Manufacturer Defect: LOTR Illustrated By Alan Lee With an Upside Down Binding

Mar 31, 2015

So about 10 years ago for Christmas, while my classmates were asking for footballs and new shoes (or whatever normal kids want for Christmas), I, in proper Nerd fashion, I asked for the hard bound, all in one copy, of the Lord of the Rings, illustrated by Alan Lee. Christmas morning, in a fury of wrapping paper ripping I unveiled this exquisite hard bound copy of JRR Tolkien's fantasy masterpiece. I broke it open to peek at the amazing illustrations and paintings by Alan Lee contained within. But I immediately closed it because I didn't want to ruin the experience of seeing each illustration for the first time while I re-read one of my favorite fantasy novels. So I flipped to the front page and to my dismay I found that it was a total manufacturer defect!

The first section of binding in the book had been glued in upside down! How could this be! Upset and defeated I possibly not too gracefully asked my parents if it would be possible to send it back and get a new un-tainted copy. Of course my parents said they would be happy to send it back. However, later that day as my dad flipped through it, enjoying the awesome artwork inside, he said, "Ya know AJ, this manufacturer defect is actually pretty cool. Think about it. This may be a completely unique copy of this book! There may be no others like it. Some day it may even be a collectors item!" I carefully considered my dad's all too often wise words of wisdom. That is pretty cool, I thought! I was sold!

Soon after I re-read LOTR, my favorite epic journey of Frodo and Sam (and all those others of course), only slightly frustrated with flipping the book upside down and backwards to read the title page, forward, prologue, and inspect the maps. Since then I have re-read this copy of Lord of the Rings several times and it has become one of my favorite books on my bookcase.