Topper.

New York, NY Ballantine: Del Rey, 1980. Mass Market Paperback First Edition Thus (1980), so stated. First published in 1926. First Edition Thus (1980), so stated. Very Good+ in Wraps: shows indications of very careful use: just a touch of wear to the extremities; a faint crease to the upper front panel; and and another to the outside edge of the rear panel; a couple of faint soil spots to text pages; the expected light tanning to the text pages, due to aging; the lavender background field of the backstrip is lightly sunned, but the titles thereon remain bold and clearly legible; the binding is square and secure; the text is clean. Free of creases to the backstrip. Free of creased or dog-eared pages in the text. Free of any underlining, hi-lighting or marginalia or marks in the text. Free of ownership names, dates, addresses, notations, inscriptions, stamps, or labels. A handsome copy, structurally sound and tightly bound, showing very mild wear and minor, unobtrusive flaws. Bright and clean. Very close to 'As New'. NOT a Book-Club or Ex-Library. 12mo. (7 x 4.25 x 0.65 inches). 216 pages. Cover artwork by Norman Walker. Language: English. Weight: 4.6 ounces. First published in hardcover in1926. Mass Market Paperback. James Thorne Smith, Jr. (1892 – 1934) was an American writer of humorous supernatural fantasy fiction under the byline Thorne Smith. He is best known today for the two "Topper" novels, comic fantasy fiction involving sex, much drinking and ghosts. With racy illustrations, these sold millions of copies in the 1930s and were equally popular in paperbacks of the 1950s. Smith drank as steadily as his characters; James Thurber's The Years with Ross tells the story of Smith's unexplained week-long disappearance. When asked why he hadn't called-in sick, he retorted, "The telephone was in the hall and there was a draft." "Topper" was Smith's most famous work, about a respectable banker called Cosmo Topper, married to his depressingly staid wife Mary, and his misadventures with a couple of ghosts, Marion and George Kerby, who introduce him to other ghosts. He is romantically attracted to Marion, who at one point tries to kill him so that they can always be together. Unusually for such a book, Mary is treated sympathetically—she does not like what she has become and tries to change. It was made into a film. Topper was made into a 1937 film starring Cary Grant as George Kerby, Constance Bennett as Marion Kerby, and Roland Young as Cosmo Topper. The books were adapted into an American television series, Topper, beginning in 1953, with Leo G. Carroll as Cosmo Topper, and Robert Sterling and Anne Jeffreys as the ghosts. Seventy-eight episodes were made. The pilot episode and a few of the early episodes were written by Stephen Sondheim.