I have some exciting news for you: after months of waiting, our special leatherbound edition of The Well of Ascension has finally shipped from the printer. Huzzah!

Like our edition of Elantris, and Mistborn: The Final Empire the Dragonsteel edition of The Well of Ascension is bound in premium bonded leather, and the pages are smyth-sewn, not glued like most regular books. Mistborn is printed in black and red inks on quality, acid-free paper, includes a bound-in satin-ribbon bookmark, full-color endpapers by Howard Lyon, gilded pages, and two-color foiling on the cover. A 24-page art gallery starts off the edition and features never-before-seen artwork, a feruchemical chart, and three maps of the Final Empire. The Dragonsteel Leather edition of Mistborn: The Well of Ascension is 797 pages.

A few things you should know: These are going to be put on my store today at 12:00 (MST). If you’re wanting signed, numbered, and personalized copies we probably won’t be able to get them out in time for Christmas, but I’ll do my best. If you just want the book itself, we should be able to get that to you in time for Christmas with priority shipping.

Along with being able to order it from my store, we’re also sending it to several independent bookstores around the country where you may be able to acquire one.

• Murder by the Book
• BYU Bookstore
• Mysterious Galaxy
• Borderlands Books
• The King’s English
• Weller Book Works
• Subterranean Press
• University Bookstore

For those of you who have been waiting to get your hands on the first leatherbound volume, Mistborn: The Final Empire, we also just received the second printing of these and will add them to our website at the same time we add The Well of Ascension.

It’s here, and it’s beautiful! This is the official launch, so feel free to retweet, blog, or otherwise share this post with people you know who are fans of Elantris!

I made a little preview post last week, because of shipping deadlines, but here is the official (with pictures) post about the Elantris Leatherbound edition! Below you’ll find shots of what makes this book so great.

Colored endpapers.

Full color inserts showing off some of my favorite covers from around the world.

New maps.

Beautiful leather binding with an Aon stamped in silver on the cover.

The entire book is two-tone, with a soft blue highlights for things like the Aons and chapter headings.

All the content of the Tenth Anniversary Edition is included in this book, and each book will be signed and numbered! (As long as they’re ordered before the end of the year. After that, if supplies last, we’ll sell the book signed without numbers.)

In addition, Michael Whelan let us include the painting of his, Passage: Verge, that inspired me to start working on Elantris many, many years ago. (And prints are available in his store, which you should totally buy. This is my all-time favorite of his paintings.)

So, where can you get this? Glad you asked! It’s available on my store and in select, awesome bookstores around the country. Please note that in my store, we also have plenty of cool things for the holidays. Most of my books signed in hardcover, this year’s con exclusive being sold for the first time to the general public, jewelry, T-shirts, stickers, a new Stormlight map poster, etc. So check it out!

For my store, we have the following order deadlines.

Note that these are the deadlines given us by the shipping companies; it’s on them to actually get you the books on time. But do let us know if you order before the deadline, but then something happens and it looks like yours isn’t going to make it on time. (I don’t think this happened a single time last year, so we should be okay.)

You can absolutely order the Elantris leatherbound (personalized or not) after the deadlines above, and we’ll do what we can to get it to you on time. We just want you to know the cutoffs the shipping companies gave us.

Now, you all should know by now that I love bookstores. Particularly the stores that invited me in to do signings early in my career, when certain other stores weren’t interested in having me. These are stores with excellent staff who work hard and are passionate about books. That’s why I sent them something special to sell. They have the low numbers. A lot of people like getting numbers under 100, and so I sent numbers 1–50 to these stores, split among them.

Please consider supporting these stores, especially if you live near them or have ever gone to a signing at their location. They are awesome! Some might even have the books going on the shelves today. (If not, they should be there very soon.)

University Book Store, Seattle

One of my favorite stores ever, the person to talk to is Duane Wilkins (though he should have prepped everyone for this). He can be found in the Children’s Department or the Science Fiction department.

Mysterious Galaxy, San Diego

No need to have a specific contact here—they’ll be on the ball and know what’s up. They also tend to carry a lot of first editions of my books, many signed, so you might want to ask them for anything else they might have in stock of mine. (Or from other writers you love.)

Borderlands Books, San Francisco

This was actually the first store outside of Utah to invite me specifically to do a signing for them. They are incredible, and will take good care of you if you go in or call wanting one of these. Note that for sponsors of the store, I’ve sent two leatherbound copies for them to give away free at an upcoming sponsor party.

Powell’s Books, Portland area

I’m not as sure for this one how you get the books, as they took a large order to be split among their several locations. I’m sure you’ll be able to find them, as Powell’s is great—but if you have trouble, you can have them look up the book by its ISBN, which is 978-0-7653-8807-0 (a different book ID number from the regular 10th anniversary).

Murder by the Book, Houston

They ordered the most copies of anyone on this list, so you should be able to find them here! In addition, they have a web form where you can order the book. Be sure to give them so love. They’re an excellent community store who has invited me in to sign time and time again.

BYU Store, Provo

My alma mater. If you can’t find the books, talk to Tammy. She’s the one who ordered them from us, and is really on the ball. But they should be right in the SF section, I would bet. I’ll also make sure they have some in stock for my release party for The Bands of Mourning next month.

Okay, now for a quick FAQ.

Q: Will these sell out?
A: The first printing looks likely to sell out fairly soon. We sold about a quarter of our stock last week, and will probably sell another quarter of it this week. We will reprint this (I plan to keep it in the store for at least a year, maybe forever, if it is popular enough), but shipping takes a good month or so to get new stock to us. You shouldn’t have trouble getting one later—but if you do want one for the holidays, you might want to jump on it soon.

Q: What about your other books?
A: If this is popular (and it looks like it will be), then we will do the other books. Our goal will be to have them sell at around the same price, and to make them match on the bookshelf, so you can have an entire Cosmere sequence of leatherbound books.

The goal will be to proceed with the 10th anniversary idea, doing Mistborn: The Final Empire next year, The Well of Ascension the year after, and The Hero of Ages the year after that. From there, Warbreaker would be next. That’s all I’m willing to commit to now, but we would eventually like to do Stormlight in this treatment. (Assuming people like these editions we’re doing.)

Q: Will you do your short stories in leatherbound?
A: The awesome Subterranean Press has done leatherbounds of some. (And is doing one for Perfect State and Shadows for Silence in the Forests of Hell, the two novellas from this year.) So I have no plans to do other leatherbound editions. However, do be aware that it’s likely I’ll do an anthology of all the Cosmere shorts in the near future. We might end up doing that too.

Q: Ah! I can’t afford $100! What do I do?
A: Don’t worry. The tenth anniversary edition is available in regular hardcover, in trade paperback, or in ebook (with the color maps!) right now. If an expensive collector’s edition isn’t something that interests you, you can get all of the same material that way.

As always, thanks for reading. Happy holidays! May you spend some vacation time spent curled up with a good book.

Brandon