Here’s how:

When we first published Eimear McBride’s A Girl is a Half-formed Thing she was an unheard of debut author – and because of that, and the difficulty of judging the novel’s reception, our first run was conservative: just 1,000 copies were printed (rather wonderfully, the same number of copies as Sylvia Beach’s first edition of Ulysses). Since then, of course, Eimear has gone on to conquer the world; she’s been lauded as a major, lasting writer – quite right too. Copies from that first run, which sold out in weeks, have become coveted items. Barely one year after publication, they already change hands for hundreds of pounds; they look set to become a piece of literary history; and every week we receive tens of emails asking if it might be possible to get hold of one. And the answer always is:

– SORRY! No!

Until now, that is…