin, and widely considered Sarah Orne Jewett’s best work.

Large 8vo., half black cloth over drab boards, lettered in gilt to upper cover with black and white photograph; lower cover with inlaid photograph of the author above her facsimile gilt signature; dark green endpapers; printed mylar jacket ($22.00); pp. [i], 2-141, [iii]; beginning with 16 pages of black and white photographs on glossy paper, featuring photographs of coastal Maine during the era portrayed in the story; a near-fine copy, just a couple of small marks and scuffs, the jacket with some light scratches and abrasions, creased at foot of upper panel.