Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban

First edition. First Impression, Third State. 8vo. Pp. 317, [3 (pubs. advts.)]. Laminated pictorial boards with cover illustration by Cliff Wright replicated on the dust jacket (priced £10.99 to front flap). "Double Smarties Award-Winning Author" commendation to bottom of cover and jacket. Third state with 'J.K. Rowling' credited on the verso of the title-page; corrected text block on page [7]; correct number sequence 10–1, stated on the copyright page, with no mention of printer; and with two pages of b/w adverts of previous books at rear. Slightly thicker coated wove paper was used for this state, making the volume noticeably wider and around 50g weightier.

A total of 5,150 copies were published on 8 July 1988 of all three states, with around half of these comprising the first state (this copy being one of the second half of second and third states). The title was released at precisely 3:45 p.m., so British schoolkids wouldn't play truant on the day. In the end, the first print run proved insufficient, with a further 101,800 copies re-printed by Clays a month later.

Endpapers somewhat flecked (production flaw), the merest hint of toning to textblock edges, in an immaculate dustwrapper.

Winner of the 1999 Whitbread Children's Book of the Year. Listed at number 24 in BBC's Big Read, 200 Best Novels, [2003]. The third in the series featuring young boy-wizard Harry Potter, about to start his third year at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry.

[Errington, Philip W., J.K. Rowling: A Bibliography, rev. ed. (London: Bloomsbury, 2017), A7(aaa)]