Works of Thomas Hardy discussion

Emilymom, I won't be joining in for this as I've already read the book and am not up for a re-read of it now.

However, I do own a probable first edition of The Well-Beloved published by Osgood, McIlvaine and Co. in 1897. My wife bought it for me for our 1st Anniversary (Paper) and it was sold to her as a first edition. However, the book is titled as Volume XVII of the first edition of a collection called 'The Wessex Novels,' so I presumed it was only the first edition of that set. However, after researching, the book does appear to be the actual first edition published of the novel, as the first 16 books of the set had been published the year before, so when Osgood published the novel version in 1897 they chose to also call it Vol. 17 of the set. In any event, it is still a cool old book that I treasure.

Heck, I've almost talked myself into a re-read. And I can read it this time on my I-Pad so I don't destroy the pages of the old book. I may have time at the end of June or July. If not, I will join in again to re-read The Woodlanders when the group gets around to that book.