THE CAVES OF STEEL. Garden City: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1954. Octavo, boards. First edition. Asimov's human detective and his robot partner solve a murder on a overpopulated future Earth where its human inhabitants live in underground hives, "a hectic, tenuously self-sustaining underworld machine of housing cells, factories, tunnels, and life-support mechanisms so intricate and interdependent that any impediment of its delicate rhythm would send the whole apparatus into fatal shock" (Berger, p. 31). The bureaucratized humans, afraid of the open air and too timid to go to the stars to solve their overpopulation problem, will perish, doomed by the strain on their complex life support systems. Asimov's first robot novel. "A richly characterized, thoughtfully told story; justifiably a favorite among Asimov's readers." - Anatomy of Wonder (2004) II-42. "Asimov's tour de force ..." - Survey of Science Fiction Literature I, pp. 318-21. Sargent, British and American Utopian Literature, 1516-1985, p. 245. Mild rubbing at tail of spine panel and mild bruise to lower rear corner tip, a fine copy in nearly fine dust jacket with touch of wear at upper spine end and front corner tips and some rubbing at lower spine end. A very nice copy of a book difficult to locate in superior condition. (#128348).
Price: $3,500.00
First edition so stated on copyright page.