O’BRIEN, Kate. The Land of Spices. A Novel.

London: William Heinemann, 1941. First edition. Crown octavo. pp. 285. Maroon cloth, title in gilt on upper cover and along spine. Spine slightly faded. A fine copy in fine dust jacket.

Kate O’Brien was born in Limerick to a middle-class, Catholic family with a Cromwellian ancestor in
1897. She was educated at Laurel Hill Convent and later University College, Dublin. In the years that
followed she worked as a governess in Spain and as a journalist on The Manchester Guardian. While
in Manchester she wrote her first literary work, a play, Distinguished Villa. Its success enabled her to
begin work as a novelist and Without My Cloak was accepted by her publisher on the strength of the
first few chapters. It became a best-seller and was awarded the Hawthornden Prize.

[L4 Mantelpiece]