3 Jon Krakauer first editions are documented on this shelf, from Into the Wild (1996) to Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith (2003) across 3 different publishers. Each linked guide gives the points of issue that separate a true first printing of that Jon Krakauer title from later printings and book-club copies — the publisher and year to expect, the number-line or edition-statement conventions, and the tells that show up in online listings.
Identification only, per the house rule: no prices and no appraisals here. Checking a Jon Krakauer copy in hand? Type the title into the First-Edition Checker or photograph the copyright page with Snap & Sort.
- Into the Wild — 1996 · VillardCopyright page states 'First Edition' with the Random House/Villard number line whose lowest figure is '2' (does not descend to 1). ISBN 0-679-42850-X; first-issue jacket carries the printed price unclipped, with the 'magic bus' photograph. US Villard is the true first, preceding the UK (Macmillan) edition. A scarcer and more sought first than Into Thin Air owing to a smaller first printing; signed copies are prized. Book-club copies lack the printed jacket price, may carry a rear-board blindstamp, and omit the stated 'First Edition'. The 'First Edition' line, the Villard line stopping at '2', and the priced jacket identify the trade first.
- Into Thin Air — 1997 · VillardFirst edition, first printing: Villard, 1997, with 'FIRST EDITION' stated and the full number line '9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1' (some copies). The notable point: the first printing contained an error — it misidentified/misattributed certain details corrected in later printings (the first state also has the original postscript before Krakauer's later additions). First-issue dust jacket priced (the printed price). US Villard 1997 is the true first, preceding the UK Macmillan edition. The first printing precedes Krakauer's added postscript responding to Anatoli Boukreev's account (added in later printings/editions), making the true first textually distinct. Verify 'FIRST EDITION' and the number line. Book club editions lack the full number line and 'FIRST EDITION' statement, are on thinner paper, and carry unpriced jackets. Later printings add the postscript and reader's-guide material absent from the first.
- Under the Banner of Heaven: A Story of Violent Faith — 2003 · DoubledayDoubleday first edition (published July 15, 2003), ISBN 0-385-50951-0. The copyright page states 'First Edition' with a full number line ending in 1. The book is quarter-bound in grey cloth over cream-paper boards with silver stamping to the spine, in the publisher's pictorial dust jacket designed by John Fontana. The first-issue jacket carries the printed price, unclipped. US Doubleday is the true first, preceding the UK (Macmillan) edition. Later printings add an author's afterword responding to LDS Church criticism, making those a 'first thus' rather than the true first; on a genuine first the number line still ends in 1 and no afterword is present. No book-club hardcover of note. Distinguish the first from later printings (number line no longer ending in 1) and from the afterword reissue. The full line ending in 1, the priced Fontana jacket, and the grey-and-cream quarter binding together identify the first.
More Nonfiction & Memoir shelves: Jonathan Swift, Joseph J. Ellis, Karl Marx, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Lewis Thomas, Loren Eiseley.
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