Book Club Editions: How to Spot a BCA or Book Club Copy

A book club edition is a copy printed for a mail-order club and sold to its members, usually at a discount and often a few months after the publisher's own edition. Because clubs frequently printed from the publisher's text and reused its jacket design, a book club copy can look remarkably like a first edition. It is not one, and the difference in value is large.

This guide covers the checks that separate the two, with a UK focus on Book Club Associates (BCA), the name you will meet most often in British attics and charity shops.

What a book club edition is

Clubs bought the rights to print popular titles for their members. To keep the price down they printed their own copies, sometimes from the publisher's plates or film, sometimes as extra sheets run on with the trade printing, and bound them more cheaply. The club, not the publisher, set the members' price, which is why so many club jackets carry no price at all.

The result is a copy with the same text, often the same jacket artwork, and sometimes even the same copyright page as the trade first. Collectors want the copy that went to bookshops on publication day, so the club copy is treated as a later, lesser version however early it was printed. Both the Independent Online Booksellers Association and long-standing condition conventions expect sellers to say plainly when a copy is a book club edition.

The quick checks

Work through these in order. One sign alone is a reason to look harder; two or three together are usually decisive.

• No price on the front flap. Trade jackets print the price at a corner of the front flap. Club jackets usually have none, and the corner is intact because a price was never there.
• A club name. Look for "BCA", "Book Club Associates", "Book Club Edition" or a club's own name on the jacket spine, the case spine or the copyright page.
• Size and weight. UK and Doubleday club copies are often a few millimetres smaller and noticeably lighter than the trade edition. Book of the Month Club copies usually are not, so size alone never clears a copy.
• Paper and boards. Thinner, cheaper paper, and plainer boards, sometimes paper-covered where the trade copy is cloth.
• The copyright page. Some club copies print the trade page unchanged, including "First published" and a full number line, so this page alone cannot clear a copy. Others add a club statement, which settles it.

If you are new to reading copyright pages and number lines, start with how to identify a first edition and number lines explained.

Book Club Associates and other UK clubs

Book Club Associates was set up in 1966 as a joint venture between W. H. Smith and the American publisher and book club business Doubleday. One of its first moves was to take over the Reprint Society, a club founded in 1939 that traded as World Books. According to Grace's Guide, BCA's clubs had 1,660,000 members by 1987, which is why so many BCA copies survive today.

BCA ran many clubs under different names over the years, including World Books, a mystery and thriller club, a military and aviation club and a fantasy and science fiction club. Whatever the club name on the leaflet, the copies themselves tend to share these signs:

Feature	Trade first edition	BCA or UK club copy
Front flap price	Printed price, in shillings and pence before 1971, decimal after	Usually no price at all
Jacket spine foot	Publisher's name or device	Often "BCA" in place of the publisher
Case spine	Publisher's name	Sometimes "BCA"
Copyright page	Publisher's imprint and first published statement	Sometimes "Book Club Associates by arrangement with" the publisher, or "Book Club Edition"
Size and paper	Publisher's standard format	Often slightly smaller, on cheaper paper (not a reliable test on its own)

The "by arrangement with" wording is the clearest single sign. A copy reading "This edition published by Book Club Associates by arrangement with Jonathan Cape" is a club edition however early its date. Older clubs such as the Reprint Society used their own name on the title page and often a distinctive uniform binding, so they rarely fool anyone.

Be aware that not every BCA copy carries every sign. Some were run on with the trade printing and differ only in the jacket. In that case the missing price and the BCA spine are what give it away.

On MyVolumes you can see the club editions we hold under BCA, Book Club Associates and the Reprint Society.

American clubs: BOMC blind stamps

American book club copies turn up in the UK too, especially for American authors. The Book-of-the-Month Club, founded in 1926, is the one to know. Its copies often carry a blind stamp: a small uninked impression, usually a dot, circle or square, pressed into the lower corner of the back board next to the spine.

• Where to look: remove the jacket and check the lower back board near the spine, in good light at a low angle.
• What it proves: a club blind stamp is a strong sign of a club copy, but some printers used their own marks, so match it against a known example.
• What it does not prove: not every club copy was stamped, so a clean board does not clear a copy.
• Jacket wording: some club jackets say "Book Club Edition" at the foot of the front flap, and that corner is sometimes clipped off to hide it.

Other American clubs, such as the Literary Guild and the Science Fiction Book Club, had their own marks, covered next.

The Literary Guild and Doubleday's gutter codes

The Book-of-the-Month Club had a rival almost from the start. The Literary Guild was founded in 1927 as a competitor to BOMC, and its selections were printed in special editions with the Literary Guild name on the title page, issued on the same date as the publisher's own edition. It became one of the Doubleday family of clubs, which TomFolio lists as the Literary Guild, the Doubleday Book Club, the Mystery Guild and the Science Fiction Book Club.

Doubleday club copies are usually easier to spot than BOMC ones. TomFolio and BookThink both describe them as cheaper productions than the trade edition, and BookThink lists the signs:

• The title page and spine. Look for "Literary Guild" or another club name.
• The jacket. Older jackets printed "Book Club Edition" at the foot of the front flap. Doubleday later dropped that wording and printed a five-digit code on the back of the jacket instead, usually black figures in a small white box.
• The materials. Thinner, often acidic paper, paper-covered boards where the trade copy is cloth, no headbands and no gilt or blind stamping on the case.
• A gutter code. A small printed code deep in the inner margin near the back of the book.

The gutter code is the sign most people miss. It is a tiny code, usually a letter followed by two digits such as "H06", printed in the gutter (the inner margin by the binding) on or near the last page of text. Collectors read the letter as the year and the digits as the week of printing. Collecting Koontz, for example, records a book club copy of Dean Koontz's Shadowfires with the code R02 on page 405, which it reads as the second week of January 1987. BookThink's study of Science Fiction Book Club copies maps two overlapping letter sequences running from "A" for 1959 to "R" for 1987, with codes apparently dropped by about 1988, and warns that there are exceptions and that the club never explained the system.

To find one, open the book flat at the last few pages of text and look into the fold, under a good light. The code is very small and can sit right against the stitching, so you may need to ease the pages apart gently. BookThink notes that BOMC used a similar device, a short alphanumeric string printed vertically deep in the gutter of the last page, which glued endpapers can hide.

A gutter code on its own is a reason to check the jacket, paper and boards; together with them it is usually decisive. If you are unsure, our book club edition checker walks through the signs one at a time.

Size is not a reliable test

Smaller size is often given as a sign of a club copy, and for many clubs it holds: BookThink describes most Literary Guild books as noticeably smaller and lighter than the trade edition, and adds that a shelf of identically sized books is very likely a run of Literary Guild or Doubleday copies.

The Book-of-the-Month Club is the exception. TomFolio says BOMC copies are often identical to the copies sold in shops, and BookThink explains that BOMC books were made to match trade quality, so trade and BOMC editions both come in many different sizes rather than one club format. A BOMC copy can therefore be the same height, the same weight and the same binding as the trade first beside it.

What this means in practice:

• A same-size copy is not cleared. Never pass a copy as a trade first just because it matches the trade dimensions. Check for a blind stamp, a missing jacket price and the gutter.
• A smaller copy is a prompt, not a verdict. Compare it against a known trade first of the same title before deciding.
• Rely on the copy's own marks. The Independent Online Booksellers Association advises using the relevant bibliography to tell a book club edition from a first, and expects sellers to disclose a club copy, however close it looks.

Price-clipped or book club?

A price-clipped trade jacket has had the corner of the front flap cut away, usually to remove the price from a gift. A book club jacket was printed without a price. Both lack a visible price, so the question matters.

• A clipped corner is visibly cut, often at a diagonal, and the flap is smaller than it should be.
• An unpriced club flap is a full rectangle with blank space where the price would sit.
• Clipped at both corners, top and bottom, is a warning: the bottom corner is where some clubs printed "Book Club Edition".

A clipped trade jacket still loses some value, but far less than a club jacket. Our guide to dust jackets explains how price-clipping is described and graded.

Why book club editions are worth so much less

Collectors pay for the copy that went to bookshops first, in the form the publisher issued it. A club copy fails that test even when it was printed at the same time, and club printings were often large, so supply is plentiful.

In practice a book club copy of a sought-after title usually sells for a small fraction of the trade first, even in better condition. This is why the misdescription matters: a club copy listed as a "first edition" because its copyright page says so is one of the most common errors in online listings. Read how much is my book worth before pricing a copy.

When a book club edition is collectable

There are genuine exceptions, though they are rare:

• First appearance in hardback. Some science fiction and crime titles appeared in hardback only through a club, and that club copy is the first hardback.
• Fine-press club editions. Clubs such as the Limited Editions Club and the Folio Society, which is a club by subscription, made books collected in their own right. See our Folio Society hub.
• Signed copies. A genuinely signed club copy is worth something for the signature, though less than a signed first, and must be described as a club copy. See signed and inscribed books.
• Reading copies. For many readers a well-made club copy is an affordable way to own a book, and there is nothing wrong with that.

Science Fiction Book Club editions

The Science Fiction Book Club began publishing in 1953 and was one of the Doubleday clubs. BookThink is frank about most of its books: they are reprints, valued as sturdy, cheap reading copies and collected mainly by completists of a particular author.

A small group is different, and these are the SFBC books collectors look for:

• True firsts and first hardbacks. Some titles appeared in hardback first, or only, through the club. BookThink cites the 1977 SFBC Lord Foul's Bane by Stephen Donaldson, gutter code H21 on page 403, as the true first edition. The IOBA also notes that science fiction is one of the genres where a club edition was sometimes the first.
• Omnibus editions. The club gathered series into single volumes that did not exist in the trade, such as Asimov's Foundation trilogy (1963), Blish's Cities in Flight (1973) and Zelazny's The Amber Chronicles (1978).
• Expensive trade firsts. When the trade first of a title becomes very costly, BookThink notes, collectors turn to the book club edition and its value rises with it.

SFBC copies carry no printing statement on the copyright page, so sellers rely on the gutter code to tell an early printing from a later one. Where copies of a title carry different codes, L. W. Currey's bibliography of science fiction and fantasy first printings names the preferred one. After about 1988, when the codes stopped, separate printings can be hard or impossible to tell apart.

Even for collectable SFBC titles, a later trade hardback usually takes precedence with collectors, according to BookThink, so describe the copy accurately: "Science Fiction Book Club edition, first hardback, gutter code H21" tells a buyer exactly what they are getting.

Check your copy

Not sure? Answer a few questions in our book club edition checker and it will tell you which you have, and why.

Find your title in Browse, see the BCA copies we list, or go straight to its edition page, where we list the points that separate the trade first from later printings and club copies. For example, the Casino Royale first edition page shows what the trade jacket should carry. Then add your copy to your collection, grading the book and jacket separately as described in our condition grading guide. Unfamiliar words are in the glossary.