# Is "Songs of a Dead Dreamer" by Thomas Ligotti a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of Songs of a Dead Dreamer by Thomas Ligotti (Silver Scarab Press, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 1985) is identified by: The true first is Harry O. US precedence, and specifically New Mexico precedence: an American author's debut from a 300-copy Albuquerque micro-press, with no UK or trade edition preceding it.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- The true first is Harry O. Morris's Silver Scarab Press of Albuquerque, New Mexico, 1985 — a limitation of 300 copies, issued paperbound in publisher's pictorial wrappers, NOT in hardcover
- Illustrated by Harry O. Morris, who was also the publisher
- Publisher and dealer descriptions state that copies were signed by Ligotti and Morris on the title page; the limitation statement is the primary point and the signatures are corroborating rather than definitive
- Ligotti's first book
- NOTE a date conflict in the record: Wikipedia's entry dates the collection 1986, against 1985 in Subterranean Press's account, the Heritage Auctions cataloguing of a Silver Scarab copy, and the AbeBooks dealer consensus — 1985 is the better-supported date and Wikipedia is the outlier, but a copy in hand should be checked against its own imprint
- Because the book is paperbound there is no dust jacket and no jacket point
- Publisher imprint reads Silver Scarab Press, Albuquerque, New Mexico

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Thomas Ligotti |
| Publisher | Silver Scarab Press, Albuquerque, New Mexico |
| Year | 1985 |
| True first | US edition |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | The true first is Harry O. Morris's Silver Scarab Press of Albuquerque, New Mexico, 1985 — a limitation of 300 copies, issued paperbound in… |
| Book-club edition exists? | No |

## Points of issue
The true first is Harry O. Morris's Silver Scarab Press of Albuquerque, New Mexico, 1985 — a limitation of 300 copies, issued paperbound in publisher's pictorial wrappers, NOT in hardcover. Illustrated by Harry O. Morris, who was also the publisher. Publisher and dealer descriptions state that copies were signed by Ligotti and Morris on the title page; the limitation statement is the primary point and the signatures are corroborating rather than definitive. Ligotti's first book. NOTE a date conflict in the record: Wikipedia's entry dates the collection 1986, against 1985 in Subterranean Press's account, the Heritage Auctions cataloguing of a Silver Scarab copy, and the AbeBooks dealer consensus — 1985 is the better-supported date and Wikipedia is the outlier, but a copy in hand should be checked against its own imprint. Because the book is paperbound there is no dust jacket and no jacket point.

## Is this the true first?
US precedence, and specifically New Mexico precedence: an American author's debut from a 300-copy Albuquerque micro-press, with no UK or trade edition preceding it. The common text is a later and different book. The expanded, revised edition was first published paperbound in the UK by Robinson Publishing in 1989, collecting two essays and eighteen stories, many revised for that edition; Carroll & Graf issued the US expanded hardcover, whose year is reported inconsistently as 1989 and as June 1990 with twenty stories — that discrepancy is unresolved in the sources consulted. Both expanded editions add 'Notes on the Writing of Horror: A Story' and 'Professor Nobody's Little Lectures on Supernatural Horror,' which are absent from the Silver Scarab original: presence of those pieces immediately rules a copy out as the 1985 first.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
No book-club edition exists — a 300-copy small-press limitation is not a book-club vehicle. The reprint states to watch are all 'first thus': Robinson (UK, 1989, paperbound, expanded), Carroll & Graf (US, expanded hardcover, 1989 or 1990 per conflicting sources), Subterranean Press (2010, republished with author revisions and generally treated as the definitive text), and Penguin Classics (2015, gathering this collection with Grimscribe in one volume). Sellers commonly describe the Carroll & Graf or Subterranean hardcovers as a 'first edition' because they are the first hardcovers; they are not the first edition.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *Songs of a Dead Dreamer* by Thomas Ligotti a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/songs-of-a-dead-dreamer
CC BY 4.0. Part of the Canonical First-Edition Points of Issue dataset (https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/api/first-edition-titles.json). Last reviewed 2026-07-04.