Next year’s World Science Fiction Convention will be held in Melbourne, which will make it the fourth international Worldcon in six years. (There was Glasgow in ’05, Yokohama in ’07, and Montreal earlier this year.) And international trips can be expensive, especially when they’re held on the other side of the world, because unless you’re Jay Lake, you’d like to stay for longer than 24 hours.

I decided I didn’t want to go into debt for the coming trip, nor did I want to save up for it over the next 11 months. Instead, I’ve decided to sell of some of my original artwork, as I think I’ve already mentioned here. (Or was it over on twitter? Or at facebook? They’re all blurring together, I’m afraid … )

In any case, the first piece that’s being let loose back into the world is the original Bob Stanley oil painting to the paperback book cover below. I’ve owned it for at least 35 years, but now it must roam free. Bidding is open over at the Heritage Auction Galleries site, and will continue for another three weeks.

Bob Stanley was one of the top cover paperback artists of the ’50s for mysteries and westerns, so if you’ve ever wanted to own one of his originals, here’s your chance—while helping send me to Worldcon at the same time!