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Special editions

Books that transcend time,
crafted to be kept forever.

Clothbound covers, gilded lettering and edges, sewn signatures, and print runs small enough to number by hand. Three titles are in the bindery now — made for the shelf you never clear out.

Roman Reads The Hobbit Special Edition
I
The Hobbit
J.R.R. Tolkien
there and back again — in cloth

Forest-green cloth, blind-stamped runes on the board, map endpapers printed in two inks.

In the bindery
Roman Reads Harry Potter Special Edition
II
Harry Potter
J.K. Rowling
the one everyone lends and never gets back

Oxblood cloth, gilded house sigil, a ribbon marker in the same thread as the headband.

In the bindery
Roman Reads The Lord of the Rings Special Edition
III
The Lord of the Rings
J.R.R. Tolkien
one volume, properly bound

Midnight cloth, gilt top edge, sewn in signatures so it opens flat and stays open.

In the bindery
What makes it special

Four things a paperback doesn't do.

IClothbound boards

Book cloth over heavy board — not laminated paper pretending to be cloth. It takes a blind stamp, and it takes twenty years of shelf.

IIGilded lettering and edges

Real foil, stamped hot into the cloth. The top edge is gilded so dust sits on the gold instead of on the pages.

IIISewn, not glued

Sewn in signatures with a cloth headband. A glued spine cracks the third time you open it flat. A sewn one doesn't.

IVSmall print runs

A few hundred at a time, numbered. When a run is gone we set the next one — we don't warehouse pallets of unsold books.

None of these have shipped yet.

The first run is still at the binder. Tell us which title you want and we'll write to you when it's on the shelf — and tell us what should be bound next.

Tell us which one meanwhile, the library is open — sixteen volumes, no waiting.