Demand for ’signed’ copies of Children of Hurin
The most expensive book to ever sell through AbeBooks was a first edition of The Hobbit for $65,000. The Children of Hurin by JRR Tolkien - which was edited by Christopher Tolkien, son of JRR - was only released two weeks ago and has been selling well on AbeBooks. However, a market for ’signed’ copies has rapidly developed.
As Christopher Tolkien is 82 years old and lives in France, he is not doing any promotional appearances or conducting a book signing tour. So the publishers have been using signed bookplates as the main promotional tool.
AbeBooks has so far sold 25 copies of The Children of Hurin priced over $100, including one deluxe UK edition with a bookplate signed by Tolkien and illustrator Alan Lee for $390. There is currently another deluxe edition with a bookplate for sale on AbeBooks for $1000 from a bookseller in Kansas. Only three signed copies are available on our site.
The scarcity of these signed bookplate copies has meant that the collector’s market for The Children of Hurin has developed much quicker than usual. Copies signed by both Lee and Christopher Tolkien will probably remain at top-dollar prices but it looks like more copies signed solely by Lee (who is 59 and an active illustrator) will come on to the market and be more affordable. Lee has made appearances in London, New York, and Oxford and, oddly, Moreton-in-the-Marsh deep in the English Cotswolds.
April 30th, 2007 at 11:07 am
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