One Life at a Time, Please

New York: Henry Holt and Company, 1988. First Edition. 225pp. Octavo [21.5 cm] 1/2 black cloth over red boards with the title gilt stamped on the backstrip. Near fine/Near fine. Signed by Abbey on the front free endsheet in the year of publication. Collection of essays by the celebrated curmudgeon. Edward Abbey (1927-1989) was a celebrated author, essayist, conservationist, noted pain-in-the-ass, and in many ways the father (or at the very least, uncle) of the modern environmental movements. "This book consists of a collection of pieces, most written on commission from some magazine editor, book publisher, or college speakers bureau. Whether or not each piece rises to the occasion I leave for the reader to judge. All were written for money, in the higher, finer sense of that ambiguous term - I have a wife, an ex-wife, several children, a dog, a cat, a mortgaged house, and a 1973 Ford pickup truck to support - and all were written for fun.