Obscure Destinies: Three New Stories of the West
Willa Cather
First trade edition, first printing (preceded by the signed/limited) of Cather's third collection of short stories, each one dealing with the death of a main character, asking how the ordinary lives of these characters can be valued and how "beauty was found or created in seemingly ordinary circumstances" (Stout, 2000).
New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1932. Publisher's original green cloth with paper title labels; pp. (viii), 229, [3]. A near fine copy in a very good dust jacket. Binding remains tight and sturdy, a touch of sunning to spine with minimal wear to boards, internally clean. The dust jacket is price-clipped, as all copies were due to Knopf changing the price just before publication, and shows a closed tear to back panel and light spine toning, else quite nice. Protected in archival mylar.