Rooney ARCs sell for hundreds of dollars online

Uncorrected proofs of Sally Rooney’s upcoming novel Beautiful World, Where Are You (Faber) have fetched hundreds of dollars on trading sites eBay and Depop, reports the Guardian.

A copy listed on eBay by a seller in North Carolina sold for US$209.16 (A$290) in June, while the canvas tote bag sent out with the ARC copies were fetching prices in the region of $80.

‘Part of the purpose of proofs is to make people get to feel like they’re in an exclusive club,’ Scribe UK publicity and marketing manager Adam Howard told the Guardian. ‘But it happened with the Sally Rooney on a scale we’ve never seen before.’

The increase in demand for ARCs—particularly as social currency on Instagram and other platforms—has made publishers change the way they think about ARCs. ‘Our focus has to be: how can we make our books as visible as possible in this new media landscape,’ said Howard. ‘At Scribe, we no longer produce generic proofs—every one of them is specially designed to be eye-catching, striking and shareable, and we invest our limited budgets into making sure that people on social media have a good reason to share a book with their followers.’

Category: International news