1906 Twilight Fairy Tales by Maud Ballington Booth - Scarce Antique Illustrated Book

Here is a first edition antique copy of Twilight Fairy Tales by Maud Ballington Booth. Being a first edition, published in 1906 by GP Putnam's Sons. With sixteen charming colour plates by Miss Amy Carol Rand. Scarce. I really like the artwork - quite different to other fairy tale illustrations. With a few condition points, detailed below.

Maud Ballington Booth (1865–1948) was a British-American activist who co-founded the Volunteers of America and championed early prison reform. Known affectionately as "the little mother to men who have erred", she wrote Twilight Fairy Tales alongside other children's literature (like Sleepy-Time Stories) as a creative, gentle outlet. She dedicated the stories in this collection to her daughter.

The book consists of sixteen distinct fairy tales. A notable character tracking through portions of the narrative is a boy named Roy and his magical adventures with fairies. Heavily praised for their rich, vivid world-building and detailed sensory descriptions. They were designed to be read to children at bedtime (hence "twilight") to calm them before sleep.

Inside the book opens with an inked inscription on the front paste down from 1907. The early pages have some mild creases. There are some brown blemishes to the top edge at the beginning, and again to the top few corners at the end. A few mild creases inside. The contents have scattered spotting and some faint dark marks. Several early pages have a chip to the fore-edge. The top edge is gilt. All of the colour plates are present as called for.

Red cloth over boards have black and gilt decoration to the front. This has remained in good condition. Just a little rubbing/rounding to the corners. A couple of light marks on the back, lower panel. The gilt and spine cloth have faded a little. Rubbing also to the spine ends, with a little fraying. A small white mark to the spine half-way down.

Your vintage copy of Grimm's Fairy Tales will be wrapped with care in tissue and ribbon* and sent well packaged. I am always happy to add a gift card with a message to the parcel.

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H 21.5 cm x W 15 cm, 271 pages, 0.63 kg. I dispatch worldwide daily from the UK. (There are just a very few countries which I am unable to ship to).

* If you would prefer for your book not to be decoratively wrapped and simply dispatched in the full packaging, a note can be added to the order.

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