"Beren and Luthien" Deluxe Edition Cover Art

We finally have a look at what the deluxe edition of the forthcoming Beren and Luthien deluxe edition will look like! It is a dark green. The Children of Hurin was blue. So, if I am correct to assume, that should The Fall of Gondolin be published in a similar style, that the deluxe edition will be coloured dark red, almost maroon.

Appropriately enough, this was revealed on 'Tolkien Reading Day', one of the dates celebrated by Tolkien fans. the others include Tolkien's Birthday, ad well as Sept. 22 [Bilbo 's & Frodo's Birthdays, as well as the publication of the The Hobbit, the first book to be published that is set in Middle-earth.]

Apparently, it features a nightingale motif, which is appropriate considering the fact that "Tinuviel", Luthien's last name, is Elvish for "nightingale." This motif is most likely designed by Alan Lee, who also provided similar motifs for the deluxe editions of The Children of Hurin and Tales From the Perilous Realm.

As a reminder, the ISBN for the deluxe edition is: 9780008214203.Painstakingly restored from Tolkien's manuscripts and presented for the first time as a continuous and standalone story, the epic tale of Beren and Luthien will reunite fans of The Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings with Elves and Men, Dwarves and Orcs and the rich landscape and creatures unique to Tolkien's Middle-earth. The tale of Beren and Luthien was, or became, an essential element in the evolution of The Silmarillion, the myths and legends of the First Age of the World conceived by J.R.R. Tolkien. Returning from France and the battle of the Somme at the end of 1916, he wrote the tale in the following year. Essential to the story, and never changed, is the fate that shadowed the love of Beren and Luthien: for Beren was a mortal man, but Luthien was an immortal Elf. Her father, a great Elvish lord, in deep opposition to Beren, imposed on him an impossible task that he must perform before he might wed Luthien. This is the kernel of the legend; and it leads to the supremely heroic attempt of Beren and Luthien together to rob the greatest of all evil beings, Melkor, called Morgoth, the Black Enemy, of a Silmaril. In this book Christopher Tolkien has attempted to extract the story of Beren and Luthien from the comprehensive work in which it was embedded; but that story was itself changing as it developed new associations within the larger history. To show something of the process whereby this legend of Middle-earth evolved over the years, he has told the story in his father's own words by giving, first, its original form, and then passages in prose and verse from later texts that illustrate the narrative as it changed. Presented together for the first time, they reveal aspects of the story, both in event and in narrative immediacy, that were afterwards lost.