BURNT OFFERINGS

First Centipede Press edition, first printing. Publisher's original quarter black cloth with J. K. Potter illustrated cloth upper board and blue cloth lower board, with titles in silver to the spine. Blue silk bookmark. Colour frontispiece by Tomislav Tikulin and two full page colour plates by J. K. Potter. Further illustrations include a gallery of artwork and stills from the 1976 film adaptation, and a black and white photograph of the author to the rear. A fine copy, the binding square and firm, the contents are clean throughout, and without previous owners' inscriptions or stamps. Complete with the original plain acetate dustwrapper.

Issued in an edition of 150 copies. American horror novel 'Burnt Offerings' was first published in 1973 by Delacorte Press. Conceived as a screenplay, it was intended to be a black comedy, but as Marasco confirmed in an interview with the New York Times in 1998 "It just came out black". One critic went so far as to point to Stephen King's 'The Shining' and Jay Anson's 'The Amityville Horror' as 'basically rewrites' of Marasco's book, with Marasco originating the now popular twist on the classic horror trope of the haunted house: "a cash-strapped family (or individual) gets a deal on a place that's above their socio-economic station. Hoping to make a fresh start, they go all in, and in short order realise that their attempt to buy a better life at a discount is the worst decision they ever made and all they can do is run for their lives, abandoning their investment" (Hendrix, 2015). The basis of the 1976 film of the same name, directed by Dan Curtis and starring Karen Black, Oliver Reed, and Bette Davis. The screenplay was written by William F. Nolan.