From a Buick 8 Common
What it’s about
At a Pennsylvania State Police barracks, Troop D has kept a secret locked away in Shed B for decades: a car that looks like a 1954 Buick Roadmaster but isn't a real car at all — it doesn't run, its parts make no sense, and now and then it puts on a violent light show and swallows things whole. When a trooper is killed on the highway, his teenage son starts hanging around the barracks, and the older cops finally decide to tell him the long, strange story of the thing they've been guarding. It's a novel about curiosity, grief, and learning to live with questions that refuse to be answered.
Significance A solo Stephen King novel (not a Bachman book); written largely before but published after 2002's Dreamcatcher, it shares the eerie-car premise with Christine yet King has stressed the two are unrelated, and it stands as one of his more meditative entries on the unknowable.
How to spot a true first 30-second check
A true 1st/1st needs BOTH the book and the jacket verified. A first-state jacket on a later or book-club book — or the reverse — is a married copy, not a first.
What to look for
- Confirm BOTH 'First Edition' and the full number line ending in '2' — one without the other is not enough.
- Unclipped $28.00 on the inside front flap; a price-clipped corner is a red flag (and a value hit).
- BCE trap: no price on the flap (or 'Book Club Edition' printed there), a blind-stamp on the lower-rear board, and NO number line.
- BCE copies run smaller/lighter on cheaper paper and are often glued, not sewn.
- Watch for married jackets — verify the number line AND the jacket together, never one alone.
- Cemetery Dance 2002 limiteds (signed/lettered traycased; Wrightson-illustrated gift) are separate deluxe editions, not the trade first.
Verified listings marker-checked
Each copy screened against the seller's own photos. ✓ confirmed = a photo shows the decisive marker; ⚠ not pictured = the shot to ask for before buying. Condition grades are as-pictured.
Buyer beware — verify before you buy. These are our screening opinions, read from each seller’s own photographs; we can misjudge a copy or misread an image. A listing marked “1st/1st confirmed” is not a guarantee — independently confirm the decisive book and jacket markers with the seller before any purchase. Authentication and the buying decision remain the buyer’s responsibility.
Genuine first, number line proven and jacket unclipped — at $14.99 it is under fair value; just get a shot of the boards.
- Number line — Copyright page shows the full "1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2" ending in low 2 — the decisive Scribner first-printing line, photographed and legible.
- Copyright — Copyright © 2002 by Stephen King, designed by Erich Hobbing, Scribner imprint, ISBN 0-7432-1137-5 — all correct first-edition details.
- Jacket price — Front flap US $28.00 / Can $42.50, unclipped first-state; rear barcode 52800 + 0902 date code corroborate.
- Dust jacket — Correct first-edition blue Buick art; no Book Club tells (price present, no club flap or blind-stamp).
- Binding — Boards/spine not pictured — ask for spine and corner shots to rule out lean or bumps under the jacket.
Recorded at screening as a Scribner first/first from ten seller frames, but the item id no longer resolves at eBay, so every line below is our own screening record rather than a photograph you or I can look at today.
- Number line — Recorded from photo 7 at screening — the full Scribner line "1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2" ending in the low 2, the decisive book tell — but the frame is gone, so this stands as a record and not a read I can repeat for you.
- Copyright page — Recorded from the same photo 7 — Copyright © 2002 by Stephen King, Designed by Erich Hobbing, Set in Garamond No. 3 and ISBN 0-7432-1137-5 — again from the record, the frame no longer being retrievable.
- Jacket price — Recorded from photo 6 — the front flap priced U.S. $28.00 / Can. $42.50 and unclipped, the first-state jacket tell — from the record only.
- Binding — Recorded from photo 9 — the boards photographed with the jacket off and no book-club blind-stamp on the rear board; the record's colour words for the spine and sides are not something I can now re-check against the rubric.
- Dust jacket — Recorded from photos 1, 2 and 8 — SCRIBNER at the jacket spine foot, the ISBN 0-7432-1137-5 barcode on the rear panel, and the Chris Buck author photograph with the Simon & Schuster Audio ad on the rear flap — none of it re-openable.
- Photographs no longer viewable — eBay returns item-not-found for this id, so nothing above can be re-checked and there is nothing here to buy; if the copy resurfaces, ask for fresh shots of the copyright page and the priced front flap before treating it as verified.
- Endpapers / bottom edge — No endpaper or bottom-edge read appears anywhere in the screening record; on a relist, ask for the open front cover and a square-on shot of the bottom text-block edge, remainder spray being common on this print run (a value point, not an edition one).
Fully confirmed first, NF-to-Fine and nothing material unseen; $34.99 is fair-to-toppish for a very common title.
- Number line — Copyright page shows the full canonical "1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2" first-printing line — the decisive tell, across 19 photos.
- Copyright — Copyright © 2002 by Stephen King, designed by Erich Hobbing, ISBN 0-7432-1137-5, Scribner imprint — all correct first-edition.
- Jacket price — Front flap unclipped US $28.00 / Can $42.50 first-state; rear barcode 0902 date code matches.
- Binding — Two-tone blue cloth spine over cream paper boards, gilt spine lettering with Scribner flame — correct first binding.
- Dust jacket — Correct first-edition credits: Fulbrook III design, Stutzman illustration, Buck author photo.
✓ Decisive marker pictured — nothing outstanding to request.
A genuine Scribner first/first with both decisive tells photographed on the one copy — the full number line on a legible copyright page and the intact, unclipped $28.00 flap — with only the boards beneath the jacket left unseen.
- Number line — Photo 5 is the copyright page square-on and sharp, reading "1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2" — full and ending in the low 2, which is the decisive book tell.
- Copyright page — The same photo 5 carries Copyright © 2002 by Stephen King, DESIGNED BY ERICH HOBBING, Set in Garamond No. 3, the Scribner colophon at 1230 Avenue of the Americas and ISBN 0-7432-1137-5 — and the page being fully legible I can say plainly that no separate "First Edition" line is printed on it, as on every Buick 8 copyright page I was able to re-open, so the number line is what carries the point on this title.
- Jacket price — Photo 4 shows the whole front flap with the price block intact at its head — U.S. $28.00 over Can. $42.50, unclipped, first state.
- Dust jacket — Photo 1 gives the front-panel art, photo 2 the rear panel with the 52800 price add-on over ISBN 0-7432-1137-5 and the 0902 (September 2002) code, and photo 6 the rear flap — the King portrait with the credit block legible beneath it: jacket design by John Fulbrook III, illustration by Mark Stutzman, author photograph by Chris Buck.
- Endpapers / edges — Photos 4 and 6 show both covers open on plain cream endpapers with no printing, and photo 3 shows the top edge clean and unstained — as the rubric describes.
- Binding — The jacket never comes off in these six frames — the spine and sides show only as a violet strip at the hinge in photos 4 and 6 — so ask for a jacket-off shot of the spine and both boards.
- Text-block bottom edge — The bottom edge is not photographed; ask for a square-on shot of it to rule out a remainder spray or mark, which bears on price, not on whether the copy is a first.
Fully documented on the edition points — the full number line, the unclipped $28.00 flap, and the quarter-bound purple-spine binding shown with the jacket off — so nothing bearing on whether this is a first is outstanding.
- Number line — Photo 4 is the copyright page with the full Scribner line "1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2" ending in the low 2, cleanly legible — the decisive book tell.
- Copyright page — The same photo 4 gives Copyright © 2002 by Stephen King, DESIGNED BY ERICH HOBBING, Set in Garamond No. 3, ISBN 0-7432-1137-5 and the Scribner colophon (the imprint repeats at the foot of the title page in photo 3), and no separate "First Edition" line is printed on the page — the number line does the work here.
- Jacket price — Photo 9 is a close-up of the flap head reading U.S. $28.00 / Can. $42.50; a clip removes precisely that block, so its presence settles the price state as first and unclipped.
- Binding — Photo 7 has the jacket off — quarter-bound, violet-purple spine with silver lettering, the Scribner flame and SCRIBNER at the foot, over pale gray-cream paper sides, exactly the binding the rubric describes.
- Dust jacket — Photo 1 shows the front-panel art, photo 2 the rear panel with the 52800 price add-on over ISBN 0-7432-1137-5 and the 0902 date code, and photo 8 the jacket whole across front, spine and rear.
- Rear flap credits — The seller's text names Fulbrook, Stutzman and Chris Buck, but no frame shows the rear flap, so those credits rest on his words rather than a photograph; ask for the rear flap if you want the credit block on record.
- Endpapers / bottom edge — Neither cover is shown open and the bottom edge is not pictured; ask for the open front cover and a square-on bottom-edge shot to check for a remainder mark — a value point only.
The book block is proven a first — the number line is the one genuinely sharp frame in a badly shot set — but the jacket is undocumented: the flap price cannot be read either way, and the rear panel as pictured carries a bare ISBN barcode with no $28.00 add-on and no date code.
- Number line — Photo 7 shows the copyright page with the full Scribner line "1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2" ending in the low 2, legible and unambiguous — the decisive book tell.
- Copyright page — The same photo 7 carries Copyright © 2002 by Stephen King, DESIGNED BY ERICH HOBBING, Set in Garamond No. 3 and the Scribner colophon at 1230 Avenue of the Americas, though the frame is cropped through the Library of Congress block so the ISBN line itself is not in it.
- Dust jacket — Photos 1 and 8 show the front-panel Buick art and the rear panel's "There are Buicks everywhere...." — artwork matching the first-edition jacket, which by itself settles nothing about the jacket's state.
- Binding — Photo 5 has the jacket off and shows a spine strip distinct from the board carrying the correct stamping — STEPHEN KING / From A Buick 8 over the Scribner flame and SCRIBNER — but the frame is dim and lamp-lit, so neither the spine nor the board colour can honestly be read from it.
- Jacket price — Photo 4 catches the front flap but is motion-blurred and washed out at the head, and the corner where U.S. $28.00 / Can. $42.50 belongs reads blank — absent and illegible look identical here, and this is the tell that would carry the jacket, so ask for a sharp, square-on shot of the top of the front flap including its outer corner.
- Rear-panel barcode — As pictured in photo 8 the rear panel carries a single barcode block (ISBN 0-7432-1137-5 / 9780743211376) with no "52800" price add-on and no "0902" code, where the other Buick 8 jackets I re-opened today carry both; ask for a close, square-on shot of that block, since with the flap price it decides which jacket this is.
- Endpapers / bottom edge — There is no usable open-cover frame — photo 4 is far too blurred to read an endpaper — and while photo 6 shows the top edge clean and unstained, the bottom edge is never pictured; ask for the open front cover and a square-on bottom-edge shot, remainder spray being common on this print run.
- Binding colour — The jacket-off frames are dim and shot on glass under a lamp; ask for a daylight jacket-off photograph of the spine and both boards so the purple spine and light-gray sides the rubric calls for can actually be seen.
Number line proves the first, but the price flap was never shown — ask for it; at $31.50 it is fair market either way.
- Number line — Copyright page shows the full "1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2" first-printing line, legibly photographed — the decisive tell.
- Copyright — Copyright © 2002 by Stephen King, designed by Erich Hobbing, Set in Garamond No. 3, Scribner, ISBN 0-7432-1137-5; LCCN 2001055118.
- Binding — Trade-trim sewn block consistent with a true first — no thin or glued BCE trim.
- Jacket price — The $28.00 front flap is never directly photographed (book is in mylar) — ask the seller to show the flap to confirm it is unclipped first-state.
Full identification detail & sourcescopyright · jacket · binding · book-club traps · print run · value · references
The Scribner trade hardcover is the true first of the standard text. Cemetery Dance Publications issued collector editions in 2002 (750 numbered traycased, signed by King + Bernie Wrightson; 52 lettered traycased, signed; and 1,750 unsigned gift copies in slipcase, illustrated by Wrightson) — these are separate deluxe issues, valuable in their own right, but the Scribner trade is the accepted reading first. No Doubleday/Viking/Putnam complication here; this is a clean Scribner-era first identified by BOTH the "First Edition" wording AND the asymmetric Scribner number line.
First-printing points at a glance
Dust jacket
Front jacket carries the title/author typography over a dark, atmospheric photographic/illustrative design evoking the malevolent Buick Roadmaster; back panel continues the dark moody treatment. Inside front flap blurb opens: "From a Buick 8 is a novel about our fascination with deadly things, about our insistence on answers when there are none, about terror and courage in the face of the unknowable." Designer John Fulbrook III; author photo (Chris Buck) on rear flap.
Art / design: Jacket designed by John Fulbrook III; book interior designed by Erich Hobbing; author photograph by Chris Buck. (The Cemetery Dance limiteds are interior-illustrated by Bernie/Berni Wrightson — six full-page full-color images — which is a separate edition, not the trade jacket.)
Also watch for: Common cautions: (1) PRICE-CLIPPED jackets passed as firsts — confirm the unclipped $28.00. (2) Book Club Edition copies (no price/blind-stamp, no number line) misrepresented as the trade first. (3) MARRIED jackets — a later-printing or BCE book in a first-state jacket, or vice versa; verify number line AND jacket together. (4) Ex-library copies (stamps, pockets, spine labels) — heavily devalued. (5) Remainder marks (spray/marker on bottom text-block edge) — common on this title given the very large print run; reduces value. (6) Facsimile/reproduction jackets — check paper/print quality. (7) Cemetery Dance limiteds offered without their traycase/slipcase, or signature pages that don't match the stated number.
Print run & scarcity
Collector/dealer consensus figure (publisher never disclosed an audited count). stephenkingcollector.com (the standard King first-edition reference site), on its From a Buick 8 page, states verbatim: "A first edition of 1,750,000 copies (single-source — treat as approximate).
First-state points & errata
No documented first-state errata point separates first printings; rely on number line + "First Edition" + $28.00 unclipped jacket. Specific typo state: UNVERIFIED (none required to confirm a first).
Limited & signed editions
Cemetery Dance Publications, 2002 (ISBN 1-58767-061-9 / 9781587670619): (1) Signed Limited — 750 numbered copies, leather-bound, traycased, signed by Stephen King and Bernie (Berni) Wrightson, with six full-page full-color Wrightson illustrations; (2) Deluxe Lettered — 52 lettered copies, traycased, signed by King and Wrightson; (3) Gift Edition — 1,750 copies in slipcase, unsigned. The 408-page CD editions feature red-and-silver gilt decoration and a folding clamshell/traycase lined with matching felt.
Market value estimate
~$15–$40
Assumes a genuine first edition / first printing in near-fine to fine condition (clean copy, unclipped jacket). Lesser condition is worth less.
Sale evidence no verified realized price: Cemetery Dance signed/numbered limited (750, King + Wrightson) appeared at Heritage Auctions (historical.ha.com Lot #26255, As New) — lot documented though hammer not publicly displayed; comparable CD limiteds trade ~$300–600. King-signed trade firsts offered by Raptis Rare Books and Meier & Sons (dealer records). Unsigned trade firsts (fine/fine, unclipped $28 DJ) consistently dealer-priced and selling in the $10–35 band (Brenner's Books, Uncommon Works, Rare Book Cellar, eBay). Note: I could not retrieve a precise Heritage realized figure (site blocked direct fetch); treat signed/limited ranges as documented dealer/comp ranges, not a single confirmed hammer.
No confirmed sale found, so this is rated at no less than its original jacket price — a true first/first should hold at least retail in near-fine/fine condition. Soft estimate from dealer listings (treat as approximate): $15–40 (genuine unsigned trade first, fine/fine, unclipped $28.00 jacket). King-signed trade first: ~$250–600. Cemetery Dance signed/numbered limited of 750: ~$300–600.
Book-club edition (the trap): $5–12. Book Club Edition (BOMC) is the trap — worth a fraction even of the cheap trade first; ex-library and reading copies often $3–8. — a fraction of a true first; never pay first-edition money for one.
Condition sensitivity is real but the ceiling is low: even immaculate, an unsigned trade first rarely clears $40 because the first printing was massive (~1.75 million copies per stephenkingcollector.com) — supply, not condition, caps value. A price-clipped jacket or any library markings push it toward BCE territory. The ONLY meaningful premium is a SIGNATURE: a genuine King-signed trade first jumps to ~$250–600, and the Cemetery Dance signed/numbered limited of 750 (signed by King and illustrator Bernie Wrightson, traycased, issued at $250) is the actual collectible, ~$300–600. THE SINGLE BIGGEST DISCRIMINATOR FOR THIS TITLE: there is NO Doubleday gutter code — this is a Scribner book. Verify the trade first by the number line "1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2" plus "First Scribner Edition 2002" on the copyright page, blue quarter-cloth over white paper boards, and an UNCLIPPED $28.00 jacket. The mislisted copies are (a) Book Club Editions — blind-stamp dimple on the rear board, smaller/lighter build, and NO $28.00 price on the front flap — and (b) the separate Cemetery Dance limited being conflated with the cheap trade book. Anyone listing the common trade first at $80+ "rare first edition" is overpricing supply.
- https://www.stephenkingcollector.com/1st/buick8.html
- https://historical.ha.com/itm/books/signed-editions/stephen-king-signed-limited-edition-of-from-a-buick-8-baltimore-cemetery-dance-publications-2002-first-edition-n/a/658-26255.s
- https://www.raptisrarebooks.com/product/from-a-buick-8-stephen-king-first-edition-signed-2002/
- https://www.cemeterydance.com/from-a-buick-8.html
- https://www.brennersbooks.com/pages/books/010517/stephen-king/from-a-buick-8
- https://www.abebooks.com/first-edition/Buick-8-Stephen-King-Scribner-New/30365246045/bd
Sources
- https://www.stephenkingcollector.com/1st/buick8.html
- https://stephenking.com/works/limited/from-a-buick-8.html
- https://www.rarebookcellar.com/pages/books/30929/stephen-king/from-a-buick-8
- https://www.abebooks.com/first-edition/Buick-8-Stephen-King-Scribner-New/30365246045/bd
- https://veryfinebooks.com/stephen-king-from-buick-8-signed-limited-first-edition-leather-bound-cemtery-dance/
- https://www.biblio.com/book/buick-8-signed-stephen-king-bernie/d/315515136
- https://bookshopapocalypse.com/products/from-a-buick-8-by-stephen-king-2002-hardcover-bce
- https://stephenking.com/other/identifying_first_editions.pdf
- https://www.stephenkingcollector.com/1st/buick8.html
- https://www.publishersweekly.com/9780743211376
- https://stephenking.com/works/novel/from-a-buick-8.html
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/From_a_Buick_8
Verification notes: Price $28.00 confirmed by stephenkingcollector.com + multiple AbeBooks/dealer listings. Number line "1 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2" confirmed by stephenkingcollector.com + dealer listings (rarebookcellar/columbiabooks). Binding (quarter purple spine, gray boards, silver lettering) confirmed by 2+ dealer descriptions. Designers (Fulbrook III jacket / Hobbing book / Chris Buck photo) confirmed by dealer copy. Cemetery Dance limited figures (750/52/1,750) confirmed by official stephenking.com limited page + veryfinebooks + biblio. BCE existence confirmed (bookshopapocalypse "First Book Club Edition"); exact blind-stamp placement not photo-verified — stated per Scribner-era norm.