“A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds…”
- Ralph Waldo Emerson
We've visited Victoria a couple of times now, and we've started to develop a list of things to do and places to visit, which, in my case, obviously includes Munro's, Victoria's excellent indie bookstore.
I have yet to visit Munro's without finding something that a) I didn't expect to find; and b) wanted to buy. This visit was no exception - there in the science fiction and fantasy section was the full four book set of Chris Wooding's Tales of the Ketty Jay, an entertaining steampunk fantasy series that I'd previously read and enjoyed in digital format.
Unlike most steampunk, the Ketty Jay series takes place in its own reality, rather than an alternate history version of our own world. As such, Wooding is free to populate his tale with airships, pirates, golems, zombies, daemonists, and whatever else catches his fancy. The result is a fun light reading experience, full of adventure, drama, conflict, romance and dry humour.
Finding the entire Ketty Jay series is a bit of a happy coincidence in terms of timing – my friend Chris has been going through a bit of a steampunk phase in his reading, and I’d recommended the series to him. However, since I only have it as e-books and he doesn’t use any sort of e-reader, I was unable to lend it to him.
The only problem was that the four books at Munro's - all British imports - didn't match. Parts one, two and four of the series were Gollancz Fantasy editions, and part three, The Iron Jackal, was from Indigo, with a completely different design sensibility. (And a note on the copyright page that it had originally been published by Gollancz.)
It actually hurt me a little bit to buy this mismatched quartet of novels, although I can't quite bring myself to blame Munro's buyer for the situation. At least they had the full set, and if this is the price that they had to pay to make that happen, then so be it. It does make me a little curious, though. These aren't just different editions, they're different publishing houses. How does this happen? Did Wooding have contractual issues between the second and third books?
A little research reveals that the matching Gollancz edition of The Iron Jackal is available on Amazon.ca, so apparently he didn't have to switch publishers, but it's ridiculously expensive, clocking in at close to $60 for a new copy. Interesting - is there some reason that the third book in that production run is in short supply?
(Damn it...I also see that there's an omnibus edition of all four books for $30....no, wait, that's for Kindle, so I haven't made a huge mistake in buying them separately.)
I realize full well that it’s irrelevant that one of the copies came from a different publisher: the content will be the same**, it’s just a bit of foolish consistency to want the cover designs to match. Regardless, if I see the opportunity to purchase a (reasonably priced) replacement copy of the Gollancz edition of The Iron Jackal, rest assured that my little mind will jump, JUMP at the chance - hobgoblin or not.
- Sid
* Actually, it's quite comfortable for a weekend away, as well as being affordable and perfectly located. But small.
** Probably. After all, I have a Science Fiction Book of the Month Club omnibus edition of Michael Moorcock Elric novels which disappointingly omits a line from my much-read Lancer edition of Stormbringer, the final novel in the series. So you never know.
I probably bought a copy of 'Retribution Falls' at the same time you did from Pulp Fiction (I got them to order me a copy which came to just under $20 after tax). It's a Ballantine Books / Spectra / Random House version. I wouldn't mind borrowing the rest of the set from you when I am finished the first one!
ReplyDelete-Chris