Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1990. A collection of related stories that share a number of characters as well as the narrator -- a "Tim O'Brien" whose experience bears certain similarities to the author's own. Inscribed by O'Brien to fellow writer Andre Dubus: "to Andre, Best, Tim. Call me!". The Things They Carried is a meditation on war and death, and on the place that storytelling has in bringing these ultimately unfathomable experiences within our grasp. Nearly three decades after its first publication, this is by consensus one of the best, if not the best, work of fiction to come out of the Vietnam war. Dubus has marked several passages in the text, mostly to do with bravery and regret, and he has written two names and some numbers on the rear flyleaf. An outstanding association copy, being inscribed to a writer whose time in the military, and the sense of honor and sacrifice that came with that, influenced his own writings throughout his life. Trace edge foxing, thus near fine in a fine dust jacket (second issue, with the spine lettering properly aligned). [#033257] SOLD