COONS, Maurice R. ("Armitage Trail") (1902-1930). Scarface. New York: Edward J. Clode, Inc., 1930.

8vo. Original cloth; publisher's dust jacket; folding case (restoration to dust jacket with some areas of facsimile on rear panel).

FIRST EDITION IN THE RARE ORIGINAL DUST JACKET with $2,00 price in inner front flap, previously unseen at auction. Coons wrote Scarface while living in Oak Park, Illinois, and his work was heavily influenced by Chicago gangster Al Capone. It is said that during this time Coons spent much of his free time socializing with members of the Chicago Mob in order to gather material for Scarface. Shortly after the publication of the book, film producer and business magnate Howard Hughes approached Coons about a film adaptation; Coons sold the film rights to Hughes for $25,000 and relocated to Los Angeles, where he died less than a year later. It has been said that while working on the screenplay writer Ben Hecht was visited by two of Capone's men, who spent hours extensively questioning Hecht to ensure that the film wasn't based on Capone's life. The film adaptation was released in 1932 and immediately attracted a firestorm of controversy for its violence, resulting in heavy censorship and outright bans throughout the country, with critic J.E. Smith describing Scarface as "one of the most highly censored films in Hollywood history." The film was later remade into the Academy Award-winning 1983 motion picture starring Al Pacino and directed by Brian dePalma. Not recorded in A Catalogue of Crime or in Haycraft-Queen.