Unusually, we’re not entirely sure what to make of these.

They feel fantastic — light and portable with a very tactile finish and a nice touch of spot varnish on the back. The paper is lovely and they are absolutely perfect for slipping in a pocket or bag.

They’re a high-risk strategy in the current market, however. The Kindle is now the perfect format for carrying books around or taking them on holiday when space is tight. Kindle editions are also significantly cheaper than these. Three years ago, flipbacks would have had a much greater chance of taking a chunk of the market.

Of course, they are very cool, lovely things, and are much more desirable than a Kindle from a design perspective. But Hodder have chosen to launch the format with resized versions of existing books, even using the same cover designs and blurbs as the original paperbacks. We feel this is a missed opportunity to really make waves and to show the limitations of the Kindle.

It would have been far better to launch with a special collectors’ list of desirable titles, specially created or re-edited for the format, to appeal to consumers with their creativity of design or as a stylish gift. That would have shown the possibilities of the flipback as opposed to the Kindle, and would have really made it something that people talked about and shared.

Once that buzz had reached its peak, and the flipback had become a coveted object in itself, that would have been the time to launch the reformatted backlist — books that people buy for themselves to read rather than to collect or give away.

So a really neat idea, but we’re aching to see a bit more imagination applied to it. Come on, Hodder, show us what the flipback can really do.