# Is "The Fog" by James Herbert a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of The Fog by James Herbert (New English Library, London, 1975) is identified by: The first-printing tell is the New English Library copyright-page convention: NEL states "First published by New English Library in [year]" or "First published in Great Britain [year]" on firsts, and the year in that notice should match the copyright year with no later-impression notice added. The census claim is confirmed: New English Library, London, 1975 is the true first of Herbert's second novel, and no US edition carries precedence.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- The first-printing tell is the New English Library copyright-page convention: NEL states "First published by New English Library in [year]" or "First published in Great Britain [year]" on firsts, and the year in that notice should match the copyright year with no later-impression notice added
- The hardcover is bound in black cloth-covered boards with gilt lettering to the spine, issued in a colour pictorial dust jacket with the price present at the front flap (unclipped copies retain the "net in UK only" line)
- The hardcover print run was small and aimed largely at the lending-library market, so ex-library copies with stamps, pockets and reinforced jackets are disproportionately common; the NEL paperback of the same year is far commoner and is not the collected first
- One caveat the sources consulted do not settle: NEL issued hardcover and paperback in 1975 and the exact precedence between the two formats is not documented — the trade uniformly treats the hardcover as the first edition
- Publisher imprint reads New English Library, London
- Not a book-club edition (see below)

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | James Herbert |
| Publisher | New English Library, London |
| Year | 1975 |
| True first | US edition |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | The first-printing tell is the New English Library copyright-page convention: NEL states "First published by New English Library in [year]"… |
| Book-club edition exists? | No |

## Points of issue
The first-printing tell is the New English Library copyright-page convention: NEL states "First published by New English Library in [year]" or "First published in Great Britain [year]" on firsts, and the year in that notice should match the copyright year with no later-impression notice added. The hardcover is bound in black cloth-covered boards with gilt lettering to the spine, issued in a colour pictorial dust jacket with the price present at the front flap (unclipped copies retain the "net in UK only" line). The hardcover print run was small and aimed largely at the lending-library market, so ex-library copies with stamps, pockets and reinforced jackets are disproportionately common; the NEL paperback of the same year is far commoner and is not the collected first. One caveat the sources consulted do not settle: NEL issued hardcover and paperback in 1975 and the exact precedence between the two formats is not documented — the trade uniformly treats the hardcover as the first edition.

## Is this the true first?
The census claim is confirmed: New English Library, London, 1975 is the true first of Herbert's second novel, and no US edition carries precedence. The first American edition was a Signet (New American Library) mass-market paperback, catalogue number W6708; sources consulted disagree on its year (variously given as 1975, 1976 and 1977), but it is a reprint either way and only the NEL hardcover is collected as the first.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
No book-club hardcover is documented for this title. The reprint traps are the later NEL, Hodder & Stoughton, Pan and Macmillan issues — including the 1988 NEL reissue — plus the much later Centipede Press illustrated edition, all of which are "first thus" rather than firsts. Because the 1975 hardcover run was directed at lending libraries, library-withdrawn copies are frequently offered as firsts; the library markings do not affect the edition but do not make a jacketed trade copy either.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *The Fog* by James Herbert a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/the-fog
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.