Curious King Books - New publication details

They just shared preorder details & mockups for their first published title, The Blade Itself by Joe Abercrombie, on their blog: https://curiousking.co.uk/the-blade-itself-info-release/?mc_cid=10556603df&m...

Their standard and numbered editions look absolutely stunning to me, though interestingly the lettered has a design style that reminds me of recent Easton Press (or even Barnes & Noble leatherbound) titles, albeit with infinitely better craft and materials.

I haven't read Abercrombie before, but I think I'll have to get myself a standard set to read, while I try to get numbered rights for their next publication, one of my favourite modern novels "The Fifth Season."

Love abercrombie. My experience with this series is that all 3 are better read back to back to back if this is your first read through. His standalone within the first law world are great as well.
Will go with the standard on this one.

>2 trentsteel: "3 are better read back to back to back if this is your first read through"

Good to know! We'll see if I have the patience to let these sit on my shelf for a couple years to complete the trilogy - though maybe it will go faster than that, sinnce we alluded to having designs ready for all 3.

It's really a beautiful standard - it's what I wish a lot of small presses like SST or Subterranean who are already offering high quality clothe-bounds, many slipcased or with foil stamping, were able to do with their works.

>1 NathanOv: The standard and numbered are both very well priced IMO. I expected more actually given recent inflationary trends. Surprisingly, even the standard has tipped in plates. I will likely go for a numbered.

" though interestingly the lettered has a design style that reminds me of recent Easton Press (or even Barnes & Noble leatherbound) titles, albeit with infinitely better craft and materials."

Interestingly, Easton Press sprang to mind as well for me, although I think it is unfortunate that full leatherbound books with a "classic" appearance, no matter what the materials/craft, get associated with EP books. I think this comparison was made for the lettered Lyra's Dorian as well.

>4 punkzip: Agreed on pricing!

As far as the lettered design, I think it's the bright, high-contrast colors applied to a classic leatherbound design that gave me that impression. Kind've like this one, though I do find the CK design a bit more tasteful: https://www.eastonpress.com/all-categories/sci-fi-and-fantasy/the-illustrated-wo...

Another agreement on pricing especially given the page count, seems whatever Randle prints either at the Whittington or Nomad presses start off at reasonable figures. I'm not much of a fantasy reader but will definitely be keeping an eye on this and might well be a last minute impulse buy on my part.

>6 wongie: "Another agreement on pricing especially given the page count"

Their commitment to longer page counts is impressive! The Fifth Season is over 500 pages in standard print, and it looks like the next two First Law books are both ove 600.

>7 NathanOv: Indeed! I love The Broken Earth Trilogy. I've been hoping for a nice edition of this series.

>7 NathanOv: "Their commitment to longer page counts is impressive! The Fifth Season is over 500 pages in standard print, and it looks like the next two First Law books are both ove 600."

Word count is more helpful. The Blade itself is about 191K, which is very high for a letterpress book. The Fifth Season is about 134K.

A 191K word count copyrighted letterpress book with tipped in illustrations for 200 GBP is pretty striking in today's market and frankly makes some other publishers look expensive in comparison. It's very encouraging as I hope other publishers will attempt longer letterpress works - Lyra's Stardust and Dorian for example are relatively short works in the 60-80K range. It's also notably well priced compared to what genre non-letterpress small press publishers would charge. For example, the standard is not much more than a SubPress book, which is not only not letterpress, but may contain few if any illustrations and certainly not tipped in, without a slipcase as well (although the selling point of the SubPress book would be the author's signature).

I do think it is possible though that this release has been underpriced, which is not uncommon for first time publishers (Curious King has just done a rebind before) and the prices may increase in the future, regardless of where inflation goes.

I agree with everything here so far. Great price, standard and numbered are priced well, and the lettered is almost garish.

And agree as well it does make Subterranean Press look like poor value. Their prices have been creeping up to $200 these days, and sometimes no illustrations. The lettered 10K Doors of January was a simple quarter bound leather, slipcase, and a single illustration from Vess, with chapter headings, offset, and cost $750.

Subterranean Press is generally very sparse when you think of illustrations, creative bindings / covers etc. What you do get is a good-quality book with regard to the paper, a sewn binding, and often a signature. Other publishers in the genre put much more emphasis on illustrations, which I really appreciate.

As to this one by Curious King: Did I understand it correctly that they all have the same illustrations, with the lettered edition having one as a fold-out that the others have as endpapers, and the standard edition having an exclusive illustration as its dustjacket? Or does the numbered edition have an extra illustration over the standard edition? The description is a bit strange, but I thought it was basically the same for standard and numbered except for the dustjacket.

>11 SF-72: "Did I understand it correctly that they all have the same illustrations, with the lettered edition having one as a fold-out that the others have as endpapers, and the standard edition having an exclusive illustration as its dustjacket?" This is correct. The standard and numbered also use the same paper, which is why the standard edition is a VERY good value. Of course, the numbered is full leather, has the author's signature, and the 150 limitation is smaller than most other numbered releases.

I have no interest in the lettered state but would be curious to see how many if any go to lottery. Given that it makes no sense just to buy the first volume, if the other 2 books are comparably priced, that's a total commitment in the 6900 GBP range. Similarly, in the very unlikely event that someone does not exercise rights to future volumes in the series, an individual lettered volume in isolation will be a very hard sell.

I take it with SubPress that you are largely paying for the author's signature, as you'd have to pay quite a bit more for an author's signature with most other publishers. They also do a lot more series than other publishers, as well as more contemporary SF and fantasy books, like recent Hugo/Nebula winners and nominees. If you are just looking at physical qualities of the books in isolation, they are not good values.

>11 SF-72: I had to read the descriptions a couple of times myself to make sure I understood, but I believe the answer to your questions is "yes, they are the same." He mentions in one that there are 7 total color plates, INCLUDING a frontispiece, and then in a description for the other state, he mentions that there are 6 PLUS a frontispiece, resulting in the same count.

>13 whytewolf1: Oddly, the standard is the only one with exclusive illustrations, since the dust jacket art is not contained in any of the others as far as I can tell.

I would’ve expected that to get the gold out treatment as well!

>14 NathanOv: I think he's following the Suntup model there, with the dustjacket illustration exclusive to the lower-cost edition. It will absolutely result in some people buying a numbered (or a lettered) and a standard edition, as well. One thing thing that's nice (assuming this is true, as I've not seen any verification) is that someone said that the publisher was supposed to be including a gallery with all of the artwork in the final installment of the trilogy. But again, that's unverified.

>15 whytewolf1: I definitely get it as a marketing strategy, but as a reader / collector prefer when the cover art is tipped into non-jacketed editions either as a frontispiece or backmatter.

>16 NathanOv: Oh, for sure. Same here.

>12 punkzip: According to a FB post the Standard edition will now also have the author's signature. The price remains the same. I would say that's incredibly good value now and I think it's now enough to push me over the edge to pick up a copy.

>18 Levin40: The standard edition is probably the best value in recent memory. For about $50-60 USD more than a recent SubPress release one gets letterpress, tipped in illustrations, and a slipcase. The Suntup AF was letterpress for $195 but this is a much longer author-signed book, and the illustrations are tipped-in. In fact, the numbered edition now only has the full leather binding (and smaller limitation and full rights) to distinguish it from the standard.

I was originally planning on the numbered but may decide to go for the standard instead. Will have about 6 hours to make up my mind...

>19 punkzip:

It also has sprayed edges and a reading ribbon, both of which I find quite nice to have. I'd honestly be tempted by the numbered edition, I also like the colours, but I prefer cloth to leather. And the fact that you lose out on the image from the dustjacket from the standard edition is another factor, at least for me.

>20 SF-72: "It also has sprayed edges and a reading ribbon, both of which I find quite nice to have" As best I can tell from the description, the standard has a reading ribbon as well. The numbered just has a different ribbon (and tailbands), as well as the sprayed foreedge. As for the dustjacket, it would be nice if they made it available for sale separately, like Suntup does.

>21 punkzip:

You're right. I read "The tailbands and ribbon are also unique to this state" to mean that the other edition doesn't have these, when they're probably just different.

Does anyone know if it's allowed to buy both a standard and a numbered edition? I know that each has a limit of one per household, which I appreciate and see it as a way of selling as many as possible to people who actually want the books for themselves and not for re-sale. But Suntup allow this combination, and since so much of this is closely following the Suntup model it would be interesting to know if they also do in this or if it's one of all states per household.

>22 SF-72: "Does anyone know if it's allowed to buy both a standard and a numbered edition? I know that each has a limit of one per household," Where does it say that there is a limit of one per household? I didn't notice that in the blog post, but perhaps it was stated elsewhere? Typically this wouldn't prevent one from buying different states, in particular, I would imagine that someone buying a lettered state might want a standard state to read.

>23 punkzip:

It's on their Facebook page, where they describe each edition and also provide this information. Any purchases above the allowed limit will be cancelled an refunded.

>24 SF-72: Why not just email Curious King and ask? As a practical matter, if someone really wanted to order multiple copies they could do so by asking relatives or close friends at different addresses to order copies.

They don't seem to answer to emails, at least they haven't to a friend and me when we asked (different) questions.

And of course there are ways around it, if you have people who can make such orders for you. My friend and I don't, part of it being the language barrier.

>26 SF-72: If you're a facebook user, that's where Anthony seems to be most responsive. I am 90% sure it is one of each state per-person, as that tends to be the standard across any presses with such rules. I've seen plenty of people planning on trying for both, and you'd imagine most lettered rights holders will likely be getting a lower state as well.

>27 NathanOv:

Thank you, that's good to know.

I don't have a Facebook account (and don't want one), so I can't ask questions there, only read what others have written.

His recent Facebook post says you can buy a standard and a numbered, but not multiples of either.

>29 CTPress-Tony:

Thank you, that's good to know.

>30 SF-72: You're welcome! It’s good to have it sorted before they become available so everyone knows the rules going in.

For anyone interested, looks like store page is up just can't add to cart yet

>32 NathanOv: I can't see it yet. Can you share the direct link?

>33 c_schelle: Sure, here you go:
https://curiousking.co.uk/shop/the-blade-itself-numbered-edition/
https://curiousking.co.uk/shop/the-blade-itself-lettered-edition/
https://curiousking.co.uk/shop/the-blade-itself-standard-edition/

>34 NathanOv: Thanks!

Website is down. :(

Another genre crasher +)

can't add anything to cart

In a turn of events that surprises no one, their website is buckling under the strain.

I can't get anything in my cart even with these links.

Looks like this is going to be an prolonged F5 battle.

>41 wongie:...hunched over our laptops, tablets, and phones furiously punching F5 as quickly as possible on multiple screens on the myriad devices. Did I say punching?

Anthony on Facebook:
"I may have to reschedule pre-order if this isn't resolved.
Everyone will still have the same chance, no copies were sold.
Thanks"

Has anyone here managed to buy something? I only get bad gateways whenever I try to put a book in my cart.

>43 Aleks3000: I kind've figured this would be the case, could be a little messy to get running again.

>43 Aleks3000:

Thanks, that answers my question.

Oh no, server issues! Who could have foreseen this?

It's being rescheduled, according to CK FB post.

It doesn't look like it's still going to work out today. Frustrating all around, I'm sure for him as much as us.

Postponed. Time to give F5 a well-earned rest.

Well that was a disaster. As far as I know no one managed to order a copy. It looks like options for the rescheduled sale would be:

1) A lottery.

2) CK could temporarily purchase more server bandwidth somehow?

BTW, does anyone know if this is the first sale that has been postponed due to server crashing and no one getting a single copy?

>51 punkzip: A third option is staggered release.

50 numbereds at 1pm / 50 at 3pm / 50 at 8pm etc.

>53 NathanOv: Yes that is what PS publishing does.

Apparently though the server company said the website could handle 100,000 users at a time. So I suspect that something was not right on their end, and it will probably be another open sale - FWIW, other sales (not books but say coveted tickets) draw far more potential customers and can handle the volume.

>51 punkzip:

They bought extra bandwidth and there was supposed to be enough for 100,000 people according to the company they used, but that doesn't seem to have been the honest truth according to the Facebook post.

>53 NathanOv:

I don't see how that would help unless only a limited number of people get the link then? I think Centipede Press did Dune like this, but then they had a waiting list and sent emails out in the order of that list.

>56 SF-72: Yeah, I was scratching my head over that too. What's to stop everyone still crashing it at 1pm? What they could do is numbered and standard at different times, might help a little by separating the audience.

I'm surprised more publishers don't go with a lottery on titles this anticipated, especially when there's no (perceived or actual) need to give some parties an early shot. There's virtually no downside and a lot of upside. Sure, some folks will miss out - but some folks are going to miss out on a battle royale anyhow, and at least this way no one has to camp out at their computer and furiously mash F5.

>57 Levin40: It distributes the amount of people trying to order at a time. Sure, some people will try multiple time slots but it's a system that other presses use and that works.

>58 donaldmcobb: I guess the issue is that unless you're 100% convinced of the demand you might end up with egg on your face.

>58 donaldmcobb:
>60 Levin40:
Or, take preorders and build the initial number of publications to the paid sales.

>58 donaldmcobb:

I'm really no fan of lotteries. I hope they'll get the website stable enough to manage this level of interest so that people can buy on their own.

>60 Levin40: I definitely get that, but it's why I specified "titles this anticipated." There's no way The Blade Itself isn't going to sell out in minutes.

>51 punkzip:

It's safe to say that a larger limitation could be sold in this case. I guess they played it safe, a bit too much in this case.

Alright, there's been an email informing us that the pre-order will be moved to another time. I hope it will work better next time. This has been stressful, but certainly more so for Anthony than us. So best of luck!

>62 SF-72: Having been involved in enough FFA-style preorders to last a lifetime, there's essentially no difference between this setup (even with adequate bandwidth) and a lottery. In both cases it comes down to the luck of the draw because, more likely than not, more people will be trying to purchase the book when the preorder goes live than there are available copies.

>66 donaldmcobb:

I guess in this case it feels more like it's in my own hands than with a lottery, not pure luck, at least if the website is working and well designed. What makes this more tricky are be websites that don't reserve your cart for you for at least a few minutes. In that case someone with a faster system can definitely buy the book straight from your cart, it's happened to me twice. But I guess we can only wait and see anyway.

>67 SF-72: My experience is that most sites work that way. Cart sniping is real and hugely frustrating and I'm not personally aware of any sites that have a measure to prevent it (mostly because it can open the door for abuse by bots).

I would prefer a lottery, this was a frustrating 40 minutes I wasted, and I would rather not repeat it

>67 SF-72:: IMHO, that feeling of control is completely illusory if there's high demand. I favor a lottery which is less stressful, but it seems that could be abused with people creating multiple email accounts or getting friends to join in. Actually, I just changed my mind; the current system does make both those possibilities more difficult.

They just need to pay Shopify (or some other e-commerce platform) to handle demand spikes, and then all will be well with the world. Bandwidth is almost certainly not the bottleneck resource in this case.

>68 donaldmcobb:

I sometimes buy from an art website that reserves the item in the cart for a few minutes, enough time to check out but not more, then allows the next person in line access if there's no purchase within that time frame. Very fair, I must say. I also know systems like that from ticket-selling websites, where there can also be very high demand. So it's definitely an option, and a nice one, though it looks like book sellers don't usually provide this, at least Suntup and Subterranean Press don't.

>70 vicwong: "I favor a lottery which is less stressful, but it seems that could be abused with people creating multiple email accounts or getting friends to join in"

As I recall as large percentage of entries in the recent Lyra's lettered Dorian Gray lottery were duplicate entries. And those were just the ones that were caught.

>73 punkzip: Amaranthine’s system of requiring you to register an account seems like a good safeguard, but then that’s asking people for more of their time without any guarantee of getting a book.

>34 NathanOv: I'm curious how you even got to those links in the first place (not that you could actually have added anything to your cart using them). I was using the single link in the email and nothing ever loaded. On the webpage, nothing ever showed up in the shop.

>75 punkzip: They came up in Google search results

>53 NathanOv: Wouldn’t that actually make it even worse?

>77 What_What: It would have been worse if some people would have been able to order using those links, which was not the case. If some people were able to order using those links, that would have been an uneven playing field as few people would think to use a Google search as opposed to going to the website or using the email link. Not sure what CK would have done with those orders in that case, as there would likely have been many (reasonable) complaints from those who could not order using the CK provided methods.

Interestingly, Google search still comes up with this page, although it cannot be accessed from the CK website. https://curiousking.co.uk/product-category/the-blade-itself/

Another open sale this Sunday. A numbered edition will be given away, I assume by lottery.

>78 punkzip: My question was how would possibly thousands of people competing for 50 books three times be more efficient than thousands comparing for 150 books.

Other companies like Cemetery Dance that do this tend to have hundreds available at a time, as their limitation is 1,000 copies IIRC.

>79 punkzip: I guess one lucky person who ordered will get a delightful email letting them know about their refund?

>80 What_What: I explained previously, but the idea is to distribute traffic ... Other businesses use this method, and it works.

Here is an idea from left field for publishers that expect similar acute demand spikes: use Kickstarter.

The platform takes a 5% cut, but is also highly competent at serving high demand. The fee could easily be worked into pricing and might even be competitive with costs otherwise paid to specialty consultants, e-commerce maintenance, and loss of good will due to service issues (if one could accurately quantify all of those costs). Also comes with essentially free marketing.

Just something to consider for future decision-makers in this space.

>82 abysswalker:

It also makes it possible to decide the actual number of books after the Kickstarter has ended and you can see how much interest there is. Though this works better for something that isn't based so much on the limitation concept, of course. But we've recently seen how well this can work with the Brandon Sanderson Kickstarters, or Michael J. Sullivan on a less extreme scale.

>82 abysswalker: I think this is an interesting idea. I was disappointed, but not surprised, at what happened yesterday, and agree with “leaving it up to the professionals” rather than having a publisher try to deal with website and hosting issues. Can even work when there’s a finite number of books available.

>85 What_What: Publishers don't even need to rely on a site like Kickstarter - they could setup a Shopify store for $30 / month, and pay far less in fees without having to worry about any hosting issues.

>82 abysswalker:
>85 What_What:
>86 NathanOv:
Kickstarter has been proven to work well for across genres this sort of sale. I'm a fan of the method. The Kickstarter cost can be passed along to the customer in a variety of creative ways that don't create ill will.

Or, take preorders on your own site and build out the numbers after the preorder period. There are publishers who do it that way. Lividian, I think? It may be someone else but it seems to work well for them.

>83 SF-72: This runs smack into contractual limitations. Sanderson and Sullivan can sell as many copies as they want via KS because they themselves are the publisher. I'm sure Curious King Books (and SubPress, and Centipede, and Suntup...) would absolutely love to sell as many copies of popular titles as they possibly could, but there's just no way a contract amenable to both sides could be hammered out.

There are exceptions, of course - Lividian occasionally does open preorders, but those also tend to be for AGEs or unnumbered runs.

>88 donaldmcobb: Hasn't Thornwillow done it on Kickstarter?

>89 SDB2012: So has No Reply Press

>88 donaldmcobb:

You're quite right about the contracts you mentioned, of course. But I'm not so sure that some of the publishers you mentioned would love to sell as many copies as possible. Apart from it requiring logistics some of them don't seem to have, part of their business is also that there's a relatively low limitation and once it's gone it's gone (often within minutes or hours) and you can only get that edition at very high prices second hand. (That doesn't go for all titles, of course, but there's certainly a tendency, especially more recently.) So I think to some degree, the exclusiveness is part of the business for them.

>89 SDB2012:
>90 kvnchn:

To my knowledge, yes. And at least one case I'm aware of was a book that was still in copyright.

...

Kickstarter is a great tool for fine press publishing, period. I started my career as a crowdfunding consultant, and introduced Thornwillow to Kickstarter, which lead to my employment there and subsequent work with No Repy. (In the first seconds of Thornwillow's first KS project video, I'm the fella off camera feeding lines to Luke.) So actually for me, Kickstarter came first, fine press came second. The ethos of Kickstarter embodies exactly what fine press thrives on – open ended timelines, funding from idea, community interaction, and most of all a pushback from complete consumerism. The Kickstarter execs are incredibly wonderful people, and are hugely supportive of fine press work. It's a great tool, but can be difficult to use without expertise, so many fine press publishers shy away from it. Hiring a professional to run a campaign is worth every penny, and even doing one on a shoestring budget and with no prior experience is worthwhile.

It's worth noting that Kickstarter is two things in one. It can serve as a pop-up online shop – a way to collect orders essentially. It can also serve as a marketing engine. The first is easy, the second requires expertise or luck. For example, if you've ever wondered why Thornwillow or No Reply's "project goals" are so low on KS ($10,000 for Ulysses?) it's because it isn't a real goal. Projects which have exceeded their goals by a lot (800% funded!) are more searchable and get recommended to potential backers more. As a pop-up online store, Kickstarter is about as effective as any old website. As a potential marketing tool, Kickstarter is an enormous bargain at 5%. The average No Reply Kickstarter campaign gets about 50% of its funding from Kickstarter itself – random people browsing the website, Kickstarter's newsletter, Kickstarter recommendations, etc. The vast majority of No Reply and (I'd bet) Thornwillow's collectors have come to the presses via Kickstarter.

On the point about limitations and Kickstarter, Kickstarter is great when you have only a limited number of an edition you can sell. Limitations are built into the platform. The downside (actually) is that a lot of presses take advantage of a "gold rush / FOMO" mentality, which Kickstarter can hinder. If demand isn't as high as supply, there's no hiding it, and the urgency falls apart. Kickstarter pledges can also be canceled before the end of the project, giving collectors the chance to think on it. In other words, you can't as easily push collectors into impulse buying based on concealed supply. I wonder, actually, if this is why many popular publishers don't turn to Kickstarter? (And for the record here: This isn't an accusation or shade thrown at any particular presses. This is a standard business practice. If you read No Reply's latest email, you're told directly that it may be the last chance to order "Amontillado," without being told exactly how many are left...)

>93 grifgon: Thanks for the detailed write-up. Kickstarter seems like a great tool to support the achievement of a long-term vision of quality publishing that focuses on a broad range of title and genre.

>93 grifgon:

That's very interesting, thank you.

In terms of letterpress specifically, which publishers have used KS? I can think of No Reply, Thornwillow, and Angel Bomb offhand.

>97 SDB2012: Which states of The Divine Comedy were letterpress? I must have missed those.

>98 NathanOv: >97 SDB2012: I do not believe any of them were actually printed letterpress, though the original Thornwillow production of Inferno by the same artist, of course, was.

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/newdivinecomedy/la-divina-commedia-the-new-...

The Facsimile Finder Divine Comedy - which I ordered and have - is definitely not letterpress. I was asking specifically about letterpress as there are many examples of offset books from small presses/publishers on KS.

>97 SDB2012:
>98 NathanOv:
>99 whytewolf1:
>100 punkzip:
Ahh, my bad. For some reason I thought it was. Must have been confused with the Thornwillow. Going to delete that comment so I don't cause confusion.

I'm recovering from a hernia repair so I blame the meds +).

>101 SDB2012: Easy enough mistake to make, considering the prior Thornwillow publication. In fact, I think a lot of folks expected that the complete set would be letterpress, even though the creator opted against it.

Managed to order both a standard and numbered (I was initially planning on a numbered only but the standard was such a good deal it was hard to pass up). Initially I could not check out as it did not recognize my US address. After a minute or two it gave me an option for express shipping at 100 GBP! Expensive shipping...

Huh, I got to paypal order and it didn't list any shipping charges. Wonder if they would charge after PayPal processing? I ended up passing not proceeding to order, the number of preorders from other publishers I have outstanding I couldn't justify anymore. So that would have been about 850ish for numbered.
Looks like it's going to be good from mockups, but I managed to refrain from the temptation.

>103 punkzip: Yeah... I'm a bit bummed. It didn't recognize my US address. Seems like that happened for all in US. After the shipping popped up for me, it was sold out. Shipping was $70 and I think that was US dollars. And, I'd had it in my cart within seconds of it going live. Ahh well, such is life.

>104 trentsteel: Yeah. I hit Paypal as I couldn't enter a credit card due to it not recognizing my address. The shipping charges came up after Paypal was connected.

>105 SDB2012: That's too bad! I managed to get it at 1:04 after they fixed the US shipping issue. Thrilled to have got both numbered and standard, though I'll probably be parting with one or the other after The Fifth Season goes on order since that's my most anticipated letterpress publication in a long time.

>105 SDB2012: So it looks like there was a shipping bug. I could not check out initially when I added a numbered to my cart as it did not recognize my address. I figured, I might as well use the time to try to get the standard which I was also trying to get so I added that to my cart - once I did that it showed combined shipping of 100 GBP.

Looking at the FB page, this seems to have happened to more people than just me. It's sad that people could not get a numbered due to this bug.

I had the numbered in my cart after one minute, but didn't recognize my address in Norway, so couldn't get it :( Got a standard after they fixed the issue...

>107 NathanOv: Looks like the numbered sold out a minute or two after 1:04 so you got in just in time :). 5-6 minutes for the numbered to sell out, but I suspect this may have gone faster if not for the shipping bug.

>110 punkzip: Yes. I was the first person asking about the shipping problem on Facebook. I'm sure they'll be popping up on secondary soon.

>107 NathanOv: I love The Fifth Season. As many accolades as it has received, it's still underappreciated as a fantasy masterpiece. I wonder if the rights stay with the book the way the do with Suntup Editions.

>112 SDB2012: Rights for the numbered Blade Itself will carry over to The Fifth season, but NOT the standard rights. However, there may be additional numbered Fifth Season outside the rights system. Not sure how this would work as it will be risky to try to get numbered copies for each book separately although I imagine that if you missed the first book you are not likely to go for later book in the series.

> 113 What I meant was if I buy a numbered The Blade Itself on ebay, will I have the numbered rights going forward? If you do that with Suntup, you get the rights. Although, it doesn't matter much now since numbered Suntups are almost always available after the preorder period.

>114 SDB2012: yes, rights always stay with the books! I believe there are no exceptions to this as there are with Suntup.

The numbered Blade Itself carries two sets of rights: to the next Abercrombie book, and to the next publication from the press which would be The Fifth Season.

The standard only carries rights to the next Abercrombie title.

I first bought the standard, no problem, but when I tried to buy a numbered edition, it didn't recognise my German address. When I went back, it was sold out. I originally thought I got the error because of that, but it seems that wasn't it. It's not the end of the world, but interesting to know that this wasn't just me but a bug in the programming.

7 hours later copies of the 500 limitation standard are still available. IMO this was probably the best fine press value in recent memory - a high word count letterpress book (much longer than recent letterpress books by other presses), tipped in illustrations, slipcased, dust jacket, first book of a well-known series with rights to the rest of the series, and a copyrighted book signed by the author - for 200 GBP (roughly $250) I can't think of anything else that can beat that for value.

If this were a SubPress release with the same limitation it would likely have been gone in the first hour, if not within 5-10 minutes, and that would have been a far worse value. The recent (IMO mediocre) 750 limitation Suntup Omen sold out within hours.

>117 punkzip: The ordering was frustrating - they literally had one job over the past week, and still managed to screw it up.

And what’s up with shipping? £70 to North America.

>118 What_What:" The ordering was frustrating - they literally had one job over the past week, and still managed to screw it up."

As I understand it there was and is no issue with ordering the standard, it was the numbered that was bugged, so that doesn't explain it.

It's interesting that other non-NA publishers such as Lyra's, Amaranthine and Books Illustrated have offered "free" shipping to NA. Perhaps this actually makes UK customers (in Lyra's and Books Illustrated's case) essentially subsidize NA customers (which may make sense given that NA is a larger market).

I do think there is a psychological barrier when the shipping cost is a substantial portion of the retail cost. I passed on the standard Hand and Eye WITW for that reason (shipping for that would have been about 1/3 of retail which is about what it is for the standard Blade Itself).

Sold out! Picked up a standard and agree with >117 punkzip: that it's excellent value, particularly now that it's signed by the author. Looking forward to it, though I think at this point it'll be sometime next year. Ludlow's seems to have quite a backlog these days - Rich Tong has (at least) Dorian, Words of Fire, Coraline and A Christmas Carol also lined up, and I'm not sure where this'll fit into the big picture. I imagine the printing at Nomad will take some time too. Wonder how long it'll take to complete the series, and I wonder if they'll start on Broken Earth before completing The First Law...

>118 What_What: The main problem seems to have been that many countries were not selectable, either initially or at all. For example, from comments on FB it seems that shipping to Australia wasn't possible. Was this an error or intentional? Very frustrating from Australian customers who woke up in the middle of the night twice! I actually looked at the drop down list of countries and there were only about 20 available: UK, USA, CAN and western European nations. If this was intentional I really think they should have announced these restrictions in advance.

As for shipping it was £28 even within the UK, which is pricey (though forgivable given the aforementioned good value of the book).

>119 punkzip:
>120 Levin40:
Shipping didn't work to the UK either for the Numbered - which is the reason I have missed out. You would think that a publisher in the UK would have at least the domestic shipping sorted properly. Based on facebook comments, all (or most) copies must have gone to USA and Canada while other countries were effectively blocked, irrespectively of whether they were on the list or not.

>121 Raenas: That's odd, as I ordered a Standard to the UK immediately and without issue. I also saw customers in the US complaining they couldn't order initially. So I guess it was just which they fixed first.

>122 Levin40: Yes they apparently fixed the US first. Note the Standard didn't have issues - I am talking strictly about the Numbered. I appreciate all the effort the publisher puts into the book, but this was a very poor management of sales - fixing one country first inevitably gives an unfair advantage. The sale should have been cancelled and rescheduled again once shipping is fixed for everyone. Now the only thing I can do from the UK is to buy it from a scalper, but not sure it's worth £1500-ish for me, which is the price it will likely go for given the rights following the book.

>123 Raenas: Agreed. I just find it odd that the shipping configuration was different for Numbered and Standard. I can't think of any reason why they'd have done that and would have expected the shipping process to have been separate from the exact product selected (given that they're both books of more or less the same weight etc).

Anyway, I guess it's the first and last time he'll have this problem, as rights will drive most sales moving forwards.

>123 Raenas: "The sale should have been cancelled and rescheduled again once shipping is fixed for everyone"

I don't disagree as a customer but from the publisher's perspective this likely wasn't an option given that the first sale failed completely. Doing it for a third time would likely been a major reputational disaster for a new publisher.

BTW, does anyone know how the free numbered edition (as compensation for the failed first sale) will be allotted? Perhaps it could be given out in a lottery limited to those who did not get a numbered?

>125 punkzip: In my opinion this second time was just short of a disaster as well, and within the first minute when it was apparent the site was failing customers randomly, it should’ve been stopped altogether. It’s hard to see how this sale could be considered a job well done.

>126 What_What: As I understand it, the glitch - not being able to order a numbered initially without also ordering a standard - also affected Lyra's first sale of Stardust. That sale was not cancelled and rescheduled. I do see the argument for doing so, but CK was definitely between a rock and a hard place given the complete failure of the first sale, and frankly I think that having a third try at a sale would probably be worse for CK's reputation.

>127 punkzip: The Lyra's issue was different. I think it was just a website being overloaded. I participated in both offerings and Lyra's website was extremely slow and didn't show the numbered option to buy. The CK website was very fast and responsive. When it was time to checkout, I kept getting a message that shipping wasn't available to my address.

But in the end, I was able to get a numbered Stardust so I can't complain. I did order a standard The Blade Itself after the shipping was fixed. Hopefully, someone will sell me a numbered down the road. I'm a bit of a fantasy geek and CK is making fantastic selections so far.

For anyone who missed out, Joe Abercrombie tweeted that remaining copies are going out next Monday at 8:30 pm BST.

No word yet on the lettered lottery or numbered giveaway that I’ve seen.

- Anthony sent out an email a bit ago explaining/apologizing/communicating next steps and the changes he plans. Seems like a great guy that cares a lot.

>129 NathanOv: Just got an email from CK about this. Interestingly, they are still not sure what went wrong. The remaining copies are just from duplicate orders which have been cancelled. The email seems to imply that if one ordered duplicate copies both orders will be cancelled but I hope this is not the case as I can see how this could happen in error due to the website issues. I can't imagine there are too many numbered books left so it will likely be extremely competitive. I hope everyone who missed out here gets a copy in the upcoming sale.

>131 punkzip: This is just anecdotal since I haven't seen anyone else report the issue, but I was initially charged in 4 seperate transactions for 3 standards and 2 numbered despite only completing the checkout process once with one of each in my cart, and recieving one confirmation for one of each.

If Shopify was duplicating a lot of transactions, there could be a decent amount available.

Third time's a Charm…🤞

>132 NathanOv: I doubt there will be too many duplicates. I can only hope. There were two in my cart when I checked out but it took all of two seconds to remove the second copy. The website was truly responsive except for that whole "can't deliver to that address" error.

>134 SDB2012: Maybe, I'm just saying that there's so far at least three different categories of duplicate orders, with some people intentionally ordering multiple, others like you getting the "extra in cart" error which I did see several mentions of, and then potentionally more like me who's orders misprocessed despite only having 1 of each in the cart, though I don't know if mine was actually counted multiple times in their system or how widespread that error was.

>135 NathanOv: Interesting. It's a weird issue. Hopefully, there are more than a handful left and we'll have at least 15-20 seconds to make a purchase. +)

Good luck to all still looking for this on Monday and, of course, in the lottery.

Got the email for The Blade Itself, and clicked on it ASAP! Problem is... it sold out in a couple of seconds. LOL

>137 Undergroundman: yeah. I was waiting on the page. I didn't realize there would be standards for sale so clicked on the wrong one. I added the numbered and removed the standard. After I hit the pay button, the out of stock message came up. Less than thirty seconds total time. Probably less than 20. Such is life. Now, the question is- do I look to the secondary market for rights or enjoy my standard set and buy The Broken Earth Trilogy on the secondary market.

I'm just glad that I got a standard edition, and was more interested in that one than in the numbered edition. Otherwise this would have been extremely frustrating. I already had a numbered edition in my cart but it wouldn't accept my address and it was sold from out of my cart during the second sale.

>139 SF-72: yeah same with me and a lot of us. I'm glad there's a market for letterpress fantasy. The Broken Earth has been on my wish list for years though.

It looks like there were 7 numbered so less than 30 seconds would be expected. I think that it was previously stated that standards would also be going up for sale. Having said that I think that the standards originally took close to 9 hours to sell out so that was previously open to everyone.

There's always the raffle! +)

>142 SDB2012: Where is the raffle?

>143 punkzip: CK is holding a raffle for a numbered for all of us who missed out due to technical issues. The odds of winning appear to be mighty slim.

Looks like these books are going for quite the premium on the secondary market, based on a post today on Facebook.

Seems like there was some confusion with an earlier post, but it disappeared before I could see what was happening.

>145 What_What: I think that there were complaints that the price was too high, the complainers were kicked out of the Facebook group, the initial post deleted and then reposted wiping out the earlier comments.

>146 DMulvee: Well that was me, but the complaint was not about the price - rather the seller's practices which there's a long history with.

No need to bring that over here though.

>147 NathanOv: Ouch, you’ve gone all irrational on FB before with that seller. No wonder you got banned, and if it was anything like your previous blow-ups, I’d say well deserved!

And it’s also nothing as simple as Mulvee here makes it sound I’m sure, as it wasn’t the last time all your posts got deleted.

>148 What_What: I really don’t think your reply is appropriate or accurately reflects the situation. In the case you’re referring to, the seller’s post was removed not my specific comments, and the publisher himself had had to step in to correct the seller on what’s allowed in the rights system.

I hope you’ll delete your comment and will delete this one if so since that conversation does not need to carry over here.

I swear some people will go to the ends of the earth to defend total stranger’s rights to capitalism, even when what they’re doing is expressly forbidden by the publisher.

>148 What_What: I didn’t see the comments. There were 34 comments on the post but only 10 were visible (not Nathan’s) and so I was trying to deduce what had happened based on the remaining comments

Just got an email from CK where yet another series has been announced.

"This Sci-Fi series is a big one (more than 3 books) and is just incredibly well written, with such a cool concept.

I have a feeling not everyone will have read this series, but I know how well it is regarded and the author has a huge following (but maybe not in sci-fi…). "

Not sure what this is but it looks like CK has clearly established itself as the fine press genre series publisher. Glad to see this is happening as it is different from the trend of recent children's/YA books - no one else is doing it.

I'm going to have to set an alarm for The Fifth Season and cross my fingers I can get in

When do preorders open for The Fifth Season?

>153 RRCBS: From the email it sounds like the 13th or 14th of January

>152 gmacaree:

Join the club. That's gonna be a sought after series for sure. Good luck, gentleman. Well... maybe not too much luck. LOL

>155 Undergroundman: I don't have high hopes!

>151 punkzip: Trying to guess the series now. Maybe Donaldson's Gap cycle?

>157 ambyrglow: I think you may be right. I've read the Gap cycle, and I'm not that excited about it. But it does fit - 5 books, and Donaldson is not famous for SF but fantasy, specifically the Covenant series. I didn't think it was particularly well written though but that may be Anthony's opinion.

It's a very surprising choice for a fine press series, as it is fairly old and wasn't that successful as I recall. A 5 book series is a lot for letterpress and collecting the entire series will be expensive.

The Donaldson series I like the best is one that is a bit polarizing - Mordant's Need.

Would be nice if the newsletter wasn't so whiny, but had a more positive note. And we're all adults, but swear words? Really?

>159 What_What: Yeah, that was kind of weird. Don't recall the other British publishers having such naughty mouths in their newsletters.

Firstly, I wish Curious King would just release a book instead of continually talking about what's on the horizon. I mean, he's already talking about a new 3+ book series but still has 3x3-4 book series in the pipeline, from which not a single book has yet been released (not even artwork completed). Secondly, I don't think it's a good idea to do a pre-order before at least the art is complete. I can't think of any other publishers who do this. Even Suntup, who are known for their long waits after pre-orders, at least have the art and prototypes complete at pre-order time. It's probably not a good idea to rush artists and, reading between the lines, it seems that that's what's happening now.

The good news is I have received all four books limitation pages signed by Dan Simmons, which is fantastic. Does that mean there will be a signed standard edition of Hyperion? Hope so.

>161 Levin40: Yes, not a good idea to throw your artists under the bus so publicly.

And agreed, I know publishers always have a lot of irons in the pot, but paradoxically it does somehow come across as unfocused and not serious to be talking about 3-4 other series of books (not just one-off books!) without even having artwork done for the very first one.

>161 Levin40: Yes. As interested as I am in the Broken Earth books, it’s hard to imagine being ready to put down money in a few weeks with no prior examples of the press’s work or a very clear prospectus.

>159 What_What: The newsletter has a very casual, non-professional, or unprofessional, tone, depending on how you see it.

The broader question is whether CK (or any other fine/small press publisher) is just another member of a community of enthusiasts and hobbyists, or a more corporate endeavor.

If fine/small press publishers are just members of a hobbyist/enthusiast community, I see no issue with a very casual communication, including use of the "f" word.

On the other hand, you'd never see a communication like CK's email from any "corporate" publisher.

Interestingly, there are certain members here who seem to take umbrage at any criticism, even implied, of fine/small press publishers here (such as criticism of book choices, business practices, etc). Yet of course, no one has any issue with extremely harsh criticism of any corporation. Perhaps the idea is that you shouldn't criticize other members of the community, while corporations are just faceless.

So there seem to be two different views of what role these fine/small presses actually are.

I have no issues with a publisher swearing in a newsletter, but publicly throwing a collaborator — even a hired one — under the bus is ... unedifying, at best. If you're running a business, I think you ought to take responsibility for delays/problems externally, and handle what you need to handle in private.

>165 gmacaree: Yes, but what explanation should have been given for the delay then? Should the communication have said that the book was delayed, but they can't say why?

>166 punkzip: Tact is important. To me, it read at best as rudely blunt, and at worst like this brand new publisher is already having some behind-the-scenes conflict with the established industry professionals they're working with.

Just my two cents though - I'm only in for The Broken Earth trilogy, and all the extended series piling up are giving me some pause on that now too.

>166 punkzip: As I mentioned above, I think he must still take ultimate responsibility for holding the pre-order before the art was ready. That's not the artist's fault.

Now I’m curious to see this letter!

>169 RRCBS: https://www.curiousking.co.uk/christmas-2022-update/ I think is what they are referencing.

>166 punkzip: Should the communication have said that the book was delayed, but they can't say why?

Unfortunately, the book will be delayed by XXX months due to some tasks taking longer than initially expected. I share your frustration and have worked hard for the past few days/whatever to resolve these issues as soon as possible, and am confident that we can publish the book in March/whatever.

A good manager doesn't throw his people under the bus. If I were the artist, I'd never work with him again tbh.

A far cry from the erudition one once expected from fine press publishers.

>166 punkzip: I would have said something like "I was overly ambitious with the schedule and the book isn't where we hoped it would be, but we're working hard to catch up, and making sure we don't make these same mistakes in the future. Thank you for your continued patience."

Just got the email for The Fifth Season. Holy crap! Must buy. They absolutely put the Subpress editions to shame.

I am surprised at how nice the standard and numbered look. It is good to see the lettered having nicer paper, though the design of the lettered isn't to my taste.

>174 Undergroundman: The least expensive edition also costs more than 3x what the SubPress edition did, so I'd be shocked if it wasn't significantly better.

The Standard edition looks great, possibly my favorite of the lineup. I’m not particularly fond of the art though, reminds me of a video game rendering.

>176 donaldmcobb: Disagree. The least expensive edition is currently ~$255 USD based upon today's exchange rate. The current Subpress books are $185-195 (to be fair, one should compare to current inflationary prices). So for about $60-70 more you get letterpress (most importantly), interior art (tipped in no less) and a slipcase - which to me, is a vastly better value, not even close. CK and Subpress have a similar wheelhouse but CK's first 2 releases show - to me at least - that Subpress books are a relatively poor value at current prices.

Having said that I likely won't buy the standard as I already have rights to the numbered. Interestingly, I decided at the last moment to buy a Blade Itself standard in addition to the numbered when I found out the standard would be signed. If I didn't decide to do that, I would likely not have gotten the numbered due to the initial glitch which prevented many from getting a numbered. Hopefully CK will have learned from the fiasco last time and everything will go smoothly now.

Glad to see that the Standard edition is far-and-away my favorite design , and that they've kept up the same quality paper as the numbered and tipped in illustrations.

I always have a pretty visceral reaction to crystals embedded into books, but I can't say I'm a fan of the blind-stamped white leather or the overall color scheme of the numbered either.

>178 punkzip: Most SP books have interior illustrations, though inexplicably a couple recent ones didn’t, despite their price. As their books creep inexorably towards $200, they really do come across as poor value compared to what other presses are producing. But they do churn out very popular and recent releases, so if no one else is producing those books, it really is a moot point.

>179 NathanOv: Is the odd blind stamping somehow linked to the story? Half of the stamping is on the right of the front board, the other half on the left of the back. There’s no way to ever see what they look like next to each other.

In my line of work we'd perhaps call this one over-designed. I had assumed I'd be one of those fighting it out for a numbered, but I think the standard is more attractive for half the price.

>180 What_What: Well, it appears to just be another title treatment, I think based on the geode motif which, oddly, has much more to do with the second book despite being the cover of this one.

I can't think of any reason for presenting it in that manner, though. However, it looks to be one of 5 variations of the title treatment, so I'd imagine they simply liked it enough that they wanted to come up with somewhere to use it in the design.

>182 NathanOv: Having read the book (as well as the trilogy) I think it is thematic. First of all, the Earth is "broken", as is the logo. In addition, it would also be related to the major plot surprise in the first book - to say more would be a spoiler..

Be sure to check your email if you have numbered rights - I just got mine and can preorder. Interestingly, even if one does like the standard better, it's hard to pass up on the numbered as it would likely be hard to get a Hyperion numbered I think without rights.

>183 punkzip: I guess the idea of a broken sphere is, in general, thematic for the series but I don't really see that reflected in the rather odd blind embossing.

Still, most of my issues with the numbered are just personal preferences that I've seen other collectors have strong opposite feelings about!

It's petty, but I wish they would actually link their updates from their homepage as well as emailing about them--I hate email newsletters and try to subscribe to as few as possible.

Having tracked down the update and still feeling petty, I also raise an eyebrow at the description of The Fifth Season as "an incredible debut fantasy novel." It was Jemisin's sixth novel. Oh well.

>186 ambyrglow: I also raise an eyebrow at the description of The Fifth Season as "an incredible debut fantasy novel."

Yeah. Me too. Odd thing to say.

I agree with the room- the standard looks fantastic and a great value. I ordered a numbered and looking forward to reading the book again. It's one of my favorite fantasies. I love it.

Thanks for the interpretations of the stamping on the board. Still not sold.

Also, wouldn’t have hurt to have someone else read over the newsletter a couple times before hitting send - there are about five typos.

>188 What_What: I was going to say - I hope more effort is being taken to make sure no typos make it into the publications, as the eye for detail displayed in the newsletters is concerning.

>189 jordanxn: I’m rooting for them, but with all the minor red flags lately it does make me wish a more established press had gotten such a landmark series.

Alas, there’s probably not another fine press that would’ve actually taken it on.

Does anyone have a link to the relevant page with the details?
I was able to find a post on instagram but with only one picture of the art.
I wasn't exactly pleased by that either (I have yet to see a single example of "fine press" genre literature where the art wasn't (to my taste) obviously subpar in relation to the text) but as I enjoyed the book I'd be willing to consider this if I could actually get to see it.

I also agree that the constant typos and the generally unprofessional tone of the press' communication does not exactly inspire confidence.

I care less about typos in the newsletters than about the fact that they're taking orders for multiple books without (as of yet) having produced any. Ready Player One was a rebind. The mock-ups of the Standard edition are lovely examples of bindings, but it's hard to convince myself to back this without a single page example of what the typesetting will look like. I trust experienced publishers to make attractive choices about font and whitespace, but I don't really know what to expect here.

193: Nomad letterpress has a teaser of The Blade Itself title page on their Instagram. https://www.instagram.com/nomadletterpress/?hl=en

>192 supercell: Thank you!
And yeah, but no. Hard pass for me. Just the font choices on the spine label are enough to put me off...

>192 supercell: Hopefully the typesetting isn't done by whoever the heck designed that webpage. White background and grey text that's so tiny it makes it even harder to read than it already is. Damn.

The Curious King logo on the spine is hideous. I wish all the books just had the Curious King text on the spine like the lettered.

I preordered the Standard edition! Really excited to receive it eventually! I was wondering if anyone knows the target date for shipping the books out? Couldn’t find any details on the site.

>198 RRCBS: It might be a while. As The Blade Itself is farther ahead in production, and it isn’t clear when that one is to ship.

>198 RRCBS: I’m happy with a standard edition as well. The design is more refined and elegant than the other states, with the same text block as the numbered.

As long as no horrific typographic choices were made, I can at least be confident in the excellent printing and binding!

As far as timeline, I believe The Blade Itself is fully printed and headed to Ludlow. Assuming that means delivery in the next 3-4 months for that edition, that’ll be just under a year from preorder to delivery.

The numbered went in a few minutes. Missed out, but I at least got a standard. Will standards get you pre-order rights for the next standards?

>201 Undergroundman: It'll get you rights to the next Broken Earth standard edition, but not to standards from any other series.

https://www.curiousking.co.uk/rights/

that lettered is just funny bad. i guess someone liked it though.

>202 NathanOv: Thanks. Was hoping for the Dan Simmons books.

>204 Undergroundman: also I thought I had read somewhere that the Hyperion books would only be produced in numbered and lettered states, no standard (very disappointing!)

>205 RRCBS: Thanks for that info. Now I am completely devastated for missing out on the numbered.

>206 Undergroundman: Per his August update:

"I can only share a few details at the moment, but it is currently unlikely that there will be a standard edition for this series due to a myriad of factors. My current plan is to publish the lettered and increase the numbered edition significantly to 300 (numbers 151-300 will only have rights to future Hyperion Cantos books). I understand this will be disappointing for some people, and I haven’t taken this decision lightly. There is however a small glimmer of hope, as if there is overwhelming response to having all four of these books in Standard Edition, i may well revisit this (and reduce the amount of numbered editions down)."

>207 wongie: Well, if he can't, he cant. Sucks, but such is life. Might have a chance if the numbered is increased to 300.

The press has shared a February update for anyone interested: https://www.curiousking.co.uk/february-update/?mc_cid=e68608065f&mc_eid=eadd...

Key details are that The Blade Itself, curiously, is having the artwork redone despite the text already being printed and ready for binding. The Fifth Season is still scheduled for Q4 delivery, though, and Hyperion should go on order in May or June.

The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy is coming, with Gary Gianni doing the art. There will be a Standard edition, and 42 (of course) Lettered, and pre-orders won't be until late 2023 at the earliest. I for one would be very interested :)

>210 AMindForeverVoyaging: Exciting team with Gary Gianni and Marcelo Anciano both working on it, but my goodness - is this the 15th book announced as under contract without a single delivery yet? Three trilogies and the to-be-confirmed 5+ book cycle?

>211 NathanOv: Curious King announces too much in advance and Conversation tree too little IMO.

>210 AMindForeverVoyaging: a must buy for anyone with fond memories of the book, or fans of sci-fi and humor.

>211 NathanOv: Nor even a single interior picture (aside from the title page) of the one book that's finished printing.

It is a good title and series, but I wish they had waited until a fortnight before pre-orders (so after the delivery of The Blade Itself) before announcing this. At the moment the press is just hype, hopefully we can see their creations and then get excited

>211 NathanOv: Yeah, this is starting to look really lame, and desperate for attention on their part. I'd be excited if I actually saw proof of them actually sending out books. I just hope this doesn't turn into another Cemetery Dance abomination...

>216 Undergroundman: what happened with Cemetery Dance?

>217 RRCBS: They announce a bunch of titles that take years to ship out.

The publisher just sounds really enthusiastic and happy about being able to publish these books to me. It's not like Hitchhiker is actually up for sale yet, so there's no need to worry about money in this case. I could be wrong, but that's the way I read it. I'm looking forward to these books and hope they'll live up to my expectations.

>219 SF-72: Nearly every publisher that has ever gone under and taken a boatload of preorder money with them sounded happy and enthusiastic about what they were doing right up to the moment everything came crashing down.

I'm not saying that's what's going to happen with CK, and it is important to note that this was only an announcement of a book and not a preorder, but I've been in this hobby long enough to be wary of publishers that announce book after book before actually publishing a single volume.

Does this owner have any prior experience in fine press or publishing whatsoever?

>221 edkennedy: He did a rebind of Ready Player One.

>222 donaldmcobb: A rebind...?

>223 edkennedy: He took the page blocks from 1st/1sts of RPO and rebound them with custom materials (Atari-themed as I recall).

It's...not really publishing. Bookbinding for sure, which is certainly an aspect of publishing, but he never had to deal with printers and selecting paper and whatnot.

>224 donaldmcobb: On that note, I found the comment exchange Curious King engaged in on this post a little eyebrow-raising: https://www.facebook.com/lyrasbooks/posts/pfbid0ZaSJC5Xen5in3wmRVK4VJ5T6LnAEgiL3...

>225 ambyrglow: Yikes! Talk about putting the cart before the horse.

I pre-ordered a standard copy of The Fifth Season. Hope I don’t end up regretting it.

>226 Nightcrawl: I wish the publisher was more focused, and there's a very real risk of them biting of more than they can chew. However, the vast majority of the work is being done by highly skilled and established craftspeople, and the fact that so many of them have agreed to multiple collaborations and signed off on plans / timelines is promising.

The biggest quality concern, in my opinion, is the manuscript and text design, and the biggest risk factor is likely cash-flow and ability to deliver.

I do wonder if the publisher has some experience in the business we don't know about / that's not obvious from the website. He certainly has access to some excellent craftspersons and gets rights that are pretty impressive.

>224 donaldmcobb: He also did this custom personal version of Gardens of the Moon, which included laying out the chapters.

https://www.curiousking.co.uk/first-project-gardens-of-the-moon/

Given our conversation 6 months ago, I have to say that - even though we're still waiting for the books - I've been impressed by the last few updates from Curious King. He seems to be taking a much more pragmatic approach now. I appreciate how open he's being about the setbacks faced (the reprint of the Fifth Season pages must have been a bummer) and in particular how he's refraining from future title announcements and the statement 'I am now engaging artists much earlier as their work takes the most time, and I’m reticent to announce a title until I have all artwork in hand – this way I ensure more accuracy with my shipping dates.'

Well done. Very much looking forward to these books.

Does anyone know the timeline for The Fifth Season? I don't recall receiving any updates.

>231 astropi: They sent one out / posted one yesterday. Supposedly still shipping by end of year.

The point where you may have gone a bit overboard on production, is when you find you need to hire a master stonecarver: https://www.curiousking.co.uk/elementor-4348/

🤯❤️‍🔥❤️‍🔥

>233 emarshal: I really wouldn’t want this! I like some stonework, and have a number of different sculptures in my house, but would I want a 7kg case? No!

I think the book itself looks very attractive. Previously I thought that the design of the different versions had been a little inverted, as I thought the standard was the nicest, then the numbered, with the lettered the weakest, but now the Roman design is the best of the four. I am confused as to who the buyer would be, especially as you have to commit to all three in the series. Over 20kg on three cases seems crazy

Owners of this definitely need to be extra careful when taking it off the shelf that they don't accidentally drop this on their toes, especially a corner landing! My toes are curling just thinking about it..

I actually find this quite beautiful visually, the book and the box, but the weight does give one pause. (As well as what it will cost, but since this will be well beyond me, I can just watch in relaxed amazement.)

Shipping cost alone will be interesting.

>238 filox:
Indeed, but I think you dont really care if you can afford such a book 😅

>233 emarshal: Looks like a ripoff of Suntup's numbered Wolfen.

Looks gorgeous! The price for the sold-out lettered was £2450 which is about 5 times the cost of the numbered. So I'm going to guess it will be about thrice the price, or roughly £7500 each, and I also bet they will sell out before you can even say "amethyst!"

>241 astropi: thats very true. 🤣

>240 Undergroundman: No.

From the August 2023 update email today:

Future Titles

...

I’m toying with the idea of offset litho printing the Standard Editions for a few reasons. It’s a much easier binding process with a block printed that way, but the main reason is the market for letterpress printed Standard Editions has taken a bit of a dive.

Any feedback from the community would be great. It would allow the price of the Standard Edition to be greatly reduced too. Perhaps to around £125ish (I haven’t got all relevant quotes, so it’s a ballpark).

As far as I can tell, this only would apply to future titles. Presumably folks here would have some opinions about this.

>244 abysswalker: I can't say I see the point, especially since he seems to exclusively pick titles that have already had small press limited editions. If they're not produced at a higher level of craft, then just a new dust jacket and set of artwork isn't necessarily going to sell it.

I think at the end of the day, he'd actually be reducing his audience that way rather than expanding it.

>245 NathanOv: I’m not in favour but it is interesting. The Fifth Season standard is still available, and if the first in a trilogy is difficult to sell, then I guess the second and third would be tougher?

>246 DMulvee:
Yeah what if I don't buy the second and third book from the serie ?
They won't sell forever, because people miss on the first book 😄

It feels slightly odd that if you are trying to attract a higher clientele (the Roman numeral Fifth Season wanted you to purchase all three books not just the first one and so costs at least £34k!) that you would want to be associated with a cheaper product. I’m surprised that the number of standard books isn’t just cut, and the prices raised slightly

If the books looked better I'd buy them!

>246 DMulvee: >247 Ragnaroek: I think part of it is lack of awareness / confidence in a brand new press. They'll likely get a small second wave of sales when The Blade Itself finally ships, and then a larger one that could very well sell it out once books are actually in hand and people, including the author, are showing them off.

I just received a “Have you moved?” email, indicating The Blade Itself would be shipping before the end of this month.

I hope someone is selling it somewhere 😂
I love that series, but missed out on it.

>251 const-char-star:

Me too. I'm really looking forward to it.

Apparently shipping has started for The Blade Itself. Just received my UPS notification. Congratulations to Anthony/Curious King - it's been a long journey and he must be relieved to get the book out there at last. Really looking forward to receiving my copy.

Awesome news.
The next publication should be Hyperion Cantos by Dan Simmons ?

I personaly would like some more Grim Dark Fantasy novels.

>255 Ragnaroek:

The tricky bit being that this will be lettered and numbered only, so not accessible to many.

>256 SF-72:
True. I bet it will sell out very fast.

>254 Levin40: Thanks for the information. I also got teh UPS notification, but wasn't able connect it to a specific book as I didn't get a shipping notice from Curious King.

I got my copy of The Blade Itself just now. First impressions: Impeccable binding job by Rich and the team at Ludlow; as usual, though the printing itself is well done (the second color initial caps and chapter headings are nice), Nomad used a small typeface again; the illustrations are great; sturdy slipcase (my only real gripes about the book are (1) that neither the spine of the book nor the back of the slipcase has the title on it, so on the shelf there is no way to know what it is, and (2) according to the website, the slipcase was supposed to be lined with custom printed papers, and it isn’t (maybe there was an update from Anthony I missed where he talked about that, but I don’t remember if so); and nice, though not amazing, paper. Some of those quibbles are to be expected - I knew about the title issue when I ordered, and I only ordered the standard state, both of which I think are improved in the higher tier versions, but the slipcase lining was not. Overall though, I’m very happy with it.

Sounds positive overall! Note - the printer isn't the one who sets the type, so it's not a quibble on Nomad about the small typeface.

>259 jsg1976: Is it just the standard edition dust jacket that’s textless? Or was there a design change to the book?

The typography and internal design is what I’m most nervous about with The Fifth Season, since as far as I can tell the publisher is designing and laying these out himself, but small font on its own isn’t necessarily a deal breaker for me if it’s otherwise readable and attractive.

The small font has me worried. When I buy an edition like this, I want a comfortable reading experience, not burning eyes. My eyes are admittedly not that great anymore, but still - a luxury edition should be better than your average mass market edition in this regard. I should receive the book this week - hopefully it won't be as bad as what I'm imagining just now.

There should be some reviews on YouTube soon I guess.

Iam excited 🙂
(The most beautiful and attractive looking standard editions from the mock up pictures you can currently see are the ones from The Conversation Tree Press. Iam most excited to finally see some books in real from that press)

Edit: the standard copy's should have the custom papers . The Web page says it still.

My copy has arrived. I like the paper, and overall am pretty impressed. My one disappointment is the font size combined with the typeface. I wish this was larger. Some pages it appears faint (and there are a lot of italics near the start).

Hopefully this won’t be repeated with their next book

Can someone share a photo? So far all the photos I’ve seen are the binding and the artwork. Obviously, there’s much more to a book than that.

Here are some pics from my copy:

Looks very nice indeed ? The pictures don't really show, maybe iam just blind, but is this copy Letterpress printed ?

>267 Ragnaroek: Yes, by Nomad Letterpress on their Heidelberg Cylinder.

>266 A.Nobody: The typography, layout and two-color printing actually looks quite nice. I'm impressed for what, from the information we have, is a first-timer's book layout and typography design.

>268 A.Nobody: Thanks for making that effort! Great photos.

Received my copy and am quite pleased. My most significant complaint is that I would have preferred a title treatment on the slipcase spine, but we knew that would be absent from the mock up photos. If we can get the 2nd and 3rd volumes at this quality and price point, I’ll be very excited.

Anyone got the numbered already ?

>266 A.Nobody: Thank you. Will you get first rights to the next book of the series?

>273 Undergroundman: It's been so long since I placed my order, I'd have to research to find out. I believe CK offers continuing rights within series.

>274 A.Nobody: Thanks. I ask, because I ordered the standard edition of The Fifth Season. Obviously, I don't only want the first book.

>275 Undergroundman: As I thought - from the CK site (regarding Standard editions): "If part of a series, then this book carries rights to the remaining books of that series, but not to new publications. If not part of a series, then the book carries no rights at all."

>276 A.Nobody: Thank you.

My copy arrived today, and as several others have said, I think the binding and design is great. However, IMHO, the small size of the typeface combined with the faint printing, is a bit of a disappointment. If this would be the same for the next books in the trilogy, I'm probably not getting them. So, hopefully, this will be rectified.

I finished it, and was surprised at how good the story was. I think that my initial impressions of the book hold. I like the two colours at the start of the chapter, and do like the quality of paper. Not all pages had the ink uniform, with a few pages almost looking faint. I would have preferred a larger font size, but it didn't impact my enjoyment.
The layout is good though not perfect. For example if you look at page 357 there are a few lines of blank space at the top of the page, and this looks odd.

I had expected not to continue with this series and instead focus on the Fifth Season series, however I will continue with this if the price point doesn't change too much

Very happy for all who received their copies. Watching Curious King execute this project has been wonderful.

I'm bracing myself for the Hyperion preorder. I had been feeling slightly disappointed because I thought all illustrations would be black and white, but Anthony himself replied to a post confirming there will also be 8 colour illustrations.

Hopefully I'll be able to get a copy and upgrade my Easton (known for its awful artwork of retouched photographs). It will be very expensive (any ideas?) and preorder will be wild.

The numbered Joe Abercrombie book will get shipped now.
(News on Facebook)

https://youtu.be/_Cywv2lwYhY?feature=shared

Unboxing of the standard edition

I'm looking for a copy of The Blade Itself. If anyone has a copy for sale/trade please let me know, thank you.

>283 astropi: there’s a standard listed for $435 plus shipping from Canada — it’s on the Fans of Curious King Facebook page

>283 astropi: I have a standard copy I can part with for a trade or maybe sale. I ordered the standard but was later able to get a numbered. Send me a PM of potential trades if you want.

>284 Objectr: Thanks! I reached out to join the group.

>285 SDB2012: Sent you a message, hope to hear back from you.

Just got the email with details on Hyperion. I didn’t see an estimated production/ship date. Was that overlooked or just me?

>287 Objectr: You’re correct, it’s not been mentioned.

>288 What_What: I was reading a previous newsletter and they metioned 'H1 2024'.

It will be very hard to get a copy in the open presale! only 150 copies

That will get an very expensive month...
New..
1. Areté Edition..
2. Conversation Tree Press
3. Curious King
4. Suntup

WOW 😵‍💫

>289 dyhtstriyk: Ah, that sounds familiar. That means the first half of next year?

Argh, I got excited about Hyperion, but seeing the prototype photos, I’m not sure… there’s something in the design language of Curious King which doesn’t work for me (which is not a criticism! just a taste mismatch). In particular the colour: both the shade of purple for Fifth Season and the shade of blue for Hyperion are somehow uninviting… At the same time, it’s one of my all-time favourite books. More thinking required!

>292 BorisG: I had the same reaction - while the standard editions have been elegant-looking books with high quality text blocks, everything up from there seems over designed.

While I appreciate the press sharing interior mock-ups, those also give me pause on this one.

>291 What_What: Yep. Can be Jan 1st or Jun 30th.

>292 BorisG: I don't like the colour combination either. The production values are top notch, but there is something in the design that rubs me a bit. I already have the Easton edition and while I won't even compare goatskin leather with Easton's bonded leather, the colour scheme is surprisingly similar.

Interesting! I’m personally thrilled with the color scheme, though I’ll admit I always love the combination of blue, white and gold.

The lettered Hyperion is very similar to the lettered The Blade Itself.

Barely 10 minutes and sold out 😁

I'm glad I managed to grab one; honestly, part of me expected that to sell out faster than it did, but I suppose £650 isn't generally something you spend on a whim. ;)

>298 emarshal: It might have if the order button weren't missing for so many people and payments were going through on the first try. Not to disappointed I missed this one though.

>298 emarshal:
3 more volumes for that price are coming I guess.

What happens if you don't continue to buy the next books ?
Seriously, nobody can force you to buy the whole serie, but why should people buy the other books, if they don't got the first ?

I had the page up 15 minutes before it went live and just stared at the timer as it counted down. I even experienced some problems with my browser as the checkout page didn't seem to like me using Chrome's autofill for my email address, it would go blank and say enter email; tried submitting 2 times before i entered it manually but luckily managed to finally check out in end 2 minutes after it went live. Phew!

I got one, but honestly hope that really isn't the final book design. Reminds of those Artist Signed Cemetery Dance Stephen King books.

I was able to grab one and now I can relax :)

Got one, with plenty of time to spare. I guess it was the price and people having lingering doubts about the design. I also hope they tweak it a bit... maybe the blue is too bright and the typography is not perfect and that sphinx image is not very convincing. But it should result as good as The Blade Itself.

>302 supercell: For just 156 copies, ten minutes is an eternity.
Really? I honestly can't think of any other recent title in that price range and with that many copies available for public sale which has sold out quicker. That was an incredibly fast sell-out for a £650 title. A significant one too as it gives the buyer the right to the whole cantos.

Hyperion was a fabulous book, one of my favorite sci-fi and a true classic. Fall of Hyperion was good, but not a masterpiece like the first -- my opinion of course. I did not read Endymion.

This edition is by far the most beautiful version ever produced. Wish I was able to snag a copy. Also wish they had released a standard edition -- why no standard edition?

>307 astropi: Unfortunately there aren't many details as to why, in the August blog post from last year this was the only information on the matter:

"I can only share a few details at the moment, but it is currently unlikely that there will be a standard edition for this series due to a myriad of factors. My current plan is to publish the lettered and increase the numbered edition significantly to 300 (numbers 151-300 will only have rights to future Hyperion Cantos books). I understand this will be disappointing for some people, and I haven’t taken this decision lightly. There is however a small glimmer of hope, as if there is overwhelming response to having all four of these books in Standard Edition, i may well revisit this (and reduce the amount of numbered editions down)."

I guess the response wasn't overwhelming enough in the end, though you wouldn't have guessed by how quickly the numbered editions sold out.

I try to ask again, because iam very curious about this particular topic...

What happens if you don't buy the second book of this series or any upcoming series in general ?

I wondered that for Suntups Thomas Harris books aswell...

That question may sound stupid, but there are trilogies were you dont have to read all books to have an great time.

>309 Libri_mea_vita_sunt: If someone chooses not to buy the second book then it would be available for general sale, and the purchaser of the second book would then be given the rights to the rest of the series.

>310 DMulvee:
So far, so good, but who would do that?

That's the point I wanna stretch here since Curious King, right now, only sells series .

The Hyperion series doesn't need read to the end to enjoy it . Normally you wann read the full serie, but there are some exceptions.

I plan to buy only the first two, based on reviews. Unable to spend almost $4,000 on a full series that isn’t that great.

>312 What_What:
Exactly what I will do.
The first 2 are one story and the last two are one, with mostly new characters.

>307 astropi: >308 wongie: I also wondered why there isn't a standard edition. It doesn't make much sense on the face of it: a standard edition would allow fixed costs to be spread over more books and increase profit. The only good argument I've heard is the one Paul Suntup gave to explain why there's no Artist Edition for The Yellow Wall-Paper: that he didn't think he'd be able to shift copies in such bulk. Fair enough, and he's probably right. But this is Hyperion! Of course it would sell! The only thing I can think of is that there are some contractual issues coming into play here which we're not aware of.

>311 Libri_mea_vita_sunt: This doesn't seem to be much of an issue if you look at other publishers who've done something similar: many Subpress series, for example, or Centipede's Elric and Dune series. I would expect those with rights to purchase the vast majority of copies of future titles, but of course there will always be a handful who don't, for whatever reason. These will then sell out very quickly from the publisher. From the perspective of anyone who was late the party, it makes sense to purchase as many titles as possible direct from the publisher at lower cost, then try to pick up the probably-far-more-expensive earlier titles from the secondary market, if they haven't already.

>312 What_What: Not sure about this. Firstly, while they don't quite hit the incredibly high bar set by the Hyperion books, the Endymion books are still very good, and reviews seem to back that up (e.g. 4.5/5 on Amazon from nearly 8,000 reviews). Secondly, even just from a financial perspective it doesn't make much sense not to complete the series: a limitation of 326 copies for one of the most highly regarded SF series, plus a sell-out in 10 minutes, almost guarantees an inflated secondary market price. Anyway, let's see. I'm also interested to see how many complete CP's Dune titles, another series which is often accused of a drop-off in quality in the second half. And a final thought: the more collectors who don't complete these series, the rarer and more sought after the full sets will become.

It really is a shame about there being no standard edition. The numbered one just got too expensive for me in this case. A favourite book or author, okay. Otherwise, no.

>314 Levin40: You have a point about the value of a full set on the secondary market. But at already almost $4,000 at retail, there’s a limit on how much someone will spend on the secondary market. Especially in these sobering post-pandemic times.

>316 What_What: True, and particularly so as your money might be tied up for 6 months to 1 year before you receive you copy. On the other hand, given how many series Curious King have ongoing in parallel, it wouldn't surprise me if you can spread your $4,000 out of 4-5 years before the cantos is completed. As for the secondary market there's always a few or whom money is no object.

I really hope that some publisher will do Stephen Kings magnum opus "The Dark Tower". If you dont get it at the publisher, at the publication date, this title will be the fifth to tenth value on the secondary market. The King Community is big and crazy. Its not easy to get rights for king I assume, since there aren't much fine press copy's of specific books so far

>318 Libri_mea_vita_sunt: king doesn't allow them, hasn't for years. Is against high priced books it seems, we, Lyra and Arete, have tried with a number of titles and suggestions, and I know others have tried too.

>317 Levin40: True, but $4k spread over four years is still $4k. And agreed on a few people spending eye-popping prices on stuff, you just have to be one of the lucky few to benefit.

People that can afford the Lettered or Roman numeral editions have enough money to buy everything they want for any price, I would say 😁
( some aren't that ultra expensive, but its most of the time alot over thrice the price from the numbered Edition)

>319 marceloanciano:
Really sad. Amaranthine is trying I know, but not much success

>319 marceloanciano: An Arete Dark Tower series would be insanely awesome. And insanely expensive. But, I'd save my pennies. Ah well, it's fun to think.

>319 marceloanciano: Dragon Rebound has done some pretty stunning editions -- their copy of The Stand really sticks out: http://dragonrebound.com/the-stand-rebound/

But I don't see any indication that King actually signed off on it. Is it different for rebinding already published books vs printing from scratch?

>324 jskalitz: It's completely different, anyone can have their books rebound, or even dozens of the same book rebound, and yes they look great! However, it has nothing to do with creating a new publishing of a book, that needs permission and worldwide rights cleared and all rights and will go through the author or estate and need their blessing and payments.

>326 Libri_mea_vita_sunt: While there seems to be a market for dressing up trade editions with fancy leather covers and the like, I don’t think that’s what anyone here is talking about.

Sewn text blocks can be rebound in an upgraded material or unique design (e.g, paper-wrapped to cloth or leather), damaged bindings can be resewn and restored, and from many presses you can even buy books in less sheets to have sewn and bound by a professional.

>327 NathanOv:
I should have visited the Web page before making assumptions. Sorry and thanks for the reminder. I will delete my post above.

>319 marceloanciano: Mhm and he also didn't have very kind words for Jerad in one of the interviews. Honestly, I felt that was very un-gentleman like from King, especially calling him out by name...

>329 filox: King is more fond of classy gentlemen like Richard Chizmar, and has no patience for pesky publishers like Jerad.

>330 Undergroundman: Jerad is a super nice, humble guy. That interview where King made those comments has been frozen in time on the internet, and every time someone remembers or reads it, it’s like it’s happening right now, which is silly. If King didn’t like Jerad or his press, he wouldn’t have allowed him to publish the King book he recently did.

>332 What_What: He didn't sign it, and it was hypocrital on King's part considering the monstrosity signed Lettered editions Cemetery Dance released later that he agreed to be part of.

>329 filox: Do you have a link to this interview?

>334 Inceptic: https://www.liljas-library.com/showinterview.php?id=36

>335 filox: Thanks, here is the exchange --

Stephen King: A thing is better looking when it's useful and... you know something you just put up on the shelf to just look at it. Isn't that weird?

I mean... the worst one in a way and I don't... this guy is gonna read this and be so bummed. This guy Jared Walters did Salem's Lot in a limited. He basically fucking wore me down because he would come back every six months or so and say, "Please, please, please, please" and I'm very vulnerable to that if people, I mean, if he'd come to me and said that he wanted to do a Dollar Baby I would say, "Yes" immediately but this guy wants to do this big huge book with this, I don't know, incredible binding done in some endangered species or something and finally the books come out and people like Frank Darabont and other collectors just loved that book and he wants to do The Shining next and so far I've just told him, "No". Because it'd be another book like Salem's Lot. It'll weigh twenty pounds, and people will put it on their shelf and look at it and they won't actually read it.

Lilja: But I have read that book and it was interesting to get a chance to read the parts that wasn't in the first edition.

Stephen King: Yeah, I know that but on the other hand if someone had suggested to me, "Why don't you put that up on the net, the stuff that wasn't in the first edition?" I would have done that. And then people could have gotten it for free.

It would be the same words. It just wouldn't be in that fancy thing. It's like... I don't know how to say this. It's like if you see some woman and you're really hot for her, you know. I mean you got to say to yourself is it the woman I'm hot for or is it just because she's wearing a certain expensive dress? I don't know...


Well, that was rather rude to Jerad (obviously) but also rude to collectors. Salem's Lot was the first King book I read. I remember telling people "I'm surprised. Many said he's not Shakespeare, sure. However, I feel he's quite a talented writer." Having read much more of his works after Salem's Lot, I still think he's talented, no doubt about that. However, it quickly becomes obvious that he's not a "great writer" and honestly not a "great storyteller" either. In fact, if it was not for movies such as John Carpenter's Christine (the movie is better than the book) and of course The Shining (the movie is far better than the book), King would not be a household name. Most of his works feel like they're some amalgam of teen angst and adult sexual frustration. In "It", the lone female of the group decides to have sex with all six boys because "unification"... what a load of doggy poop!

Anyway, the above is of course just my opinion. Likewise, if anyone asks me for "good horror" I don't mention King, rather I note greats such as -- William Hope Hodgson, Edgar Allan Poe, HP Lovecraft, Shirley Jackson, and many more.

>336 astropi: The Cemetery Dance Lettered Goatskin editions literally make Jerad's Salem's Lot look like a mass market paperback. You need freaking custom bookshelves to store those monsters. Hypocrite much?

>337 Undergroundman: Wow... that sure does seem hypocritical! I've concluded that I prefer to watch a King movie than actually read his books. For example, the original version of IT (released on TV in 1990) was excellent. The two-part adaptation released a few years ago was also really good. Both are much better than the book which gets tedious and honestly, I find his characters to be so two-dimensional.

>338 astropi: Here is a book he signed that no one will ever read.

https://youtu.be/tbfkr4yD_4k?t=291

>339 Undergroundman: Other than being able to show it off, I don't get the appeal of that book at all. But he seemed very happy with it.

>336 astropi: I get what he's saying. It's misguided, and not really in accordance with the history of books as sacred texts, but it is in line with his "everyman" persona. For a very eccentric/rich individual, King has always stayed true to his ideals, and one of those is the sort of humdrum practicality that shines through consistently in his writing. People who aren't collectors can't understand collecting, it's really a genetic thing, certain personality types are geared toward it.

King isn't a great writer, nor even a great storyteller, but in terms of power/atmosphere/concepts he's a master. All of his books/prose have issues but the sheer originality of his ideas and his ability to execute the parts of the novel that really count are what keeps people coming back, and there is really no writer that has rivaled him in that regard, even in the literary sphere.

If he had died in 1997, his career would be considered one of the best of all time, even with the duds that made it in there. Unfortunately, he kept writing, and produced a big swath of bleh books. His newer novels have been better received, but the terror and nihilism is gone, and has instead been replaced with more of the same folksiness that gives birth to statements like the one you quoted, or the utterly cringe opening scene of Mr. Mercedes.

This folksiness is the same reason his novels don't translate well to screen. Kubrick did away with it and produced something legitimately terrifying. Mike Flanagan pulls it off better than anyone else but there's still moments in his movies/shows that are really cringe/too on the nose.

However, if you look at all his books written when he was coked out and hungry, even with their flaws, it's an insanely strong career. I really think a writer should aim for no more than 15 full novels. That's a huge number, and I cant really think of any writers who have been able to maintain that quality long term, partially because to achieve that quantity, your work inevitably falls into more formulaic/lazy patterns.

How can you view a novel's place in a writer's greater body of worker when it is 1/100? It ends up turning people off to the writer more than anything. Joyce Carol Oates and King are like the poster children for literary exclusion, and part of that is the sheer number of books they've put out.

>341 ClarenceBodicker: I basically agree with all of what you wrote, but just as one additional data point the somewhat recent miniseries of The Outsider is pretty well done. Captures the King feel on film with some style, and even has a satisfying conclusion (I find King endings often sort of awkward). Good acting, good pacing.

>342 abysswalker: I will have to check it out!!! I'm fascinated by the idea of King on film because it so rarely works, and yet he's maybe the most adapted writer of all time. I don't know, but I'd imagine he's up there.

He shouldn't be a writer that's so hard to adapt, like there's nothing in his books that can't theoretically be translated to screen almost exactly as it is on page, but more often than not it gets botched. I need to check out some of these newer shows like Castle Rock, though.

I felt like the JFK one was actually an incredible television adaptation (didn't read the book) just because it so willingly embraced that folksiness and even made it work to its advantage. When you consider that and also The Green Mile/Shawshank, it becomes clear that the horror is way harder to adapt alongside it.

Darabont's Mist was pretty solid but ultimately felt generic. Some cool visuals but nothing that really stood out. The ending is really overrated IMO. I was extremely disappointed with IT as well, it was way too by the numbers, and a great testament to how film's preference for linearity breaks the books. When you remove all of the time switching and historical stuff, it's just 2 hours of a clown scaring the kids lol, and I heard the second part was even worse.

Can't recommend In The Mouth of Madness by John Carpenter enough for anybody who hasn't seen that. It's a masterpiece and pokes fun at SK/Lovecraft in a very loving way. Not scary (most Carpenter isn't) but one of his best.

>341 ClarenceBodicker: I agree, he's such a prolific writer that often the "good" just gets lost. I really did enjoy Salem's Lot, even with it's "issues" I also enjoyed The Shining, although as you said it was Kubrick that truly made it terrifying.

>343 ClarenceBodicker: In The Mouth of Madness is of course a Lovecraftian movie, although it certainly does poke a bit of fun, and I would say also a bit of homage, to Stephen King... or Sutter Cane :)

By the way, my favorite Lovecraftian-esque movie is The Lighthouse.

>344 astropi: The Lighthouse is fantastic.
>343 ClarenceBodicker: I don't know. King isn't a particularly visual writer. Yes, he has some vivid imagery from time to time, but I think the problem with many of the adaptations is they focus on what he's weakest on and ignore the internal lives of the character. For example- the Pet Semetary film has some creepy or even disturbing visuals but the book's strength is the harrowing internal depiction of loss and how people will destroy themselves in the attempt to heal their grief.

Earlier today, Curious King announced their latest title - Legend by David Gemmell. Here are some details from CK:

- This book will get the full Curious King treatment, and I can currently confirm there will be: 3 tiers (26x Lettered, 200x Deluxe and 350x Standard)

- All states will be letterpress printed

- Justin Sweet is producing 8 colour paintings and 25 black and white pieces and will be signing each edition

- Stella Gemmell will be contributing a new forward and signing each edition

- The Standard Edition will also come with a unique dustjacket by Justin Sweet unavailable on the other tiers

And they are looking at pre-order around June and delivery before Christmas. No pricing info yet.

>347 A.Nobody: Exciting news! I just hope it's not sold out instantly -- I suspect the lettered and deluxe will be gone before you can say oh-my, but hopefully standard editions will survive for a day or two...

>348 astropi: I am not familiar with this title, so if rights carry from Hyperion, I might be able to offer someone a numbered copy at cost.

>349 NathanOv: If I understand correctly, the next title to be offered for preorder will be Abercrombie's Before they are Hanged, so rights to Legend will follow from that.

>348 astropi: I'm hugely enjoying this era of letterpress 'standard' editions from the likes of Curious King, Suntup, Lyra's, Amaranthine and Conversation Tree Press. Wonderful, fine press books at reasonable prices. Long may it continue!

>351 Pax_Romana: You're right I think. Damn, it's confusing! haha

I must say I find it disappointing that they are planning a second title with just the first book in the series and not a complete set. That's really not my cup of tea at all.

>353 SF-72: There are 11 titles in the series. If he committed to it, it probably wouldn't be done for 15 years of so and would block him from taking on other titles.

>354 Levin40:
>355 Pax_Romana:
The newsletter said: "We will be publishing this book as a standalone title (not the full trilogy)", so I thought it was three books. And yes, 11 books are quite a commitment. Still, I really prefer complete series, not one-offs, but understand if others are happy enough with one nice title in a series.

>356 SF-72: My understanding is that they plan to publish the first three books, aka "The First Law" trilogy. At least I certainly hope so.

357: Drenai ≠ The First Law. The trilogy implied here likely consists of Legend, The First Chronicles of Druss the Legend and The Legend of Deathwalker.

https://curiousking.co.uk/the-blade-itself-info-release/
This edition comes with rights to “Before they Hanged” and “Last Argument of Kings” (as well as any future abercrombie works we do) but does not come with rights to rights to our other titles.

That settles that question, they are certainly going to do the first trilogy, and potentially other volumes as well!

>360 astropi: We're talking about Legend by David Gemmell. Keep up, buddy ;-)

>361 Levin40:

What Levin40 said. There's been a misunderstanding. First Law / Abercrombie will get a complete release, but Legend / Gemmell will only be that title, just like Hitchhiker's Guide / Adams. I'm really glad it's First Law getting a complete release, I love that trilogy. and I certainly wouldn't mind more Abercrombie from Curious King.

>361 Levin40: >362 SF-72: Ahhh, thanks :)

Anybody else have the thought reading Curious King’s newsletters that they’d be a great case study on the Dunning–Kruger effect?

I’m very glad they’ve brought in Marcelo for their edition of Hitchhiker’s Guide to The Galaxy.

>364 NathanOv:
I’m very glad they’ve brought in Marcelo for their edition of Hitchhiker’s Guide to The Galaxy.

Me too. Super excited about it. I reread it recently and it was even funnier than I remember. Will definitely reread every few years.

>364 NathanOv: Are you referring to the part about delivering four books this year, while at the same time announcing a further delay on the (already delayed) first title? If so, then yes, it probably is a stretch. But then again, the same could be said of pretty much every fine press publisher. Here's one of my favourites: https://madparrotpress.com/upcoming-projects/

Any guesses on the trilogy? I was thinking maybe Three Body Problem.

>368 Pax_Romana: I'm getting a numbered, and I don't anticipate any issues. I don't think Anthony would design the books to be unreadable. I'm not a fan of the amethyst in the spine, but hope to be swayed once I see it in person. I'm a fan of the series and can't wait to read the CC production.

I got my copy of Fifth Season today. Did anyone else have a stray piece of paper with trees on it laid into theirs next to one of the illustrations? It almost feels like it's printed on wrapping paper - it has that same matte on the front, smooth on the back finish. Before I pitch it, I just want to make sure it's an artifact of the binding process, and not part of the book (I haven't read this yet, so I didn't know if this is some kind of easter egg relating to the story.

>370 jsg1976: Did you get an email with tracking? Still haven't got mine. :(

>370 jsg1976: Received my standard edition and no paper like that.

The book itself is really well done and I’m really pleased with it!

>373 Ragnaroekk:
Flicking through my newly arrived Fifth Season, I can see no map.

Just announced that their next series will be Robin Hobb's first Farseer trilogy. The artist isn't much to my taste based on a quick flip through his portfolio, but I guess we'll see what he produces for this edition.

https://curiousking.co.uk/robin-hobbs-farseer-trilogy/

People have started receving their Hyperion limited editions.

https://www.instagram.com/p/DAQbIRIAI-A/?img_index=5

Mine has not shipped yet

>376 dyhtstriyk: I received the email that it was being shipped soon, no tracking yet. Last time I got a book from them I got no tracking information. The only reason I knew it was on the way was because I have a Fedex account. Not cool.

Fall of Hyperion details are out (and preorders, for those of us who have rights). https://curiousking.co.uk/book-release-fall-of-hyperion/

>378 emarshal: This shipment has been very very slow. According to Anthony they should all be shipped before October ends, but that would put many people with rights (myself included) in the position of having to purchase Fall of Hyperion before receiving the first book.

And it's a hefty investment. So I don't know if I'll acquire the second one.

>380 Ragnaroekk: yes, I've read only the first two. No concern, it was just that for that price level I was not expecting to have two preorders paid before receiving the first book. For Curious King it didn't happen with Abercrombie or Jemisin.

>382 Ragnaroekk: It is crazy that a publisher has taken pre-orders for volume 1 of a series, is taking preorders for volume 2 and then shipping volume 1 a few days after the preorder closes. This is being explained as in the interests of the reader! As someone who hasn’t read any Hyperion books my view of the press has been dented by this experience

>381 dyhtstriyk: when you say it didn’t happen for Jemisin, have you heard any news on the next book? I’m surprised that there are so many new series and no word on that (unless I missed something)?

>382 Ragnaroekk:
I respectfully hope this doesn’t come across as confrontational, and I have avoided answering in the same manner a number of times before.
You come across as an investor in books with a financial slant. It seems if you have bought a book and committed to a publisher, that you become a little incensed should another person offer a negative opinion on that same publisher.
Plus I feel you oversell books you have a financial interest in beyond available information. I recently read your “review” of “great production values” for a book that won’t be available for many months to come?

I am not looking to be holier than thou, but when I buy a book I have little interest whether anybody else buys it. I buy it because I want it, not because lots of other people want it. I don’t mind if that’s how you feel, but it seems you are desperate to help everyone else reach the same conclusion as yourself.

>379 dyhtstriyk:
I agree with your general sentiment. I feel you are right to expect a certain level of service for your commitment.

In your defence, a couple of years ago I committed to the purchase of a Roman/Artist (whatever your preference) version of a book.
Every version of that book has been delivered some time past and the publisher has also done some other private work in the meantime.
Now I know I am going to get my book sometime this month but the fact that I paid five times the price of the next highest level and was then pushed to the end of the queue will/has made me rethink my commitment to that press.

I've read both Hyperion and Fall. I honestly feel that Hyperion could basically have ended as is, unresolved. It was just beautiful. Fall is more "traditional" and sure, it offers a much more resolved ending, but I would say not in the same league as the original Hyperion. Nor honestly is the ending particularly "satisfactory".

POTENTIAL SPOILER WARNING:
When you're dealing with time travel, I feel you could do just about anything and people are like "well, I guess so, since the Shrike blah blah blah..." I find that almost a cop out. There were definitely beautiful moments in Fall, but again, I was honestly disappointed by the whole time-travel which is basically a deus ex machina.

>384 Ragnaroekk: I disagree. Realistically I am going to read about 100 books per year. If I read them in an edition with a wonderful binding and thick paper, then I will enjoy the book more, and so there is no point reading everything in a cheap edition and then again in a special edition. Of course, I run the risk of buying something and not enjoying it, but Hyperion is famous so I don’t see the difference between getting this or Spenser’s Faerie Queen. Alongside the (hopeful) enjoyment of reading it, I will learn whether I like books from that genre and this will help guide me to find books that I like in the future.

If we were being asked to pre-order the second volume and there was six months before we would receive the first volume, I wouldn’t be as frustrated. However it is only meant to be a few days, and this is what annoys me the most. I really don’t think delaying the pre-orders would have been such a big deal.

Have I buckled and ordered the second? Yes, but it leaves a bad taste in my mouth that the publisher puts the reader in such a position. Would I order from Curious King again? Yes. However if I am on the fence between ordering a book from CK or a different publisher, this episode will push me a little toward the other publisher.
I’m not ordering the Hitchhikers Guide (I have the Folio LE) and am now on the fence for the Farseer trilogy. Again it isn’t something I have read before, but I don’t want to be put in this position again, so if the book is beautifully designed I will go for it, but if I am on the fence perhaps not

I personally see nothing but red flags with a publisher insisting on preorders for the second book in a series before sending out the first. Especially when the first is supposedly so close to completion.

>390 DMulvee: I agree, the first book is a masterpiece and the second book is… just fine, they are leagues apart. I’m glad I read the second one to see where Simmons wanted to take the story but for my book collection I’d be perfectly happy with just the first one (and as such am gutted I missed this version) because it’s the one I would re-read over the years. I wouldn’t read the second one again.

>389 astropi: >393 anthonyfawkes: I have a different take. I loved the second one. I read them in an omnibus edition, and to me there was just no separation between the two: they were just two parts to the same story. I think the confusion arises from the way they are usually marketed as two separate books - though in fact they are no more separate than The Fellowship of the Ring is from TTT and TROTK - and the difference in structure. The first one is made up of short stories (which are excellent) while the second one brings it all together in one huge, expansive, mind-blowing space opera (at least, that's how I remember it). I've even read complaints that the first volume 'ends on a cliffhanger', as if the readers are completely unaware that the book has a second part. I agree with >380 Ragnaroekk: that you can't have one without the other: they are two parts of the same book. The Endymion volumes are two parts of the sequel.

>392 NathanOv: I think that's a bit harsh ('nothing but red flags'). The publisher has made it clear that they are trying their best to delivers asap and that they are aware that the situation is not ideal. That's why they wanted to at least release an initial batch, so that people could see photos of what's coming. Obviously there is some hold up in the bindery; I think every one of us here is aware that fine press production is not always smooth and patience is often necessary. Looking at it from the publisher's side: 1) they tried their best to get it out and at least come up with a compromise solution; 2) cash flow from the preorder is needed to keep the business going, it might not be possible to always delay indefinitely and 3) if they delay this, do they then delay Hitchhikers too? Cos if not people would complain that they are too close. In any case, I would suggest some here wait until they have both volumes in hand before they start to read (see first paragraph above).

>387 paulm16: This is also a bit harsh. I think it's pretty clear which book you're talking about. Not sure it's fair to say you've been 'pushed to the end of the queue'. You are aware that in ordering the most expensive edition you ordered the most elaborate and most complex to produce edition, right? I think you'll find your answer there. Again, this is common in the fine press world - take a look at the Suntup 'Status Updates' page, for example, and see how long some have been waiting for their lettered editions. As for 'the publisher has also done some other private work in the meantime', there is a difference between design work and the printing and binding work needed to create the finished product.

It is annoying that no one has received their Hyperion copy yet, and we are expected buy Fall in just a few days. I was hoping to get mine before the holiday shipping bombardment, but that seems unavoidable now. Shouldn't be making promises you can't keep.

>394 Levin40: Well said on all fronts. I'm one who has yet to receive my copy of Hyperion, and while it's hard to predict whether something will turn into a Dark Regions Press, I haven't seen anything in terms of delays or communications on updates from CK that is out of the ordinary in the fine press world that gave me pause on preordering Fall as soon as I received the link.

From Curious King:

Hi everyone,

Just to give everyone an update on Hyperion and Fall of Hyperion!

We have decided to extend the pre-order period of The Fall of Hyperion until November 3rd at 20:00GMT, and moved the public pre-sale to November 5th at 20:00GMT.

This decision hasn’t been taken lightly, but we wanted to ensure as many customers as possible have their copies in their hand before the public pre-sale.

We also want to ensure each copy is perfect before it goes out, so shipping has taken (and continues to take) longer than usual for one of our books. We can only apologise for this! We are certain though that you should all be very pleased with the finished article.

As mentioned there will be some extra copies of Hyperion going up once the remaining copies have been shipped. When we know exactly how many we have left we will keep everyone informed of a date/time for when they go up for sale.

Please note, everyone who buys one of these remaining Hyperion copies, will be offered a matched The Fall of Hyperion – so do not worry about not securing a matched copy. Even if this is after the The Fall of Hyperion public sale, we will hold some back for this very situation.

Once again, many apologies for this situation arising, Hyperion should have gone out months ago! We hope you understand the reason to extend the period as we really want everyone’s copies in their hands before the window closes.

For now, please enjoy some pictures of Hyperion in production!

The pre-order deadline has been moved back to November 3, fyi.

>398 A.Nobody: yes, these news are much appreciated.

>394 Levin40: I fully respect your opinion. I also think you're 100% correct that they are meant to be read together, similar to Lord of the Rings. Nevertheless, I feel the two are not in the same league. The first volume is one of my favorite science fiction works of all time, and in my mind a masterpiece. The second is very good. Absolutely worth reading, but it nevertheless does not have the same charm and the deus ex machina ending is unfortunate.

Anyone got their book? I haven't yet.

>401 dyhtstriyk: mine arrives tomorrow - I emailed Ludlow and they said that the couriers weren’t turning up to pick up the books for some reason

>401 dyhtstriyk: Mine arrived today - in the Netherlands.

>402 willraven:

>403 frik51:

Thanks. Are you getting shipment notification e-mails once they are shipped?

>401 dyhtstriyk: Nope

>404 dyhtstriyk: Yes, I got two. One from inexpress and one from DHL.

UK here, I just got my Inexpress email notifying me that my shipment from Ludlow bookbinders has been booked with DHL with a tracking number, but nothing from DHL yet and the tracking isn't working so likely still getting the parcel ready for collection.

Has anyone without publisher's rights got their notification yet? I assume they're sending out to that group first.

>404 dyhtstriyk: Did get a notification; not from CK but the track and trace from Ludlow. I actually had expected a different book - Hyperion came as a surprise when opening the box.

Just received a shipment notification. It was sent directly from Ludlow.

My copy just arrived. The updated DHL tracking yesterday said it would be delivered Monday so was pleasantly surprised when I got a notification early this morning saying it would be delivered this afternoon.

Got my copy. The photos on the website don't do it justice. I initially didn't like the design, but it's much more nicer in person. Great job.

Received my copy today. Spectacular production. By the feel of the paper and the letterpress you know what a luxury item truly is.

The only thing I wish was different was having all edges gilt instead of just the top one. But it's relatively minor.

Thinking to make The Hitchhiker's Guide my first purchase from CK. Having never purchased before, should I expect to be online hitting refresh from the moment public sales go live?

>415 cyber_naut: They can be a bit of a madhouse, but the limitation for the standard Hitchhikers Guide is also fairly huge. I suspect any numbered will be very hard to get, but you should have at least a few minutes if not hours on standard.

>416 NathanOv: thanks!

Not a fan of the numbered. Those white boards are going to be annoying to keep clean. Wish they would have gone with a different color. The standards look okay.

>418 Undergroundman: Standard is my favorite as well, I just don't know why it had to be so busy, with the 4-5 stamped designs over what's already an ornate marble pattern, and then that light and wavy typeface on top of it all.

I'd be buying it primarily for the interior if I decide to, and the art looks great, I just hope it's more organized and less over-designed than the exterior.

>419 NathanOv: Yeah, the standard is a bit loud. Still, I much prefer it over a White book. The Lettered also looks like the Suntup Neuromancer lettered.

418-420: I have a couple of white leather books on my shelves - and have had no issues keeping them clean. Of course, white could get tricky if you frequently need to get your hands dirty, smoke indoors, or live in an area with a high level of air pollution (e.g., Bombay or Beijing). That said, November has been an expensive month, and I am not *that* enamoured with the deluxe design, so I am going to go with the champagne standard.

>419 NathanOv: Agreed. The label on the spine uses marbled paper with a black background and white swirls, has a gold border, then white text stamped over the white swirls, and then the image of two fishes in gold it seems.

It does have rather busy boards. I’m attracted to the champagne edition but it has darker marbling which the title and design seems to get a bit lost in. The black edition seems to have a dark blue marbling which allows the design to stand out more.

>362 SF-72: Am I understanding correctly that Hitchhiker’s Guide will not be published by CK as a series? I am also thinking this might be my first CK purchase, though that fact gives me some pause.

I think it will be a fantastic release but with my tendencies for completion and consistency I’m wondering if I would be better off with the FS series.

I’m okay with CK doing only the first book. It’s far and away my favorite of the series. Personally I wouldn’t want them to commit to a 5 books series, but I understand why some would prefer all or nothing.

>425 Ragnaroekk: I think you’re right, it looks too good to pass up (assuming I’m fast enough).

I was wondering for the Fifth Season standard that is actually numbered will we get a matching number for the next book?

>428 Undergroundman: It's not stated anywhere but almost certainly 'yes'. They even matched standard editions across series: my copies of The Blade Itself and The Fifth Season have the same number.

>424 PJ-Reads:

That's what they said, and I must say I find that disappointing because I would enjoy having the complete series in their edition. If that bothers you, the complete FS edition would definitely suit better. The limited edition is very nice, but the standard edition is also pleasant and is still available from the publisher. You can find the limited edition for sale, but it's expensive. But as has been said, the one by Curious King will be much richer when it comes to illustrations. Gary Gianni outdid himself once more.

>429 Levin40: OK. Thanks.

Around 30 minutes to go to the public pre-order of Hitchhiker’s Guide.

I’m still debating between the black or the champagne standard edition. I decided against getting a deluxe copy. The binding is too out there for my taste.

Looks like website issues?

Seems like a redirect from the countdown page isn't working. I got it to work by editing the link a bit: here's the functional one.
Ordered a black standard edition. Gianni seems like a great fit. I like lavishly illustrated books, it's why I fell for Lyra's Alchemist which also had Gianni.

>433 DMulvee: Follow the link in the email

There is a working link on CK's Facebook page, as well (that is how I got there).

Deluxe has gone. I picked up a black standard and am very happy with that.

Settled for the champagne standard.

Picked up a Deluxe by following the email link...

Black standard because to me it suits better with the marbled paper. But I don't have a confirmation email yet, which is strange. I hope that's just a glitch.

>440 SF-72: Agreed - the champagne with the dark marble papers didn't work for me. Received order confirmation a minute after ordering so the emails are going out ok.

Also snagged a Deluxe. Hand & Eye Letterpress, Ludlow Bookbinders, Gary Gianni, Freya Scott at Paperwilds; you cannot go wrong! I have not read this book in nearly 40 years. Love the Deluxe design on white goatskin. If not for that would have decided otherwise for one the Standard editions. Cannot go wrong with the options. First Curious King title. Excited!

Definitely beautiful all the way around! I'll be honest, fiscally speaking, it's an easy choice to go with the Standard, and I suspect there are a number left because they fortunately made 750 copies :)

>440 SF-72: Same - it looks like there's much better contrast for the stamping on the marbled paper and on the slipcase with the black version.

I am glad that I decided to go with standard rather than deluxe this time as that bad link would not have been good for my blood pressure - I did have Outlook running on the background but it did not ping for the email. Champagne version for me, although I did have some concerns about how the marbling and those (rather unnecessary) stamped designs interact. I guess it will be down to dumb luck in the end, though, since hand marbled sheets are all different.

Which is it, Mohawk or Munken Lynx?

Instagram post, 11/11/2024:
"Limited to 250 copies, the Deluxe Edition is letterpress printed on Mohawk Superfine 148gsm in two colours by Phil and Robert from Hand & Eye Letterpress and is 276 pages. The colour images have been offset printed on the page by Gomer Press, and the typography and B&W overprinted by Hand & Eye Letterpress."

Curious King web site:
"Limited to 250 copies, the Deluxe Edition is letterpress printed on Munken Lynx Rough Ultra White 150gsm in two colours by Phil and Robert from Hand & Eye Letterpress and is 276 pages. The colour images have been offset printed on the page by Gomer Press, and the typography and B&W overprinted by Hand & Eye Letterpress."

>446 PostToastee: I believe it is the Munken. I read somewhere that Europe was having a rough time getting Mohawk these days.

>441 antinous_in_london:

Thank you. Something seems to have really gone wrong with mine, but fortunately for my nerves someone replied to my email and confirmed that my order went through. Hopefully it's just some glitch or spelling error. I would have hated to miss out on this. It looks great.

>446 PostToastee: Those sound like two very different papers. I hope it's the Munken Rough since I like more tactile and natural feeling paper, but it's not exactly what you'd chose as a substitute for Mohawk Superfine.

>450 LT79: In this case, yes! You can check on the website and currently there are only 4 copies of the black and 48 of the champagne left. If you want the black, move now! :-)

I went with the Champagne Standard.

Unusually, neither the deluxe or lettered binding appealed to me. So I'm very happy to go with a standard.

The Black Standard is now sold out, and 47 copies of the Champagne remains.

Wanted black, hesitated too long, ended up with champagne. Sigh. First CK for me - I could not resist the beautiful, copious illustrations. Same reason I got the Alchemist. If this illustrator does another few titles I like next year, I am doomed. Expensive year...Hopefully not as many titles I like next year!

>457 LT79: If you type "100" in the quantity field, it'll update to how many are actually available.

>459 LT79: Currently 41

>456 LT79: I seem to about the only one that preferred the looks of the champagne.

>461 Cardboard_killer: I also prefer that look overall. I prefer the color of the cloth and also the marbling.

But I do find that the stamping on the front cover is kinda lost in the marbling with the champagne.

>461 Cardboard_killer:

The champagne cloth is beautiful and I would have loved to buy it, but to me the dark marbled paper with the light stamping works better in combination with a black spine that doesn't distract / detract from that. It's a pity. It would have been more interesting to have a completely different marbled paper then that might have been more in harmony with the champagne spine. But that's just my impression and taste. It's a great idea that they offered both.

>464 LT79: I think there are 36 copies left -- Considering they are close to selling out of 750 "standard" editions, that's really great! You know, I don't really approve of "standard" I propose a name change: Collector's Edition because "standard" does not in any way or shape do justice!

455: Gary Gianni has also done illustrations for Areté Editions (The Case of Death and Honey & The Adventure of the Creeping Man) and Lyra's Classics (A Christmas Carol). Of these, The Adventure of the Creeping Man is still available. It is not *that* profusely illustrated (just 4 drawings), as it was intended as a companion book for Death and Honey, but otherwise highly recommended.

461: I did go for champagne, as well (as have done 340 other people, most of them well before the black version sold out). Unfortunately, CK has issues with keeping things simple, and they have tended to add too much extra bling to their designs. As a result, I share Nerevarine's concerns about the visibility of the stampings on the marbled cover, particularly since no two marblings are exactly the same.

465: Nah, standard is just fine - Collector's Edition would be mere marketing mumbo jumbo.

>467 supercell: Hint, it’s all marketing mumbo jumbo.

>461 Cardboard_killer: Same!

>467 supercell: Thank you for the recommendation - I appreciate it. I think you are right about the marbling. I am guessing that depending on the marbling the stamping visibility will vary in both color ways. Likely both will be great in hand. Looking forward to my copy.

11 copies remaining of the Champagne standard, if anybody is on the fence.

>472 LT79: Wasn’t it £14? That actually sounds good to me

>474 LT79: When the Blade Itself was released P&P was £28 for the U.K.! So it has moved in the right direction

Nothing gets delivered to Australia for £28. Here the postage often costs more than the book!

>477 wcarter: Training kangaroos is expensive.

>478 Cardboard_killer: Indeed.

Just announced: next edition will be Weir's The Martian

Illustrated by Eason Zhang

https://curiousking.co.uk/andy-weir-the-martian/

I'm interested, but something about their aesthetic never works for me when the book actually shown.

>480 dyhtstriyk: excellent news, I am a fan of that book! I am working on my own edition of Project Hail Mary so hopefully it’ll go nicely with that.

Excited for this one! I missed the Subterranean release the first time around but hope to snag one of these!

I like the illustration a lot, but I'll read The Martian first to decide. I already have editions of his books, albeit not at this quality level, but haven't gotten around to reading them yet.

>484 SF-72: The Martian is an awesome read. I also highly recommend the Wil Wheaton narration via Audiobook - absolutely nails the character perspective in my opinion.

I honestly thought the movie was better than the book. I thought the writing in The Martian was okay but far from great, and I found some of the characters cliche -- for better much of that was trimmed off in the movie. The illustration does look very nice, and I'm sure the edition will be wonderful.

I thought the movie lost much of what made the book so enjoyable, the look into the inner workings of the protagonist and how he figures out the solution to each problem as it comes up. The movie was enjoyable but there was much less tension because of the pacing and lack of introspection.

>487 anthonyfawkes: I can see that point of view, but I thought the book moved too slowly. The movie, with all the special effects, and in my mind cutting out much of the filler, just made for a more enjoyable experience.

By the way, the premise of The Martian, that a storm on Mars is so powerful that it knocks down a rocket is highly unrealistic. Mars can have huge sandstorms, but the atmosphere is so thin, the power generated by the windstorms is minuscule compared to on Earth. That said, overall from a scientific perspective it was very clever and well executed :)

>485 NotSoSlimShady:

I've now read The Martian (and Weir's other two novels) and they're all really good. Now I am interested in the Curious King release, but while the illustration looked good at first, it's now clear that it doesn't really fit the description in the book. In this scene, he isn't wearing a space suit but several layers of clothing on top of each other, and if I remember it correctly, it's also stated that you can't look through the helmet's face plate. This kind of thing is irritating at the best of times, but more so with a book that puts an emphasis on getting things right with regard to science, space exploration etc. I'll wait for more illustrations and decide then.

>490 Ragnaroekk: LOL

Beginning to think the publishers, and artists don't actually read many of the books they work on. I blame the publisher more than the artist.

The topic of illustrations not fitting "very well" goes back to the early days as far as I can tell. One example that readily comes to mind is Dante's Inferno illustrated by Dore. Now, I love Dore, he was a genius. BUT, some of the illustrations in the Inferno are just, shall we say, using artistic license :)

And consider Arion Press and other such presses. For example, here is an illustration from their Odes of Horace --

So, what exactly does a smooth rock have to do with Horace? Well, again, artistic license and honestly, I don't think that's necessarily a bad thing. At the end of the day, if I like the illustrations I have no qualms, even if they're not exactly aligning with the text.

>493 astropi: The smooth rock is only relevant to the discussion if it was supposed to be a rough rock, I think. Was a rough rock part of the story by any chance?

>493 astropi: That's a really bad example considering it's poetry, and has more liberty with the artist's interpretation. A novel is totally different, because it's a complete story with actual descriptions that is supposed to hold the story together.

>495 Undergroundman: No, it's not a "really bad example" especially if you know what the Odes of Horace are about. A lot of poetry paints pictures just as clear as any novel, and the Odes are no exception - for example:

To Mercury
Mercury, eloquent grandson of Atlas,
I’ll sing of you, who wise with your training, shaped
the uncivilised ways of our new-born race,
with language, and grace
in the ways of wrestling, you the messenger
of Jove and the gods, and the curved lyre’s father,
skilful in hiding whatever pleases you,
with playful deceit.

Such ekphrastic poetry clearly evokes ancient Roman civilization and art, and NOT smooth stones. But again, I personally don't mind the artistic license when done well.

>496 astropi: The audience paying for an Arion P. book should know not to expect illustrations that depict anything from the text literally. (The Moser engravings for Moby Dick are a notable exception for them. Motherwell's Ulysses etchings seem much more the norm.) As for publishers like CK or Suntup: yeah, there's definitely a different expectation from the audience here.

>497 DenimDan: Agreed. Although I will say some of the Arion books I've seen such as The Sundial do indeed depict the text well --



although that is a notable exception :)

>496 astropi: If you asked me what Horace's odes were 'about' I'd have to suggest that they were in not-insignificant part about how much he hated one specific tree.

>499 gmacaree: Such works always struck me as being ancient "self-help" books to an extent -- I mean, much of the time they come down to "if you want to be happy, follow this advice" :)

The LEC Odes of Horce is reviewed at https://www.librarything.com/topic/339228
And the Folio Society limited edition at https://www.librarything.com/topic/367259

>502 LT79: Ditto. Also intrigued by the hint about the oft requested book with 22 illustrations and an asking price under 100GBP. Considering Hitchhiker's Guide is a short book and started at 185GBP, what could it be that would cut down costs that much? Public domain title? Tiny page count?

>503 A.Godhelm: I’d guess no letterpress, though if that’s the case it seems quite the risk to make that change on a much-requested title.

>503 A.Godhelm: “It is going to be offset litho printed”

>504 NathanOv: >505 Dr.Fiddy: I didn't realize it was that simple to cut the price in half.

>506 A.Godhelm: Yeah, it generally costs significantly more to produce letterpress publications than offset simply because offset is so readily available to basically anyone. Of course to myself and others, nothing compares to letterpress! I hope that if they do an offset edition, they also produce a letterpress edition for those that want it.

>508 astropi: The site does say ‘the Standard Edition is going to be accessible to most people. It is going to be offset litho printed…’ so would assume other states would be letterpress.

>510 antinous_in_london: Must have missed that, can you share the link where it says that please?

Here's what he said about the offset printed titles in December:

'I have also been giving some thought to doing a different kind of Curious King release for more niche titles. These would be offset print and possibly machinebound (by the best machinebinder in the UK), and would be considerably cheaper than current CK titles. It’s just an idea at the moment, but I feel there are some fantastic titles/series that deserve a limited edition with great design and art, but might not have enough of a following to justify the letterpress treatment. The turnaround would also be a lot quicker than our current titles due to printing/binding, but they would still be curated in art and design as our core releases. Again, I would only do titles that I love, to ensure they get all the care in the world.'

>511 astropi: It’s in the blog update on the site :

https://curiousking.co.uk/january-2025-production-update/

‘There is something else. And it’s probably happening this year. It’s very exciting. Just working out the full schedule at the moment and the best way to launch it. What I can say is, the Standard Edition is going to be accessible to most people. It is going to be offset litho printed and have 22 pieces of colour art by one of the best in the business. It’s also going to be very reasonably priced (under £100 I think). It’s one of the most requested, and a lot of you will be very pleased when announced’

>513 antinous_in_london: Doing one of his most requested titles in offset litho is dead opposite of what he’d said he’d use offset for if he were to switch up printing methods at all.

I frankly couldn't care less whether something is printed letterpress or not in most cases (something like Arete's Words of Fire being an exception). And seeing the huge difference in price just confirms this to me.

>515 SF-72:
I agree. Letterpress is just one factor that to me determines if a book is a fine edition or not. The other factors are :-
- Binding
- Illustrations
- Design and presentation
- Paper
- Slipcase/box
- Endpapers
- Page edge gilding or illustration.
Sewn pages and tail pieces are a given.

>515 SF-72: There seems to be quite a few letterpress books printed today where removing the letterpress element wouldn't change the feel of the book at all to me (and therefore adds very little to my enjoyment of it).

Letterpress tends to add the most to a book (for me) when craft is central to the publisher. Simply outsourcing printing to somewhere with a Heidelberg doesn't tend to result in an edition which produces the same feelings.

>518 Ragnaroekk:

Exactly, that's why I mentioned Words of Fire. With novels like the ones Curious King publishes, letterpress really doesn't make a positive difference, in one case actually a negative one since the printing wasn't quite even across the book or some pages. With something like Words of Fire where there's wonderful paper that you couldn't use for a long book (it would get much too thick) the effect is beautiful and the emphasis on the paper, printing, and content, of course. It works beautifully.

I love beautiful paper, too, and made my first experiences there when it comes to art, not books. The discovery of books using mould-made paper came much later.

>516 wcarter:
>517 EdmundRodriguez:

Exactly.

>519 SF-72: which CK book had printing issues?

>521 drizzled:

The Blade Itself. My very first page already had uneven printing (better at the top, then slowly getting worse towards the bottom), some of it being rather weaker than it should have been. I like the illustrations a lot, good binding and paper, but the letterpress printing left a lot to be desired. Considering how much of the price comes from that, I'd actually prefer a different printing process here, especially if it isn't even reliably good. It will be interesting to see if Before They are Hanged will be better.

>522 Ragnaroekk: >523 SF-72: I can confirm that their last book, Hyperion, has excellent and consistent printing throughout. The book also has many well produced b&w letterpress-printed illustrations. So if they did have some minor teething problems at the beginning I think they've been fixed now. Anyway, we'll find out for sure when we see Before they are Hanged in a few weeks. Personally, I'm one who doesn't have much problem with a few (minor) letterpress printing inconsistencies - in some strange way they can even add to the charm...probably as an artefact of an analogue, human-controlled, inherently imperfect process in a digital, machine-controlled world. Or something like that :-).

>523 SF-72: that’s disappointing and, ultimately, not sure it can be put down to teething problems of a new press. CK may be quite new but it was printed by Nomad unless I’m mistaken.

I think the printing in The Blade Itself wasn’t great, it was better in the Fifth Season, and I didn’t notice anything wrong at all with Hyperion so fingers crossed Before They are Hanged follows this trend

>527 Ragnaroekk: I did not notice the writing errors, but that may have just been my brain correcting them when reading. Is there a list of the errors or some errata?

>525 cyber_naut: Nomad may not be new, but it may well have been the first time they printed a lengthy novel at a quite high limitation. Probably a different quality control process needed from their usual fare and may have taken some getting used to.

I'm not saying it's directly connected to the printing, but I would also remind everyone of the price of this edition. If I recall correctly the 'standard' was around £200 for a lengthy, letterpress printed limited edition, hand bound, in copyright and signed by both author and artist. That's pretty damn good I would say, and a few minor imperfections are certainly forgivable. God knows what the Folio Society, say, would charge for such specs. I believe they've charged more for their standard editions with an artist-only signature stuck in.

Just to make that clear: I'm not saying it's a bad book, and price is very fair for what you get. But the letterpress printing certainly isn't what makes me enjoy it, quite the opposite in this case. And yes, the font could have been bigger. My eyes aren't that great anymore and one of the things I appreciate about releases from smaller presses that do limited editions is that the font is usually much more readable than regular editions.

Just received my 'Before They are Hanged' standard. Having had a flick through I can say that, if there were any minor printing inconsistencies with 'The Blade Itself', they seem to have nailed it this time. My copy is well printed and consistent throughout. It will be a striking set once complete.

>533 Levin40:

Glad to hear it. I was hoping it was just teething problems with a first book.

Some photos of the standard edition of Andy Weir’s The Martian up on Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/share/p/16VSCcKRLs/?mibextid=wwXIfr

Disappointed with the design of all three states of ‘The Martian’. It’s a shame as I had been looking forward to this

>536 DMulvee: it makes me absurdly angry that they commissioned custom hand made Cave Paper for that lettered binding, and then went and printed the text on Mohawk superfine.

Would have been more interesting to use the Cave Paper with something else to form a landscape. With this design, its like looking straight down at the ground, filling 100% of your field of view.

Almost $800 US for the deluxe with suedel as the main material is kinda insane.

The standard at pre-order price is not bad value for a fun take on the novel. I (luckily) don’t like the CK deluxe / lettered designs, pretty consistently…

>538 What_What: I think that the solander box looks great, couldn't they have used that design in inlaid leather for the book? Then instead of using the Cave Paper for the exterior of the book, used this for the endpapers (I am a fan of marbling, but in this one instance I think that would have made sense).

I'm also irrationally angry at the email saying that they might do 'Project Hail Mary' and so you need to buy 'The Martian' to gain rights for that. I need to walk away from the computer and calm down!

>540 BorisG: If the standard was plain beneath the dust jacket, I would have been happy with this, I just don't like the image on the buckram

I read The Martian some years ago, and honestly, I thought the movie was better. I was unimpressed by Weir's writing. The plot was wonderful, even if there are some plots holes -- in fact, a Martian sandstorm can be huge, but nowhere nearly powerful enough to topple a large vehicle. But that aside, fun story, just not a great read in my opinion.

I quite like the designs on this one. No interest in the title though.

>543 gmacaree: agreed on the liking the design. I have read The Martian and Project Hail Mary, and while I found both very enjoyable they aren’t top picks and I don’t need a fine press edition. There a lot of people out there who absolutely love these books though so I’m happy they get a wonderful version to enjoy.

Echoing others, this looks really good, nice illustrations. Read the book, saw the film. No real interest in reading it again. I too felt the book was weaker than the adaptation, Weir's comedy is hitting that self-deprecating popculture note that reads like a reddit post over and over. Hail Mary (which CK say is coming up) felt a bit more ambitious in concept, more like an Arthur C Clarke plot perhaps, and the comedic touches were definitely the weakest part there too. I do appreciate that he tries to get the facts straight even if he fumbles some of them. Good on CK for including the additional entries so the edition feels complete.

I enjoyed the novel (a lot more than the film, which I saw first and liked then) and am looking forward to this edition. Great news that Project Hail Mary might also be done, though it will be interesting to see if the illustrator will manage to illustrate something that is very much out of our world.

Traffic must have been fairly heavy, tried nabbing one of the deluxe Martians but alas the site bugged out and I wasn't able to add anything to the cart for a good 5 minutes before they sold out, at least I managed to nab a standard.

547: I had the same issue. I tried four different browsers, and all three versions refused to co-operate. By the time I got the standard in my cart, both deluxe and lettered were gone. Fortunately, a standard copy was all I was trying to get this time - otherwise, I would have been seriously pissed off.

Edit: Everything's gone now.

>548 supercell: Same for me. I was going for the standard but couldn’t add it to the cart for a good 2 minutes. Once I’ve been able to do so, I checked the deluxe and it was sold out. Luckily I was only after the standard.

I couldn't even get a standard. It was trying to send me a verification code and I never got it. By the time I refreshed it was gone. I really wonder if they need to up their standard numbers.

I wasn't in the purchase scramble for this one, but was a little surprised to see the press already making a "it wasn't our fault" post on Facebook. This was not a big purchase event by Shopify standards. Plenty of bigger brands on Shopify get this level of traffic and sales on a normal business day.

I faced the same problem - it was five minutes until I could finally add a standard copy to my cart, which was fortunately what I wanted. The Deluxe was already sold out by then. I would have been really frustrated if I'd missed out on it because of that website / shop glitch. I'm just really glad it worked in the end.

I was at work and unable to check the link until an hour later :((
If anyone who managed to get a standard feel like parting with theirs (now or later on), I’d be very interesting in buying it.

I can only imagine the rush for Assassin’s Apprentice. I hope the issue will be dealt with by then. I wouldn’t want to miss out on that one because of a faulty add to cart button.

>553 BorisG:

It really looks like they should have made a larger number of books in this case. This one is really popular, and very nicely made, too.

I also wonder if scalpers are using bots for their purchases -- I know Shopify is supposed to prevent this, but when you never receive your code and the product sells out in the interim that defeats the purpose.

>556 astropi: Really sorry to hear you missed out but confused about your mention of receiving a code. I purchased The Martian and previously Hitchhiker's Guide from CK and there was no verification code as part of the purchase flow.

I did have technical issues in the first few minutes where I couldn't add the book to my basket but went through fine after that.

>557 cyber_naut: Are you in the UK? If so, that might explain the reason. Every time I've purchased from CK I've received a Shopify code that is used to verify my identity - fair, no problems. But this time even though the code should have been sent, I never received it. I then asked Shopify to email me the code, and it would not work, and so I just refreshed and that was that - sold out. Stinks.

>558 astropi: I am in the UK but no idea if that's the reason. I didn't even log into a Shopify account but checked out as a guest, although I do seem to have a CK Shopify 'account' associated with my email address.

No idea if this would help any as I don't know if the verification is enforced at 'login' or purchase but perhaps if you logged into https://curious-king-books.myshopify.com/account in advance of a release time, it could get verification out of the way before the sale is live?

Or if it really is just down to geography, a VPN to give yourself a UK IP address? Somewhat ridiculous to have to jump through such hoops just to buy a book though! Especially if nothing stays in stock long enough to risk wasting time testing out any of these approaches...

558: I am in the EU, and have never needed a Shopify code. Like cyber_naut, I simply check out as a guest, i.e., without logging in. I do seem to need to go through the bank's payment verification process whenever purchasing from CK, though, and in a tight race that could become an insurmountable hurdle.

>559 cyber_naut: >560 supercell: Thanks, maybe it was trying to log me in? At any rate, it was frustrating since Shopify clearly glitched and the standard edition just vanished.

>561 astropi: I've required Shopify codes in the past as well... this time it came in time but I've missed out on others due to the added wait. Will have to look at the guest option next time, or see if there's a way to pre-authorize / get the code early.

>561 astropi: I bought Gibbet Hill yesterday and Shopify sent me a code. Not unusual for me. Based in Asia.

>561 astropi: Shopify allows for saving payment info (address + card) and tying it to an email. The verification flow will trigger when you try to check out with the code required to retrieve the stored address and payment info.

I’d recommend using a new email if you have autofill enabled in your browser or use Apple Pay (PayPal is too slow IMO)

>551 NathanOv: I was surprised at this as well. It has to be some implementation issue on their website, as it’s hard to see how the load, such as it was, would make the button ineffective. Not to mention, as you said, that kind of load is negligible for Shopify.

It sounds like one is better off without an account with shopify. I always check out without one and am not asked for a code, which delays things by too much with book sales like the one yesterday.

What didn't work was the purchase button, and I do find that weird. I can't imagine that Suntup at its peak didn't have as much traffic and their website always worked, still does. The same goes for The Broken Binding when they're selling a small number of copies left over after subscribers's sales.

Their latest email announces an upcoming edition of Mythago Wood. No details are provided, and I do wonder if they would have announced this early if Folio weren't preparing to release a limited edition of the same work next week.

>567 ambyrglow: It's fascinating how often these coincidences pop up. It's not the right's holders shopping around their IP to small presses surely? In which case it's synchronicity.

I also wonder if the rights owners start offering their book and the end result are almost simultaneous editions. Which would be pretty unfair.

I do wish Curious King named an artist or showed at least some artwork so one can compare. I'd rather support them in general, but John Howe's art does appeal to me.

>568 A.Godhelm: I think the proximity is somewhat of an illusion in this case. FS are days away from publishing; Curious King have literally just got rights and nothing else, as far as I can gather. So years apart really. But yes, there are now so many small publishers exploring turning older SF/fantasy titles into nice editions that some overlap is inevitable, especially with FS now pivoting to largely SF/fantasy LEs too. What I'm wondering is if the estate even informs publishers that another publisher already has rights and is making a parallel edition. It seems not!

>569 SF-72: From the way they describe it, Curious King don't have an artist yet, they've literally just got the rights. He even says it's 'not set in stone'. It's highly unlikely that anyone will attempt to sell a copy at this stage, given that we know nothing of the production details, or the pricing, and it's not even the next book for those with publisher's rights.

>570 Levin40: I think SF-72 was talking about copyright owners in general rather than about the rightsholders of a certain fine press.

>571 supercell: Yeah, could be actually. Maybe I misread it.

>571 supercell:

Exactly. There have been so many cases of several small presses publishing their special editions in a relatively close time frame, that it's starting to look like more than lots of coincidences to me. I could be wrong, though.

And like > 567 ambyrglow I wonder if that's why Curious King announced this edition at this time. That way their customers know they can wait for their edition as opposed to buying the one from Folio Society and then facing the choice of buying a second one or not.

>573 SF-72: If they just signed the contract, it’s probably two years away from shipping, while the Folio Society will be shipping theirs next week.

>574 What_What:

Quite possibly. Still, it makes a difference. I just refrained from buying a book I usually would have got since I already have a nice edition from someone else who published it maybe two years ago. In this case I probably wouldn't have waited around for it, in others I definitely would. So It's good that Curious King mentioned that they are planning an edition of Mythagowood, too.

I’d wait for Curious King editions if I thought I had more than a slim chance of getting one before they sell out.

>575 SF-72: I agree it’s good they mentioned it. CTP did the same thing, and who knows when theirs is going to ship.

>577 What_What:

Do Conversation Tree Press also plan an edition of Mythago Wood or do you refer to another book?

>578 SF-72: Presume it’s Perdido Street Station, announced by CTP soon after Folio announced their LE.

>579 cyber_naut:

Ah yes, thank you.

>579 cyber_naut: Thank you.

From the email today it looks like CK have learned a lesson from the issues affecting some people trying to buy The Martian.

Hope everyone who wants a copy of Assassin’s Apprentice can get one. 750 copies of the standard is a pretty healthy limitation.

For what it's worth, I asked if they intend to do any Robin Hobb beyond the Farseer Trilogy - personally I'd love to get the Liveships Trilogy - and got this response:

'We fully intend to do the full series if we are given the chance. We just need to secure the rights for each new trilogy separately. So we can't promise 100% that we will do the whole 16 book series, we will certainly be trying our best to make that happen. Assuming each title sells well, I see no reason why we won't be able to keep going until the very end. Wish us luck, we are in it for the long run!'

I wasn’t planning to pick this one up initially, but I might just splurge on the Standard after all. Did I mention blue is my favorite color? Well-made, heavily illustrated fantasy editions might become my weak spot. I’m still fairly new to the genre, I’ve only invested in Folio Society’s A Song of Ice and Fire series so far.



And next month, CTP is releasing Tigana (also in blue, haha? :D ), which I absolutely enjoyed reading.

>584 drizzled:

They're doing a wonderful job visually. The only reason I won't buy these books is that I already read the first trilogy in a previous illustrated edition and found it incredibly depressing. Does anyone here know if the later books are different in that regard?

>585 SF-72: I find the Liveship books (set in a different part of the world) less depressing, but if you're asking about Fitz's story specifically, no, not really.

-Removed as I was corrected and informed by others below-

>587 HowardEriksonWolfe: Prices are there in the original blog post on curious king website.

The design looks nice! Hoping I can grab a standard copy and it doesn't gets sold out instantly.

>587 HowardEriksonWolfe: it’s on the product page (albeit there seems to be more than one of those): https://curiousking.co.uk/book-release-assassins-apprentice-robin-hobb/

GBP £225 standard; £575 numbered; £2,350 lettered.

>586 ambyrglow:

Thank you very much, that's what I needed to know. It's really not something I want or need then. Life is tough enough right now, I don't need to wallow in depressing literature on top of it.

Still, it is a beautiful edition and I'm sure others will it enjoy it.

>588 PulseOfEarth:

Thank you, not sure why I missed that.

>589 cyber_naut:

Thank you! I guess that fault was in me for not looking thoroughly enough!

Just confirmed a standard edition, good luck to everyone ordering. It took a couple minutes for the link to work. The Deluxe was showing sold out, not sure if that’s an error.

Edit: the standard is also showing sold out for me now. I have to assume something isn’t working, seems way too fast to actually sell out.

Expensive day with Folio & CK releases! Congrats to both with super fast sell-outs.

Skipped the Folio because it was not signed (and the 25 % ROW markup would have been too much, anyway), and the standard Assassin's Apprentice sold out while I was checking out (after taking several minutes to get the link to work and waiting a minute in the queue). A very inexpensive day - particularly since I now do not need to buy any of the Hobb follow-ups, either.

Sold out by the time I was able to even do anything :/

>595 supercell: So annoying. Sometimes I feel publishers are a bit clueless -- "We're going to publish one of the most acclaimed and desired books in fantasy! and our books sell out in seconds. Let's therefore release far too few copies!" -- I seriously wonder if they do this on purpose?

Missed the Deluxe, but was able to get a Standard. So happy day for me (but expensive, with Folio’s It).

Dithered and missed out, but in retrospect I'm ok with keeping my powder dry for other upcoming releases.

I read the books many years ago and thought they were enjoyable. But there's only so much shelf space in the world and I'd feel compelled to finish the trilogy and, knowing me, the subsequent trilogies if CK decided to continue - and why wouldn't they given the rollicking success of this release? That's a lot of shelf inches and money devoted to something I only 'enjoyed' so probably for the best.

At least that's what I'm telling myself!

A queue for checkout, wonderful... That's me being sarcastic. In my experience, that's a really bad way to checkout. And I'm rather negatively surprised that things still didn't work properly. It sounded like they had that solved with not using their own website. And yes, the limitation was clearly too low. I'm rather glad I didn't need this title after reading about people's experience here.

Rant:
I don't know if anyone on here plays/collects video games as well as books? There's a video game publisher called "Limited Run Games" -- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limited_Run_Games
They really created the "indie publisher" model of today - that is, publishing only physical copies of games that would otherwise have only been available as digital copies. When they first started, they would publish 1500 copies of a game or less, and it would often sell out in seconds. Obviously that turned many people off, since demand was far higher than availability. They quickly fixed that problem by having an open pre-order period. I really don't understand why a publisher does not aim for the same model? I do of course understand that it's unreasonable for say Curious King to publish 20,000 copies of a book. But in my mind they could certainly have a pre-order period with the same limitation of "one copy per household" and then see how many copies people purchase. I think for a very popular book such as Assassin's Apprentice they might have had a few thousand pre-orders. This is not unreasonable, and it's not as if Bantam Spectra would complain about a few thousand copies being produced, especially since Robin Hobb greenlighted all of this. At the very least, they could have sent out a survey and I bet they would have found that 750 is certainly far too low.

Well looks like it was not an error, that was a tremendously fast sell-out. I understand it is a popular fantasy series but 750 seemed a fairly generous limitation - at least enough to last more than a matter of minutes. Anthony must be pleased, although I wonder if in these cases there is a feeling of regret for not having more copies available. I wonder if the fine presses ever consider going back and increasing the limitations - but maybe agreements have already been made with the printers/binders, supplies orders already placed, etc.

Would be interesting to have some statistics on the fastest selling books, but I’m sure that would be practically impossible without real time estimates.

Congratulations to Anthony and team. They are clearly doing something right with the way CK books are selling.

>600 astropi: seems we were having similar thought processes. An open pre-order period makes sense, although I suppose the risk is what to do if the interest far exceeds the capacity to produce. Fulfill on a first-come-first-serve basis up to the max number of units and then cancel the rest of the pre-orders?

A survey would be better to simply gauge interest, but I wonder if the results can be remotely trusted as representative of actual purchasers.

>600 astropi: That's an interesting idea. I believe Conversation Tree press did something like that with the Treasure Island Kickstarter - at least for the Standard/Collector's and Deluxe states. From the site: "The final print run will be set at the end of the campaign based on the total number of backers, in addition to a select number of extra copies for those who miss the campaign."

I don't know the pros and cons from the publisher's perspective. I thought it was an interesting approach.

>602 PJ-Reads: Maybe a subscription model? Ask buyers to purchase in advance, then base limitation on how many pre-orders you have. That might turn off the people who consider the exact limitation a major deciding factor, since they won't know it in advance, but I don't know that that's a large group.

I'd been flipping between yes and no on this (not having read the book before) and ended up missing the time.
Ah well, probably for the best - I realized I don't love the artwork they've shown.

In terms of pre-orders, even for a book as popular as Assassin's Apprentice it's not as if 10,000 people are going to purchase such an "expensive" edition when you can get the book on amazon for under $10. However, I could definitely see around 1000-2000 orders. Fine letterpress books are definitely a niche market, and I don't see that changing anytime soon. That said, a pre-order where you have to pay ahead of time (that's what Limited Run Games and other such video game publishers do) would in my mind, have made it so that anyone that wanted a copy could get one. As it stands, some people on the Curious King facebook page (honestly, I believe they are resellers as far as I can tell) are already saying "rights to the series are going for thousands of dollars" -- maybe true, maybe an exaggeration. Regardless, super aggravating for anyone that truly wanted a copy and missed out.

I don’t understand how I missed out on the standard. It seemed to be released a couple of minutes after the hour, I had created an account and pre-loaded information. I did have to confirm my transaction with my bank (20-30s), however I am stunned that it then appeared to be sold out. Something sounds very odd. I was wandering around Devon earlier in the day, I happened to remember the Folio Society had a limited edition King being released today and I managed to buy that, so am baffled that I miss out on a standard copy of the Farseer.

>607 DMulvee: With how fast these sold out 20 to 30 seconds is more then enough time to miss it. The deluxe version was sold out in less then 20 seconds from what I can tell. Im not sure how long the standard was around, but I would wager it was less than 5 minutes or so.

>608 XileLerinrill: The standard was held back for 2 minutes, it was possibly 4 minutes past the hour when I completed the bank authorisation, so I think it was more like 2 minutes to sell out. That is what I find implausible

Well, that was unexpectedly fast. Reminds me of early Suntup days. I was hoping to pick up a standard, as I have all previous CK releases in this tier, and I figured that the increased limitation mean that we had at least 20-30 mins even if it sold fast. How wrong I was. Anyway, perhaps in retrospect it's a good thing as I was coming at it more from a publisher completionist perspective and it frees me up from the serious now.

>609 DMulvee: I think there are a few factors involved here, beyond the obvious one of the book just being plain popular. Firstly, CK are in general far better at marketing in the run up to releases than most other presses and I think it's starting to really pay off now. Secondly, perhaps the author herself has been promoting this sale and, if so, it doesn't seem beyond the bounds of possibility that 1000+ of her more rabid fans were lining up to buy...

>601 PJ-Reads: Anthony must be pleased, although I wonder if in these cases there is a feeling of regret for not having more copies available. Probably more likely regretting not having charged more per copy!

>600 astropi: My suspicion is that they are being constrained by printer capacity and scheduling- that is they actually only have capacity for X amount of copies. I think they outsource their printing/binding, which would make printing larger runs (less design/promo work + additional labor is borne by the contractor) the obvious choice otherwise. But I think if they could do a near open edition in the preorder stage would be beneficial at least for the standard.

>611 ensuen: I have not done an analysis but anecdotally, it seems like there are a very small number of printers/presses being contracted by every publisher selling letterpress editions. I imagine letterpress printing to be a time consuming operation performed by an incredibly small number of people, meaning that they likely couldn’t offer up the time to print 2500+ copies given all their other projects. I hate to say it but there is probably a fundamental mismatch between the desire for high quality, “hand-crafted” books and higher limitations. Unless someone is going to open a letterpress factory.

>610 Levin40: Levin40: don’t give them any ideas! I am just grateful to be able to afford the standard editions.