I have been meaning for some time to write a post detailing how you tell one of the new Poysers from the original editions, but I fluffed, faffed and prevaricated, until an email from a collector today shook me into action. So here goes - there are three key differences to look for:
1) The back cover has a list of the entire Poyser series, in order. Most Poysers had an instantly obsolete list of titles, along with an out-of-date address, an old price, an incorrect barcode etc. So I decided to standardise this in a way that would show people exactly what's available in the series.
2) The copyright page (usually page 4) states that 'this is a print on demand copy, produced from an original edition'. The rest of the copyright page has also been updated.
3) There is no spine blocking on the book. This is the gold lettering that you get on the cloth of the spine, below the dust jacket, which you of course will continue to see on standard Poyser editions.
There's another thing too - all PODs have endpapers that are coloured light blue; the actual colour is called Puffin Blue, which I found rather pleasing. This isn't distinctive in itself - I learned from Trevor Poyser that there was a conscious decision from the very first book in the series to always have coloured endpapers, and some of the originals no doubt had light blue ones - but if you find a book with endpapers like this it probably derives from the recent revival.
Jim
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