Friend-pimping Stephen King
Posted on June 16, 2006 Posted by John Scalzi 3 Comments
Art by Mark Geyer
No, I don’t know Stephen King personally. I don’t even know him impersonally. I hear he’s a nice guy. But I do know Bill Schafer, publisher of Subterranean Press, and that’s why I’m letting you know that Subterranean is publishing a special 10th anniversary edition of King’s serial novel The Green Mile:
Subterranean Press is delighted to announce the 10th Anniversary Edition of this classic work. Mark Geyer, whose art graced the original paperback releases of The Green Mile, has agreed to provide more than 60 original sketches for our edition. This exclusive publication will consist of six individual illustrated hardcover volumes, contained in a cloth slipcase.
For you collectors, these books come in three editions: Gift, Limited and Lettered. If you get the Lettered collection, you take your collection very, very seriously. Apparently, for Stephen King, there are a lot of serious collectors, so if you’re one of them, you really should get a move on.
This is pretty cool for Subterranean, and as someone who’s done a lot of work with them, I’m happy to see the house doing well. I can’t imagine this edition of The Green Mile will be anything but excellent.
We have a few books printed by Subterranean (including Agent) and the quality is universally excellent. Some of them are really beautiful books, and I expect that the King editions will be superb. If I had a spare $2500, I’d be might tempted. And I’m not a King fan.
Every time I think I’ve lost my mind as a collector, I refer myself to the Stephen King collectors, and then my hobby doesn’t seem quite so zany.
Wow.
Wow… hard to believe it’s been TEN years since The Green Mile. I was selling books at the time (Waldenbooks, Lenox Square/Atlanta, in case I have any underground fans) and though I’ve never read any King, I remember thinking Holy shite, this is genius! What an incredible way to get people to pay almost $20 for a mass-market paperback!! How can this ever be topped??
It took 10 years, but now I know. Hats off to marketing guys everywhere.