The Alcoholics

New York: Lion Books (127). Fair. 1953. First Edition. Softcover. [a well-worn copy, binding intact but with heavy external wear, spine roll, creasing to covers, browning to pages, etc. -- not so much beat-up as beat-down, like its characters]. Mass Market PB Thompson gives us a day in the sanitarium among "the living dead": The General ("brain wet with rotgut"), The Twins ("alcohol was killing them"), and The Rich Man's Son ("strapped to a table, a mute, tortured imbecile"). One of five, count 'em five, paperback originals by Thompson published in 1953 alone, near the beginning of his most productive period. In Fair condition only -- but hey, do you really expect your books about institutionalized booze-hounds to be all neat and pretty? .