Caudimordax wrote:

Cheers Stu, that's encouraging! I've gotten into a habit of scanning eBay and addall every day now, hopefully a decently priced one rears its head and I can nab it quickly enough. Or perhaps someone in the forums will be kind enough to sell me their extra... hey, you never know!

Also keep an eye on Amazon used. I found a copy last year on there for under £10 and I saw it because the seller had put an image against it and I was doing an image search. The tricky thing is that it shares the ISBN with a more common version, so there may well be copies that come up for sale, but just don't get discovered.

Stupid question here Stu, but when you say “image search”, do you mean you were just poking around google images with “1992 Unfinished tales” or some similar keyword phrase, and it popped up? Or did you do some advanced reverse image search wizardry to dig deep enough to find it?

Caudimordax wrote:

Stupid question here Stu, but when you say “image search”, do you mean you were just poking around google images with “1992 Unfinished tales” or some similar keyword phrase, and it popped up? Or did you do some advanced reverse image search wizardry to dig deep enough to find it?

Yep, the former - I just occasionally Google to se what turns up, and I was looking at the results as images.

Cheers Stu. I've also been writing in to "suspicious" Amazon listings which match the year and ISBN, but have the stock photo from the 2000 printing. It's been "no" every time, and I've done a few at this point, but who knows!

On a side note, I do rather like that 2000 printing with Tolkien's illustration of "Glorung". Very beautiful! In fact, with the new 40th anniversary UTs coming out, and the existing HCD, and of course the original printings, there are a lot of very attractive volumes.

Buuuuuuut as I've resolved to not have too many duplicate novels on my shelf, the purple UT is what I'm solidly fixed on. Of course, cheating on this little rule would land me in very good company. Hmm....

I have listed a copy of my spare copy of the purple unfinished tales in the Tolkien Collector facebook group for those interested

https://www.facebook.com/groups/109789 ... rmalink/2058673681003698/

Not everyone is a Facebook fan so you could be limiting your audience, out of curiosity what is the market rate?

The most recent auction listing we have a record of is from 2019, and then of course the one that Emilien bought. I know one came up in 2020 as well, which sold for about the same as the first one (£400), but I'm having trouble locating at the moment. The book does not come up that often for sale. Averaging about once a year or once every two years or so.

https://www.tolkienguide.com/modules/auctions/184002121999
https://www.tolkienguide.com/modules/auctions/254626113634

The last copy that appear on the market in january of last year sold for £580 in auction. It was in rough condition :

https://www.tolkienguide.com/modules/auctions/185275526676

The copy I'm selling is not the one I bought in 2020. This is my spare copy.

Here is my message from the FB group with pictures if some are interested here:
------------------------------

Hello everyone,
I have for sale a very uncommon and very sought after copy of Unfinished Tales with the purple dust-jacket, published in 1992 by HarperCollins at what it seems a low number of copies, considering the rarity of these copies on the market. The last one sold in my records was on January 2022, and was a very rough copy. This book comes by for sale roughly every 2 or 3 years...
The one I have for sale is a near fine copy, with some very slight defects which are pictured below (some slight marks and shelf- wear on the dust jacket, a very slight stain inside the dust jacket which is barely visible, slight foxing on the upper text block, 2 small foxing marks on the side text block, and 2 very slight spots of red ink on the front endpaper. A small white area on on side text block). I tried to picture the book as best as I can, additional pictures on request.
Apart from these, the book is near fine, and already very scarce, is very rarely seen in this near fine condition.
Will send internationnaly with heavy protection, bubble wrap, strong box, international tracking and shipping at cost. (Some people who already purchased some books from me could attest the quality and seriousness of my packing and shipping.)
I'm offering this book here before listing it on ebay.
One of the most sought after Tolkien books.
£900 + shipping at cost. Payment with PAYPAL 'Send to friend'
Send me a message if interested. First come first serve
----------------------------

Emilien wrote:

The last copy that appear on the market in january of last year sold for £580 in auction. It was in rough condition :

https://www.tolkienguide.com/modules/auctions/185275526676

The copy I'm selling is not the one I bought in 2020. This is my spare copy.

Thanks, that's the one I was thinking about but it wasn't coming up for me for some reason, probably because the dealer labeled it BOLT.

Cool thanks