Khan, Phantom Emperor of 1940

(no dust jacket, but encased in a nice-looking facsimile reproduction of the original first edition jacket; see 2nd scanned image posted with this listing) [ex-rental library book with much external wear (spine turned, spine cloth faded with small rips at both ends) and some internal depredations (confined to the endpapers and pastedowns, including the original front jacket flap affixed to the front pastedown)]. A novel of the future (in this case merely a rather unambitious six years in the future) that takes a look at the international situation and warns that the United States must be prepared for another world war, which the author, in his Prologue, feels sure is coming. He's not worried about the Nazis, though -- nope, it's the Commies, the "'red spider' [that] is slowly enmeshing in its web the entire world." (He rather appreciates Hitler and Mussolini, in fact, crediting the former for "prevent[ing] Germany from becoming communistic" and stating that the latter "saved Italy twelve years ago, and his iron rule has prevented Communism from taking root there.") On the domestic front, he rails against the usual suspects: pacifists, isolationists, the colleges, labor unions, "very young people [who] are also its victims," etc. To illustrate his talking points, he's concocted a wide-ranging narrative involving "a plot to blow up the Panama Canal and bombard the American cities; a gigantic conspiracy to set up a World soviet empire, and the eleventh hour intervention by a U.S. Major who frustrated the most stupendous cataclysm in the history of mankind." Along the way, "the Author cleverly discusses and solves many pressing national and international problems, and delivers a compelling message to America." This appears to have not only been this author's only book, but also the only book ever issued by this publisher; interestingly, even though only "J.C. Reklar & Co." appears on the book's title page and on the dust jacket, at the base of the spine on the book itself is imprinted "Cosmopolitan Publications," which, if one is at all conspiratorially-minded, suggests some kind of linkage with the Hearst publishing empire. NOTE again that the dust jacket on this book is a FACSIMILE, and that its presence has not been factored into our pricing.

Product Info

Publisher: J.C. Reklar and Co.

Year: (c.1934)

Type: Used

Binding: Hardcover

First Edition

Seller Info

ReadInk

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Country: United States