# Is "The Martian" by Andy Weir a First Edition?

> **Quick answer.** A first edition of The Martian by Andy Weir (Crown Publishers, 2014) is identified by: CENSUS CLAIM REFUTED — the true first is the Crown hardcover, New York, 11 February 2014 (ISBN 978-0-8041-3902-1), not a 2011 self-published paperback. The census's claim that the true first is "the scarce 2011 self-published paperback (CreateSpace)" is not supported by any source consulted and is contradicted by the documentary record.

**Checklist — a true first has these:**
- CENSUS CLAIM REFUTED — the true first is the Crown hardcover, New York, 11 February 2014 (ISBN 978-0-8041-3902-1), not a 2011 self-published paperback
- The first printing has "First Edition" stated on the copyright page above a full number line descending to and including 1
- Binding is solid black boards with white lettering to the spine; approximately 369 pp
- The jacket front bears only the title, author name and the descriptor "a novel", with seven reviews on the rear panel; first-issue jacket is priced at the flap
- Decisively, the Crown copyright page itself states: "Originally self-published, in different form, as an ebook in 2011" — the publisher's own testimony that the 2011 self-published form was an ebook
- Publisher imprint reads Crown Publishers
- Not a book-club edition (see below)

| | |
|---|---|
| Author | Andy Weir |
| Publisher | Crown Publishers |
| Year | 2014 |
| True first | UK edition |
| Format | Hardcover (trade) |
| Key point | CENSUS CLAIM REFUTED — the true first is the Crown hardcover, New York, 11 February 2014 (ISBN 978-0-8041-3902-1), not a 2011… |
| Book-club edition exists? | Yes |

## Points of issue
CENSUS CLAIM REFUTED — the true first is the Crown hardcover, New York, 11 February 2014 (ISBN 978-0-8041-3902-1), not a 2011 self-published paperback. The first printing has "First Edition" stated on the copyright page above a full number line descending to and including 1. Binding is solid black boards with white lettering to the spine; approximately 369 pp. The jacket front bears only the title, author name and the descriptor "a novel", with seven reviews on the rear panel; first-issue jacket is priced at the flap. Decisively, the Crown copyright page itself states: "Originally self-published, in different form, as an ebook in 2011" — the publisher's own testimony that the 2011 self-published form was an ebook.

## Is this the true first?
The census's claim that the true first is "the scarce 2011 self-published paperback (CreateSpace)" is not supported by any source consulted and is contradicted by the documentary record. No CreateSpace or other self-published PRINT edition is documented by fedpo.com, Wikipedia, ISFDB-linked listings, or dealer inventories; searches for such a paperback return nothing. The 2011 origin was a free chapter-by-chapter serial on Weir's own website, followed by a the printed price Amazon Kindle ebook (September 2012). Weir sold print rights to Crown in March 2013, and Crown issued the first print publication in any form on 11 February 2014. The first UK edition followed from Del Rey (Ebury / Penguin Random House UK) in 2014 and is separately collected — one dealer reports the UK hardcover as limited to 1,000 copies, a figure not independently corroborated here. US Crown precedes.

## Telling it from reprints & book-club editions
The Crown text is substantially revised from the self-published ebook: profanity reduced, spelling and grammatical errors corrected, scientific errors fixed, many minor stylistic changes, and a 263-word epilogue removed — so the 2014 first edition is not textually identical to the 2011 original, a point of interest to collectors. No book-club issue is documented. Later traps include the movie tie-in printings and the Deluxe Edition; the negative tell throughout is the absence of "First Edition" plus a number line ending in 1.

## Source
New Mexico Literacy Project — Is *The Martian* by Andy Weir a first edition? https://newmexicoliteracyproject.org/first-edition/the-martian
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.