The Bookseller.com

4th July 2009

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Penguin launches retro cover series

24.08.07 Alison Flood

Penguin is reissuing 36 recent bestsellers in the classic Penguin paperback look to mark its Publisher of the Year win at the British Book Awards. Its initial print run for the series totals 815,000 copies.

The "Penguin Celebrations" titles, ranging from Pat Barker's Regeneration via Jeremy Clarkson's The World According to Clarkson to Meg Rosoff's How I Live Now, will be published on 6th September in six of the classic Penguin designs given "a modern reworking" by Penguin Press art director Jim Stoddart. They are slightly larger than the original Penguin pocket size in B format, and all books are priced at £7.99.

Penguin is aiming for retail front-of-store bays. The books will be available until Christmas, and flag up Penguin's Nibbie win on the reverse.

"We wanted to celebrate being Publisher of the Year, not just through marketing but also through our publishing," said publishing director Tony Lacey. He said the look had "a hint of retro as well as being chic".

Lacey said the decision to price at £7.99 was a "homage" to the original Penguin principle of a uniform paperback pricepoint of sixpence. However, 6d in 1935 had the same spending worth as just 92p today, and Penguin founder Allen Lane wanted his books to be cheaper than a packet of cigarettes (now costing between £5 and £6).

Penguin is likely to offer all titles at a discount on its own website. AbeBooks will auction a signed set of the orange fiction titles, with proceeds going to English PEN.

March of the Penguins

New fiction (orange)
Any Human Heart; What A Carve Up!; Everything is Illuminated; Notes on a Scandal; How To Be Good; The Other Side of the Story; English Passengers; The Impressionist; A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian; How I Live Now; The Accidental; White Teeth; Adrian Mole and the Weapons of Mass Destruction; Regeneration

Essays (purple)
The Consolations of Philosophy; The World According to Clarkson; Letter from America

Science and non-fiction (light blue)
Hegemony or Survival; The Revenge of Gaia; Empire; The Classical World; Blink; The Fabric of the Cosmos; Freakonomics; Fast Food

Mystery and crime (green)
The Secret History; A Certain Justice; Rumpole and the Penge Bungalow Murders; The Beach; The Chimney Sweeper's Boy

Adventure and travel (pink)
The Shadow of the Sun; Congo Journey; Dark Star Safari

Biography and travel (dark blue)
Leonardo da Vinci; Jane Austen; The English

Penguin classics Alison Flood