This holiday season, you can give your child an actual Golden Ticket. It comes tucked inside a new special edition of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, one of a slew of deluxe editions of books Penguin Young Readers is releasing this fall.
The new volume is full of little surprises. Willy Wonka has scribbled notes throughout the book in his curlicued script and tucked bits of paper into the pages, like a secret blueprint of the factory and an Ooma-Loompa to-do list. There are also new editions of Pride and Prejudice and Sense and Sensibility featuring new art by Anna Bond, of the Rifle Paper Co., or a deluxe copy of the hit romantasy novel, The Secret World of Briar Rose, that comes with a fairy-tale inspired embossed jacket, a gold foil-stamped case, and sprayed edges.
None of these books come from a boutique press catering to rare-book collectors. They’re from the children’s division of the world’s largest publisher, Penguin Random House, which generated $5.76 billion in revenue last year. This wave of new books is part of a deliberate strategy to cater to the company’s most devoted readers by designing premium editions that they want to own, display, and carry around as a marker of their identity.
There’s a good reason for this push. Today’s young readers are more passionate about reading than ever, driving Penguin Young Readers’ growth. “We’re selling more books than we’ve ever sold,” says Jen Loja, president of Penguin Young Readers. However, there are actually fewer of these bibliophiles than ever before.
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