Books

NEW, only the shipping box was opened to check for damage (none found), all else never opened. LIMITED to 750 numbered copies; limitation page signed by Gene Wolfe, Sam Weber and Neil Gaiman. The four volumes are presented together in a handmade cloth-bound slipcase blocked on two sides in pale gold foil with designs by the illustrator and lined with silver mirrored paper. Each of four volumes is three-quarter bound in black buckram with spines blocked in red foil and cloth front boards printed with designs by the illustrator. Set in Jenson with Priori Serif display with decorative initial letters designed by the illustrator, printed on Abbey Pure Rough paper, 1,196 pages of text in total. Color frontispiece and double-page illustration in each volume. Three black and white full-page plates in each volume. The set includes: 1. The Shadow of the Torturer. 2. The Claw of the Conciliator. 3. The Sword of the Lictor. 4. The Citadel of the Autarch. In these volumes, Severian, a young torturer just learning his trade, makes the mistake of falling in love with one of his victims. Unable to bear the sight of her pain, he offers his love the mercy of a sharp blade, and for this crime he is exiled from his home. He is ordered to travel to the distant city of Thrax, there to take up the position of Executioner, but the journey will be longer and stranger than he can imagine. On the road Severian finds new friends and enemies, and discovers a strange jewel that seems to command power over life and death ? a power that others will kill to obtain.

The Book of the New Sun is a series of four science fantasy novels or one four-volume novel written by American author Gene Wolfe. It inaugurated the so-called 'Solar Cycle' that Wolfe continued by setting other works in the same universe. Narrated by Severian, a disgraced journeyman torturer who rises to the position of Autarch, the story involves themes of time travel, theology, and the nature of reality.