Lit New Hardcovers Out of Print, Ridiculously Expensive!

I love hardback books. I love how they feel, I love how they look on my shelf, and I love how the size of it brings out the art on the dust cover. In general, hardbacks are my favorite.

What a displeasure then to see that newer books like Lords of the Sith cannot be obtained in hardback form for less than $100! I bought the paperback just to read it, and this is definitely one that I'm going to want to have in hardcover eventually. Will they print any more copies of this in hardback? Is there any way that I can tell Del Rey to do this?

 

The worst part is, I bought it, A New Dawn, and Heir to the Jedi in HC when they first came out, and sold them used very cheap.

 

Ironically, they used to have the problem of too many hardcover books, even for 200-page novels that they would sell at $40 simply because it's HC.

 

I kind of doubt they would reprint hardcovers. I'm so glad I started getting them from the beginning. They all look so nice lined up.


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What the... ? Have there been any paperbacks since the re-launch?

 

Yeah, most came out in paperback with additional short stories packed in. Tarkin and A New Dawn were bound together with three original short stories. All paperbacks are very available. Get the HC while you can, though!

 

I mean straight-to-paperback, no hardcover release. Have there been any?

 

No, not from Del Rey. Middle Grade books through Disney Press like Servants of the Empire were, though.

 

Hello - Del Rey person here,

We are aware that some of our books have become very expensive on the secondary market after going out of print in hardcover. Those titles are unlikely to see another hardcover reprint. Actually - absent some anniversary or special circumstance - it is rare for any book (SW or otherwise) to return to press in a format that has gone out of print...

Hardcovers generally go out of print around the time of the paperback release. That is not a guarantee, but if you're keen on collecting it's good to use as a time marker. Paperbacks generally release 9 months after the hardcover. Sometimes a little less, sometimes a little more. It varies.

The best suggestion I can give is to avoid paying those high prices and search in used book stores locally or in areas you travel to. I've found several hardcovers of titles like Tarkin and A New Dawn in used book stores that were very reasonably priced. You might even band together with other book hunters to try and track these down. If in my travels I come across any, I'll be sure to let people know where to find them, or perhaps even buy a few up to give away (I visit A LOT of used/rare book shops each year).

 

Some sellers on Amazon take the piss.

Hardbacks mostly go down in price, not up. Consider buying from abroad and just pay the shipping, can be less than you might expect.

 

I would have liked to start collecting all of the new canon books in hardcover format but sometimes I prefer paperback if it's a resonably sized book and not a tiny book like the Legends reprints where I have to be really careful not to damage the spines. Sometimes Paperback is less of a hassle for me if I don't have space. I'll tell you what is too much when it comes to Amazon and Ebay buyers, Dark Horse paperback comics. Some of the later stories I can still get for cheap at least for a little while but goddamn, Dawn of the Jedi: Force Storm is ridiculous with prices going from £200 to £500. I also regret not getting Son of Dathomir when it was only £15. I'll get the Legends reprints Marvel is putting out but I always preferred having the Dark Horse logo on my shelf personally.

 

Same with music; I've been checking some of those "limited bonus" editions that I ignored years ago, and the best bargain I saw was one that's a few € on eBay listed for €600 on Amazon. I think most of it comes down to incompetence based on the fact that they have to deal with too many products.

 

You could also try a specialist SF bookstore. I know Forbidden Planet in London has a SW section and I usually see a mix of HC and PB books on the shelves when I'm there.

 

One thing I'd flag is books and comic trades tend to operate under different rules, so don't assume what's true for one medium applies to the other.

 

You shouldn't feel aggrieved about Son of Dathomir. As it is canon, it wont be getting a Legends re-print, just a re-print with Marvel on it. Whether the DH version will retain it's value then is anyone's guess.

And yes I would agree with LAJ Fett - specialist shops like Forbidden Planet tend to go further back hardcover wise than the mainstream shops. In fact when i went last week there were selling off Razors Edge HC for £1.99!!!

 

I got this pack on kindle for my paperwhite. So awesome!

 

The normal pattern as described is that the paperback comes bundled with an Insider short story. So Lords of the Sith came with Orientation, TFA came with Bait (and the perfect weapon). etc. However that's not always guaranteed even in the tie in short story novels. Aftermath paperback didn't come with Blade Squadron Zero Hour.

 

Isn't there supposed to be a Blade Squadron Anthology collection thing coming out? Could have sworn anyway.

 

Hey, go here:

https://www.abebooks.co.uk/servlet/SearchResults?bi=h&sortby=17&tn=star+wars+lords+of+the+sith

You might have to pay higher shipping but given the other offers going, that might be the best deal you're going to get.

 

Abebooks is good for stuff like this, as can be Powells Books. (The latter are US-based). I've used both in the past. Abebooks is owned by Amazon, I believe.

 

bsmith-I love the hardback picture.

I usually collect the hardcovers the day it comes out. I've done that with the legends stuff before. If they add special stories in the paperbacks then I collect them too. The hardcovers are so nice. The name of the game is if you want to get the hardcovers, plan for when the books come out and then buy them. If you buy them from amazon, they usually go down in price by the time of release.

 

Really glad I started collecting all the hardcovers of these on day one. My Legends bookshelf looks so silly with the mix of paperback and hardback, especially with books in the same series but different formats.

 

This is indeed the golden rule of buying hardbacks.

 

Looking at that hardcover collection from the US, I find it weird that the font used for the word, 'aftermath' in the UK edition of the first book, differs on its spine.

Front cover of the UK aftermath novel = normal aftermath font, but on the same book on its spine it uses a different one, weird

 

Funny you should say that, as I've got a copy of pretty much every hardcover SW novel that was ever released that I've never really used. Probably read each one once but they'd be in mint condition.

Reason being that I hate hardcovers. I much prefer the smaller paperbacks (which they don't even seem to be releasing the new canon novels in at all, like wtf?) and I always bought the paperbacks as soon as they came out to keep rereading etc. The only I reason I bought the hardcovers was because I couldn't wait 6 months just to read the book and now they just sit around and do nothing.

So yeah I've got at least 2 copies of most SW books

Btw anyone know what the deal is with the new canon paperback formats? Like why don't they release SW books in the smaller, more compact paperback versions anymore? It's really annoying.