Westeros

After many years of hoping and praying, fans in the UK are finally getting their wish: Voyager is re-releasing the first four novels in the “A Song of Ice and Fire” series in matching hardcovers.

The U.K. hasn’t seen a wide-release hardcover of A Game of Thrones since the book was first published in 1996. The same can be said for the lack of re-release of A Clash of Kings and A Storm of Swords.  Unlike in the U.S., the U.K. market meant that it did not make sense for Voyager to re-release hardcovers on a wide scale, even as Martin hit #1 on both sides of the pond with A Feast for Crows.

The new editions are due to hit shelves on November 11 for the first two volumes, and December 5 for the last two (just in time for the holidays, one notes!)

We should add that these are not, technically, the first hardcover re-releases from Voyager. That belongs to the “special edition”, slip-cased copies of the books that Voyager quietly began to release shortly after A Dance with Dragons: A Game of Thrones, A Clash of Kings, A Storm of Swords, A Feast for Crows, and A Dance with Dragons. These special editions are more limited runs, however, and may only be available for purchase on-line, so far as we’ve been able to discover. And, while slip-cased, they lack cover art beyond a stamped sigil for each book.