Skip to main content

Choose Your Own Edition: The Ruby in the Smoke

This Choose Your Own Edition comes to you via my thus far failed attempts to foist a copy of The Ruby in the Smoke off on my friend Beth. The Sally Lockhart series is my favorite of Pullman's work, and I am just so eager for her to read that first incomparable line. My own copy is currently on loan in a different city and won't be returning soon. I did run across an older library copy for sale with a somewhat dismaying pale blue 90s cover and naturally turned my nose up at it (I did go back later but it was gone, naturally). Full disclosure: I am such a snob sometimes about the cover that accompanies someone's first impression of a book I love. Honestly, someone needs to beat it out of me. It's the reason I own three editions of Sunshine and yet only ever loan out one (my favorite first edition), so that new readers come into the experience with the right (IMHO) packaging. SIGH


In any event, with no copies ready to hand, I've been browsing editions online and require your input. I actually like all three of these, though I am drooling rather most over that one on the left—a gorgeous new UK 30th anniversary edition. They've done the whole series, of course, and I . . . well, I need them all. My own copies are beloved and mismatched and the only cover of mine I really love is the first one. Because the Sally on it is Sally. And because it's smoky and threatening and atmospheric in just the right way. But I do like the sort of Dickensian Scholastic cover in the middle above (out of print, but fairly cheaply available), as well as the font and the red framing of the one on the right. And so. Which one would you gift had you the spare cash and the inclination?

Comments

  1. I really like the middle one - it has a kind of steampunk feel to it which would make me want to read it IMMEDIATELY.

    ReplyDelete
  2. Hey Melle! Unfortunately, it is only available in the UK. But! You can order it with free worldwide shipping from The Book Depository. Here's the link: http://www.bookdepository.com/Ruby-Smoke-Philip-Pullman/9781407154190.

    ReplyDelete
  3. It does, doesn't it?

    ReplyDelete
  4. The 30th anniversary cover is just lovely. Sadly, my own copies of the series are all mismatched and ugly but I do know the cover you speak of and it was the best. That's the copy my library had and I borrowed it so often it should have just been mine. :)

    ReplyDelete
  5. The best! I'm so glad someone else read and loved that edition, too.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Oh goodness, I can see why you're having a difficult time deciding!

    The middle cover has a sort of classic feel to it, but I love the black and pink contrast on the first.

    ReplyDelete
  7. Yeah. Yeah . . . so pretty.

    ReplyDelete
  8. The contrast is so great, particularly as it captures a bit of the darkness that really makes up a huge quantity of this book and series.

    ReplyDelete
  9. wow ~ this is really tough! I struggle with the same burden! I am desperately trying to overcome it (just today I bought a Juliet Marillier book I have been wanting to own, but havent bought so far bc I just can't decided which edition to go for. I saw it for $1 at the op shop yesterday, didnt get it (as all undecided about collecting the large PB version), then went back today and bought it (luckily it was still there). I don't know why I agonise so! Amyway, it's a pretty enough edition but now I feel like I have committed to getting the whole series in the same matching large PB...


    I like the first two. I would love to see the inside typography and design to get a real feel for them before deciding (not that you can do that online...)

    ReplyDelete
  10. I love that 30th edition cover. It is incredibly striking.

    ReplyDelete
  11. Not just me then! Phew. Well, the matching thing is a serious issue. It does bother me when my copies switch editions mid-series. I'm still pining over the Australian edition of Marillier's The Dark Mirror. I have the second two books in the series in the Aussie versions and they're so much lovelier than the US ones.


    Being able to peek inside these would totally help me decide! If only.

    ReplyDelete
  12. It really is. And put it together with the other two in the series in the same editions and they're just perfect.

    ReplyDelete
  13. Absolutely my favorite Pullman books, and some of my most beloved child books. Unfortunately, I think mine have the light blue 90s cover you described... well all except the last one which is mismatched and drives me crazy. I like all three of these covers better than mine, but particularly that first one. It might be time for Sally to get an upgrade in my library!

    ReplyDelete
  14. I love that 30th edition cover. It is incredibly striking.
    Nạp Tiền ViettelThẻ Điện Thoại với các loại Mua Card Online

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

You Might Also Like

Bibliocrack Review | You Should Be So Lucky by Cat Sebastian

If I'm being perfectly honest with myself, I've done a shamefully poor job of addressing my love for Cat Sebastian 's books around these parts. I've certainly noted each time her beautiful stories have appeared on my end-of-the-year best of lists, see:  The Perfect Crimes of Marian Hayes ,  basically every book in  The Cabots series , and of course  We Could Be So Good .  And the pull is, quite simply, this: nobody is as kind and gentle with their characters and with their hearts than Cat Sebastian. Nobody. I haven't always been one for the gentler stories, but I cannot overstate the absolute gift it is sinking into one of Sebastian's exquisitely crafted historicals knowing that I get to spend the next however many pages watching two idiots pine and deny that feelings exist and just  take care of each other  as they fall in love. I wouldn't trade that experience for the world. Not this one or any other.  Only two things in the world people count by months. H

The Strangely Beautiful Tale of Miss Percy Parker by Leanna Renee Hieber

This book has made the rounds and no mistake. I started seeing early reviews awhile back and read a few delightful interviews with Leanna Renee Hieber and found myself intrigued to read her first novel-- The Strangely Beautiful Tale of Miss Percy Parker . I was, therefore, tickled to receive a copy for review from Ms. Hieber and quickly set about settling in. I knew it was a Gothic paranormal mystery of sorts, featuring (among other things) a group of loyal comrades, a private London academy, a bit of magic, an albino, and a swoon-worthy broody professor a la Richard Armitage in North & South . *moment of silence for the awesomeness of The Armitage* And that was the extent of my pre-reading knowledge. That and the fact that I loved the cover with its simple yet moody, midnight blue and its slightly off-kilter, scripty title. Miss Percy Parker is about to embark on an adventure, albeit a much larger one than she imagines. Leaving the convent--the only home she's ever known--a

Review | The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion, Vols. 1 & 2 by Beth Brower

I feel a bit giddy finally talking to you all about this series. If you'll remember, I fell madly in love with The Q  when it came out a few years ago. Now, Beth Brower is writing The Unselected Journals of Emma M. Lion — a series of novellas set in London in 1883. Each volume is an excerpt from the incorrigible Emma's journals, and the first two volumes are already available with the third on the way soon. I think they'd make rather perfect pandemic reading. Humorous and charming down to their bones, they're just what the doctor ordered to lift your spirits in this uncertain time that just proves to be too much some days. If you're experiencing one of those days, I suggest giving Volume 1   a go (it's only 99 cents on Kindle, $4.99 for a trade paperback copy). It will surprise exactly none of you that I own print and digital editions of both volumes.  Miss Emma M. Lion has waited long enough. Come hell or high water (and really, given her track record,  both a