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Roadwork Collectible pb original

as Richard Bachman
1981 · Signet (New American Library / NAL), New York
First-edition cover of Roadwork
First-edition jacket (first edition (verified vs jacket)) · source

What it’s about

Barton George Dawes is a middle-aged laundry plant manager whose home and workplace both lie in the path of a planned highway extension. As the city marshals eminent domain to bulldoze the streets that hold every memory of his life, Dawes quietly refuses to relocate, and his slow-burning resistance hardens into something far more dangerous as the deadline closes in. A grief-soaked portrait of one ordinary man's breakdown against the machinery of "progress."

Significance Originally published in 1981 as a paperback original under King's "Richard Bachman" pseudonym; a non-supernatural character study, later collected in the omnibus "The Bachman Books."

Is this the true first?NO. Roadwork is a PAPERBACK ORIGINAL (Signet mass-market, March 1981). There is NO US hardcover first edition. Like the other early Bachman titles (Rage 1977, The Long Walk 1979, The Running Man 1982), King's publisher issued it directly as a Signet paperback with no preceding or simultaneous hardcover. The 'true first' is therefore the Signet paperback original. The first hardcover appearance of the text came only later inside the omnibus The Bachman Books (NAL hardcover, October 1985) — a collection, not a standalone first.
The true first edition/first printing is the Signet (NAL) mass-market paperback, 1981, ISBN 0-451-09668-1, identified by the complete number line '1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9' on the copyright page. No small-press limited and no hardcover precedes it. (A 1983 UK New English Library paperback exists but is a later, separate edition, not the true first.) Decades later Suntup Editions produced fine/limited hardcover editions (2020s) with new Darrel Millsap-based art, but those are modern collector editions and do not affect first-edition status — the 1981 Signet paperback remains the true first.

First-printing points at a glance

First-printing statementNo 'First Printing' wording is present. UNLIKE its companions Rage ('First Signet Printing, September, 1977') and The Running Man ('First Printing May 1982'), the Roadwork copyright page carries NO printed first-printing statement. The SOLE first-printing point is the complete number line. (Authoritative King first-editions guide lists Roadwork's identifier as only '1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9' on CP — no month/year statement.)
Number line'1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9' on the copyright page. A first printing shows the complete line beginning with 1. Any later printing has the lowest numeral(s) stripped (e.g., begins '2 3 4 5...' or higher) — the presence of the numeral 1 is the make-or-break point. Confirmed by two independent authoritative sources (official stephenking.com 'Identifying first editions' guide compiled by Bev Vincent; and collector listings).
Gutter / printer codeN/A — gutter/printer codes (e.g., Doubleday's 'R49') apply to Doubleday hardcovers, not Signet paperbacks. There is no gutter code for this title.
First printing — copiesNot publicly disclosed
First jacket price$2.25 (printed cover price — this is a paperback, so the price is on the front cover, top right, not a dust-jacket flap). Cross-verified by the official stephenking.com first-editions PDF (lists DJ/cover price $2.25) and multiple collector listings. Later printings carry higher prices ($2.50, $2.95, etc.); the 1983 UK NEL edition shows a £1.50 rear-cover price (different book). (Upper-right corner of the front cover (mass-market paperback; no dust jacket). '$2.25' (with the Canadian price typically alongside, e.g. '$2.95' in Canada on later/Canadian variants — UNVERIFIED for the 1981 first state).)
Board (panel) colorN/A — paperback. The book has pictorial wraps (no boards). Front cover is a full-color Darrel Millsap painting; the SIGNET logo and price sit on the front. No cloth boards exist for any first edition.
Spine / center bindingN/A — paperback, glued perfect-bound wraps. Spine is part of the printed pictorial cover (Signet branding + title/author). No cloth spine. A true first should have an uncreased, unbroken spine for top value.
Binding styleMass-market paperback, glued/perfect-bound (not sewn), pictorial paper wraps. ~4¼ x 7.0 in trim, roughly 0.6 in thick (per the King first-editions guide: 4¼ x 7.0 x 0.6).
Topstain / endpapersN/A — paperback, no topstain and no endpapers. Page edges are plain cut; paper is standard mass-market pulp stock (yellows/tans with age — expected, not a defect).

Dust jacket

Full-color front-cover illustration by Darrel Millsap in the early-1980s Signet style. 'Richard Bachman' byline and the title 'Roadwork' on front; Signet logo and $2.25 price upper area. (No dust jacket — pictorial paperback wraps.) Back cover carries blurb/copy and price code. UNVERIFIED exact front-cover scene description from sources reviewed.

Art / design: Cover painting by Darrel Millsap (confirmed — Suntup Editions later commissioned a fine-art print of his original Roadwork cover artwork). Designer/art direction: Signet/NAL in-house (UNVERIFIED specific designer credit).

reference photohttps://www.firstandfine.com/product/king-stephen-as-bachman-richard-1981-roadwork-us-first-edition/reference photohttps://shop.suntup.press/products/roadwork-art-print
Book-club edition & fakes — how to spot a wrong copyN/A in the usual sense — there is NO hardcover trade first and thus no Doubleday/BOMC blind-stamp or 'Book Club Edition' flap to worry about for the standalone 1981 paperback. CAUTION instead: the text was later collected in the hardcover omnibus The Bachman Books (NAL 1985, including a slipcased issue) and in The Bachman Books trade paperback — those are omnibus reprints, NOT a Roadwork first. A standalone hardcover 'Roadwork' will be a modern Suntup limited, never a 1981 first. Verify the standalone Signet paperback by the '1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9' line and $2.25 cover price.

Also watch for: 1) Later Signet printings passed off as firsts — always confirm the number line BEGINS with 1 ('1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9'); a stripped line ('2 3 4...' or higher) is a later printing. 2) Price/printing mismatch — a $2.50/$2.95 cover price is NOT the 1981 first. 3) The 1983 UK New English Library paperback (£1.50 rear price) is sometimes mislabeled 'first' — it is a separate, later edition. 4) Omnibus copies (The Bachman Books, 1985/1986) sold as a standalone Roadwork first — they are collections. 5) Ex-library / reading-copy condition: mass-market pulp is fragile; spine creases, cracked glue, sun-fade and page browning sharply cut value. Coverless or rebound copies have little collector value. 6) Modern Suntup hardcover mistaken for a vintage hardcover first — no vintage standalone hardcover exists.

Print run & scarcity

FORMAT CORRECTION: The prompt frames Roadwork as a 1981 Signet paperback original (correct) but asks for a 'hardcover' first-printing figure — there was no 1981 hardcover. Roadwork was Bachman novel #3, issued ONLY in mass-market paperback by Signet/New American Library (ISBN 0451096681, 274pp). No publisher has ever disclosed the original paperback print run; it is genuinely unpublished, hence I did NOT invent a number (and deliberately did not reuse the ~30,000 Carrie figure, which is unrelated). FIRST HARDCOVER APPEARANCE of the text was the 1985 omnibus 'The Bachman Books' (NAL, ISBN 0453005071) — also no published first-printing quantity for that omnibus. NO small-press signed/numbered/lettered limited edition of Roadwork as a standalone is documented (no Grant/PS Publishing/Cemetery Dance limited surfaced). Standalone hardcovers of sibling Bachman titles (The Long Walk, The Running Man) only appeared for the first time circa 2025; Roadwork's standalone status under Scribner is unconfirmed and would be modern, not a 'first edition.' INDIRECT context only (not a Roadwork figure): the related Bachman title Thinner sold ~28,000 copies in its initial run before King was unmasked, then ~10x after; King intentionally gave the Bachman paperbacks minimal marketing, so early-Bachman print runs were modest — but this is inference, not a published Roadwork print quantity. Bottom line: the original Bachman paperbacks are scarce/collectible precisely because runs were small and pre-fame, but no hard number is on record.

First-state points & errata

See firstStatePoints — none documented beyond the number line.

Limited & signed editions

No 1981-era signed/numbered/traycased edition exists (it shipped as a cheap paperback original). Modern limiteds: Suntup Editions produced a slipcased/limited fine-press hardcover Roadwork in the 2020s (Artist/Numbered/Lettered states, with Darrel Millsap art) — a 21st-century collector edition, not a first. The 1985 NAL omnibus 'The Bachman Books' had a scarce slipcased issue. A UK 'Rage/Roadwork/The Long Walk' NEL softcover set has appeared traycased by dealers (dealer-made, not publisher-issued).

Market value estimate

~$250–$650

Assumes a genuine first edition / first printing in near-fine to fine condition (clean copy, unclipped jacket). Lesser condition is worth less.

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): $250–650 (genuine first printing, Fine/unread, $2.25 cover, full number line 1–9; exceptional copies push toward $700+)

Book-club edition (the trap): No true book-club edition of the standalone Roadwork exists (it was a mass-market PB original). The real "traps": later Signet printings of the same paperback (number line missing the 1, or a higher cover price) — worth $5–25; the 1985/86 "The Bachman Books" omnibus (hardcover or Signet PB containing Roadwork) — $15–125, NOT a Roadwork first; and the 1981 NAL library/hardcover bindings. Any of these mislisted as the "1981 first edition" should be treated as $5–25 filler, not the $250–650 collectible. — a fraction of a true first; never pay first-edition money for one.

Condition is everything for a 40+-year-old mass-market paperback: spine creasing, cover wear, sunned/rolled spine, and reading creases crush value fast — a VG copy is $40–120, a true Fine/unread copy is the $250–650 piece, and most surviving copies are well-read. The #1 thing separating a real first from the mislistings: this title has NO dust jacket and NO hardcover trade first — the FIRST IS THE PAPERBACK, identified by the $2.25 cover price AND the full number line "1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9" on the copyright page. A higher cover price or a number line starting at 2+ = a later printing worth a fraction. Beware sellers passing off the 1985/86 "Bachman Books" omnibus or a library hardcover binding as "the 1981 first." Signed/inscribed copies are very rare (King signed almost nothing as Bachman before the 1985 reveal) and carry a large premium — an authentic signed Fine first could reach $1,500–3,000+, but authentication is essential.

Value sources:

Sources

Verification notes: Price $2.25 and number line '1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9' each confirmed by 2+ sources: official stephenking.com 'Identifying first editions' guide (Bev Vincent, updated 2024) lists Roadwork 1981 Signet, trim 4¼ x 7.0 x 0.6, price $2.25, identifier '1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9' on CP; corroborated by collector search results. Critical distinction verified: Roadwork's CP carries NO 'First Printing' statement (unlike Rage and The Running Man in the same guide) — number line is the sole point. Cover artist Darrel Millsap confirmed via Suntup Editions. Paperback-original status (no hardcover first) confirmed by guide + Wikipedia + dealer listings.

confidence: high — Price ($2.25) and number line ('1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9') are cross-verified by the official stephenking.com first-editions guide and independent collector sources; paperback-original status and cover artist (Darrel Millsap) confirmed. Lower-confidence/UNVERIFIED items: exact front-cover scene description, Canadian price variant, and precise realized sale prices.← Back to all titles