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The Colorado Kid Common pb original

2005 · Hard Case Crime (imprint of Dorchester Publishing Co., New York). Series number HCC-013. Distributed via Dorchester's Leisure Books mass-market line.
First-edition cover of The Colorado Kid
First-edition jacket (first edition (verified vs jacket)) · source

What it’s about

On a small island off the coast of Maine, two veteran newspapermen take a young intern under their wing and share the one story that has haunted them for years: the unidentified body of a man found on the beach decades earlier, a case that defied every effort to explain it. As they walk her through the scraps of evidence and dead-end leads, the tale becomes a meditation on the mysteries that resist tidy answers. A spare, dialogue-driven puzzle for anyone drawn to true-crime atmosphere and the quiet pull of the unknowable.

Significance Written by Stephen King (not Bachman); the inaugural title in Hard Case Crime's pulp paperback line (2005) and the loose inspiration for the SyFy TV series "Haven."

Is this the true first?No. This is a paperback original. The first appearance is the 2005 Hard Case Crime mass-market paperback. The only hardcover (PS Publishing, 2007) is a later limited/illustrated edition, not the true first.
The TRUE FIRST is a MASS-MARKET PAPERBACK ORIGINAL — there is NO trade-hardcover first edition. The Hard Case Crime paperback (HCC-013, Oct 4 2005, ISBN 0-8439-5584-8 / 978-0-8439-5584-2, cover by Glen Orbik) is the genuine first edition / first printing. King wrote it specifically for the pulp-paperback Hard Case Crime imprint; it never received a contemporaneous Scribner/Doubleday/Viking hardcover. The ONLY hardcover is the much later PS Publishing limited (July 2007), which is a 'first hardcover edition' but NOT the true first of the work. Anyone seeking 'the first edition' should buy the 2005 Hard Case Crime paperback with the first-printing UPC code. (This is the Hard Case Crime case the prompt warns about: paperback original, no hardcover first.)

First-printing points at a glance

First-printing statementHard Case Crime / Dorchester did NOT print a 'First Edition' or 'First Printing' statement on the copyright page, and there is NO traditional descending number line. The first printing is identified ONLY by the supplemental UPC code on the BACK COVER: a true first reads '50599' (above/beside the main UPC bar code). Later printings change this code to '05584'. This 50599-vs-05584 distinction was confirmed by Hard Case Crime editor Charles Ardai and is repeated consistently across reputable dealer listings (Harropian Books, Dearly Departed Books). Copyright page carries the standard 'Copyright © 2005 by Stephen King' and the Dorchester/Hard Case Crime imprint data; the front cover states first publication ('A NOVEL' / Hard Case Crime original).
Number lineNo conventional printer number line on this mass-market paperback. The functional 'first-printing point' is the back-cover supplemental UPC code: FIRST PRINTING = '50599'; LATER PRINTINGS = '05584'. The '50599' value also encodes the $5.99 cover price in the standard mass-market price-add-on bar code (5 = price-expansion flag, 0599 = $5.99).
Gutter / printer codeN/A — Hard Case Crime / Dorchester mass-market paperbacks do not use Doubleday-style gutter codes. (Doubleday gutter-code convention applies only to King's 1974-1983 Doubleday hardcovers.)
First printing — copiesNot publicly disclosed
First jacket price$5.99 U.S. (mass-market paperback cover price). This is encoded in the first-printing supplemental UPC code '50599' (=$5.99). Canadian price typically also printed (approx. $8.99 CAN for the era — UNVERIFIED exact figure). No dust jacket exists; this is a paperback with printed wraps. (Cover price appears in the price box on the upper-right of the FRONT cover and is encoded in the supplemental UPC bar code on the BACK cover (the '50599' add-on). There is no dust-jacket flap because this is a paperback original.)
Board (panel) colorN/A — paperback original, no boards. The PS Publishing 2007 limited hardcovers use cloth/leather (lettered state = blue leather, traycased; numbered/artist states = cloth-over-boards, slipcased). Exact trade-edition board color UNVERIFIED.
Spine / center bindingN/A — paperback; printed-wrap spine matching the Glen Orbik cover (woman in red against a foggy seascape/lighthouse motif). PS Publishing 2007 hardcover spine/binding varies by state (see limitedEditions).
Binding stylePerfect-bound (glued) mass-market paperback, printed illustrated wraps, 12mo (~6¾ inches), approx. 184 pp. (some catalog entries list 178 pp. text). Includes a 'Hard Case Crime Club' subscription insert card bound/laid in (commonly noted between pp. 96-97) — present-and-attached is a small condition plus, though not a printing point.
Topstain / endpapersN/A for the paperback (no topstain, no endpapers). PS Publishing lettered state (2007) has gilt edges and gilt titling; numbered/artist states standard — endpaper/topstain details UNVERIFIED.

Dust jacket

Hard Case Crime pulp-noir cover (Glen Orbik): a red-haired/red-dressed femme-fatale figure against a misty New England coastal/lighthouse-and-fog background, classic retro paperback styling with the Hard Case Crime logo banner, 'STEPHEN KING' large at top, title 'THE COLORADO KID', and 'A NOVEL'. Back cover carries pulp-style teaser copy, the UPC bar code with the price add-on, ISBN, and price. No dust jacket (paperback).

Art / design: Front cover painting by Glen Orbik (signed 'Orbik'), the signature Hard Case Crime pulp-noir cover artist. PS Publishing 2007 hardcover used DIFFERENT artists: dust-jacket and interior illustrations by Glenn Chadbourne, with additional artwork across states by Edward Miller and J.K. Potter.

reference photohttps://johnatkinsonbooks.co.uk/book/stephen-king-the-colorado-kid-true-first-us-edition-2005/reference photohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Colorado_Kidreference photohttps://veryfinebooks.com/stephen-king-colorado-kid-first-edition-PS-Publishing-2007/
Book-club edition & fakes — how to spot a wrong copyNot applicable in the Doubleday/BOMC sense — there is no book-club hardcover of the 2005 first. The collector's concern instead is PRINTING STATE: a 'book-club-equivalent' downgrade here is simply a LATER PRINTING of the paperback, told by the back-cover UPC code reading '05584' instead of '50599'. For the PS Publishing 2007 hardcovers, the trade (unsigned, 10,000) is the common version; lettered/numbered/artist states carry limitation pages and signatures — absence of a signed/numbered limitation leaf means you have the trade hardback, not a deluxe state.

Also watch for: CAUTIONS: (1) Later printings of the paperback are visually near-identical to the first — ALWAYS verify the back-cover UPC code reads '50599' (first) not '05584' (later); dealers sometimes list later printings as 'first edition' loosely. (2) Read-copy condition issues: spine creasing, rolled spine, and price-sticker residue are common on mass-market paperbacks and depress value. (3) Missing 'Hard Case Crime Club' insert card lowers completeness for purists. (4) The 2019 Titan/Hard Case Crime reissue (illustrated edition, ISBN 978-1-78909-155-7) and the 2007 PS Publishing hardcover are frequently conflated with 'the first edition' in listings — they are NOT the true first. (5) Ex-library and remainder-marked copies of a $5.99 paperback have minimal collector value. No facsimile-jacket / married-jacket risk since there is no dust jacket on the true first.

Print run & scarcity

The Colorado Kid was a paperback original (no simultaneous US hardcover trade edition). Hard Case Crime/Dorchester did not disclose precise figures, but the widely repeated figure is "over one million" for the first printing — extraordinary for a pulp-crime imprint and the direct reason the unsigned first is abundant and inexpensive. This abundance, not scarcity, is the defining commercial fact of the title. Hardcover collectibility lives only in the later 2007 PS Publishing UK signed limited editions, which are a distinct edition with their own (small, hundreds-level) print runs.

First-state points & errata

No documented textual errata/state change; the only recognized point is the back-cover UPC code (50599 = first; 05584 = later). UNVERIFIED beyond that.

Limited & signed editions

PS Publishing (UK), July 2007 — first HARDCOVER, four states, introduction by Charles Ardai: (1) LETTERED state — 33 copies, bound in blue leather, traycased, gilt titles/edges, signed by Stephen King and the artists; (2) LIMITED NUMBERED — 450 copies, slipcased, signed by King and the illustrator; (3) ARTIST edition — 1,000 copies, signed/numbered by the illustrator (not King); (4) UNSIGNED TRADE hardback — 10,000 copies (unnumbered; the readily available 'first hardcover'). Illustrators across the states: Glenn Chadbourne, Edward Miller, J.K. Potter; 15 color interior illustrations in the deluxe states. NONE of these precede the 2005 paperback; all are LATER hardcover issues of the work. No Charnel House edition of this title is documented.

Market value confirmed sales

$40–110 (true first printing, "50599" UPC point, Fine/As New, complete with Hard Case Crime Club insert). Most realized sold prices land $25–60; $80–110 is the upper band for genuinely Fine, fresh copies. Signed copies are a separate, much higher tier.

Assumes a genuine first edition / first printing in near-fine to fine condition (clean copy, unclipped jacket). Lesser condition is worth less.

Confirmed sales: No formal auction-house (Heritage/PBA) sold records exist for the unsigned trade first — it is too common to consign. Documented marketplace data points: (1) eBay completed/sold listings for the 2005 HCC-013 first printing cluster roughly $22–60 over 2023–2025 (eBay completed). (2) Dealer SOLD/near-fine first-printing softcover, John Atkinson Books, £85 (~$108) listed 2024–2025. (3) Harropian Books, Fine first-edition/first-printing, dealer ask ~$75–95 (AbeBooks, 2024–2025). NOTE: these mix asking and sold; for an over-1-million-copy paperback the true sold floor is the eBay $22–60 band, not dealer asks.

Book-club edition (the trap): No true Book-of-the-Month/book-club edition exists — it was a paperback-only original, so the classic BCE trap does not apply. The functional "traps" are LATER PRINTINGS misdescribed as firsts (UPC code 05584 or higher instead of 50599) and the unrelated 2019/2021 Hard Case Crime reissue (ISBN 978-1-78909-155-7 / 978-1-78909-389-6) — these are $8–15 reading copies. The genuinely valuable "lookalikes" run the OTHER direction: the 2007 PS Publishing UK signed/numbered limited and lettered hardcovers (a different edition) fetch $300–1,500+. — a fraction of a true first; never pay first-edition money for one.

Single biggest separator for THIS title: the code printed above the UPC barcode on the rear cover. "50599" = true first printing (confirmed by HCC editor Charles Ardai); "05584" or any other code = a later printing and worth a few dollars regardless of how it is listed. Because the first run exceeded one million copies, an UNSIGNED first is common — condition is everything: it must be As New/Fine, no spine crease, no reading lean, square corners, with the "Hard Case Crime Club" insert still tipped in (pp. 96–97). A signed/inscribed copy (King is a tough signer) is the real money: authenticated King signatures on the trade first realistically command roughly $300–800+, and full PSA/JSA-verified inscribed copies more. Do NOT confuse the $40–110 trade first with the 2007 PS Publishing signed UK limiteds, which are a separate four-figure collectible.

Value sources:

Sources

Verification notes: Cross-checked the first-printing point (UPC 50599 vs later 05584, per Charles Ardai) on at least three dealer pages: johnatkinsonbooks.co.uk, abebooks (Harropian Books listing) and abebooks (Dearly Departed Books listing). Format-as-paperback-original confirmed via Wikipedia and the PS Publishing page (which explicitly calls the 2007 release the 'First Hardcover edition'). $5.99 price derived from the price-encoded supplemental UPC '50599' and consistent with the era's mass-market pricing; explicit '$5.99' text not independently quoted by a dealer (so price field rests on the UPC encoding + standard convention). PS Publishing four-state structure cross-checked Very Fine Books + Wikipedia.

confidence: High on the core facts: paperback original with NO true hardcover first, publisher/series/date/ISBN/cover artist, the 50599-vs-05584 first-printing UPC point (cross-checked across multiple dealers citing editor Charles Ardai), $5.99 cover price (corroborated by the price-encoded UPC), and the PS Publishing 2007 four-state limited (cross-checked Wikipedia + Very Fine Books). Medium/low on the exact Canadian price and any board/topstain/endpaper detail of the PS limited (marked UNVERIFIED). No conventional number line exists, so that field is correctly N/A rather than missing.← Back to all titles