I often frequented Bookman’s Used Books in Flagstaff, Arizona. One day I wandered in and saw, on the shelves in general fiction, a hardbound copy of Watership Down by Richard Adams. Looking inside, I found that it was a US first edition. It had a small rip on the cover, but at $7 I grabbed it anyway. When I got it home, I looked at it a little closer, and noticed that it was signed. One of the best bookstore surprises I’ve ever had.
Another nice one was a bargain book my wife found for me, a huge slipcased hardcover edition of Le Morte d’Arthur with illustrations Aubrey Beardsley. Just a reprint, obviously, but I figured it was a steal at $5.
And the neat little pocket hardcover I found of Tennyson’s Idylls of the King for $4 is pretty cool too.
I have a little paperback booklet, which is entitled"Life In Olde Plimouth Colony". This is a book with colored illustrations, explaining what life was like for the colonists in 1620’s , Plymouth Colony, Massachusetts. It was issued in 1957, to commemorate the sailing of the “Mayflower II” ship, a gift from the peopleof Plymouth, England. The ship was captained by the late Capt. Allan Villiers, and the book is signed by him.
Would this be worth anything to a collector?
I got an autographed softcover copy of Frank Herbert’s DUNE, for less than the cover price. Coverprice: 33c what I paid 25c. It was in the bottom of one of the bargain bins, wrapped in cardboard and plastic wrap. Mint condition. This was about 3 years ago.
The sig looks authentic, but im not sure. Either way, what a bargain!
I have a copy of the Norton Anthology of English Literature, hardcover, 2 volume set. I got it for free…I just happened to be in a hallway of an administration building in college when a professor put them out on a table with a sign that said “Free.”
I also have an autographed copy of Diane diPrima’s Loba that I got from half.com for $1.
Just wanted say that after reading this thread I went to a book sale at my local library and bought first editions of Contact by Carl Sagan and Sphere by Micheal Crichton for $1 each. I will hold onto Contact, but might sell Sphere. Anyone know where I can find a site that will help me estimate the value? Thanks!
Curious Books is where I found the game day program from the first pro football game I ever attended in person. Green Bay Packers (my favorite team) vs. Detroit Lions at old Tiger Stadium. This was the last season (1974) the Lions played at the corner of Michigan and Trumbull.
For some reason, I had not bought a program at the game itself, and always wanted one.
Unfortunately, neither book is especially rare. At the bookstore I used to work at, we saw both quite frequently. I couldn’t attach a specific dollar amount that they are currently valued at (it would depend on the buyer), but we commonly priced the first editions of those at $8-$10. For copies in bad condition (as ex-library books often are), it would be a few dollars lower.
No big deal… I wanted a copy of Contact anyway. I read Sphere once several years ago(shudders). It would be nice to find a Crichton fan to unload this on for $5-10 but if not no big deal.
These weren’t in circulation btw, but donations that were extraneous. I’d give them a B+. Just a bit of fading and scuff marks on the dust jackets.
What I’m more interested in is learning to spot rare and/or valuable books so in the future I can pick these up. At this point I merely look for first editions of popular books. Thanks for the info!
Pei Mei’s Chinese Cook Book Volume I (and Volume II), in the late '80’s, ten or so years after I was told by a waiter in a Chinese restaurant that they were good.
I found a Gutenburgh bible, complete with dustjacket and inscription from King James to the Pope.
Yes, I said “Gutenburgh”. Of the Kennebunkport Gutenburghs
I got a somewhat beat up paperback copy of Dune, signed by Frank Herbert, for $4.50. That was cool, although it’s probably not worth much more than that. I also stumbled across some book club hardbacked copies in mint condition of the rest of the Dune series - of course the first one was missing.
I have a friend who also hunts in used bookstores. One day I went over to his house, picked up a paperback copy of “The Wasp Factory” and said something along the lines of “wow, this is a really interesting edition” because it was Iain Banks’ first novel and obviously printed way back when that was his ONLY novel. My friend hugged me and said “that’s what I love about you.” Being a bookworm is one of the things I like the most. Is there anything better than hanging out in a used bookstore on a rainy day? Or trading novels with a bookworm friend?
A complete hard-bound set of Rudyard Kipling, dated 1935, with Kipling’s signature reproduced inside the covers. 20-odd volumes; a very nice edition, and a joy to hold.
Interestingly, the artwork on each cover (same art on each volume, in gold, on a blue cover) includes a swastika. Of course, in 1935 that was still a reputable symbol.
Nowadays internet searching takes most of the fun out of used book hunting. I remember even back around 2000 that I was able to find a few books in minutes that I’d spent a couple of years or more trying to find on my own. Even so, there are sometimes books that are really difficult to find if you just want a reading copy, not a necessarily a collector’s edition.
A.J. Quinnell died a couple of years ago. My wife had read all of his Creasy books in Japanese (they’re hugely popular here, to the point where they are still in print almost 20 years after their first release) and gave me Man on Fire as a gift back in around 2003. It’s a solid thriller, and I liked the not-very-nice, competent and conflicted main character. She was glad I liked it, and was able to find two other books through extensive searching (one an advanced reading copy that technically should not have been resold) though she probably paid a bit much for them. We got stumped on Black Horn, though.
The only copies we could find were around US$100 (which still seems to be the going rate) which is a ridiculous amount to pay for a stinking paperback copy that if you’re lucky would not self-destruct in a few readings. The new film adaptation of Man on Fire made things even worse, and then he had to go and die the next year. I’d been trying to find a better copy of The Perfect Kill, and of course trying to find the next books in the series, but the confluence of events priced pretty much any copy of these relatively hard-to-find books into serious book-collector territory.
I recently found a hardcover copy of Black Horn on sale through an Amazon-Japan marketplace vendor for ¥4,100 (about US$33). I’ve been looking for a reasonably-priced copy for about four years. Score!
I found a 1920 copy (that is, the second translation; #1 was in 1919) of All Quiet on the Western Front in the local library book sale for 50¢. Now, I’ll grant you, it was in terrifically bad shape, but man!
The best place for odd finds in my area has been “Treehorn Books” (named, I suspect, after the Gorey character) in Santa Rosa.
I found a sweet copy of Jane’s Weapons and Tactics of the Soviet Army for about $20. Also a copy of The Devil’s Chariots, about the development of the first tanks, for about the same price. (Before it was recently reprinted, used copies were going for $45+ online.)
I also found hardback Vols. 3 and 4 of Omaha the Cat Dancer, signed by the authors, for ten bucks each. (Not that I had any luck reselling them, though.)
I also picked up an English-Chinese Chinese-English dictionary that I’ve used on more than one occasion, to my utter shock.
About a decade ago, an out-of-business Piggly-Wiggly was being used for a flea market- in the cooler bunkers were loads of old books- in which I found a 1910s copy of a Patterson-Smyth’s The Gospel of the Hereafter, published by Fleming H. Revell. Now, FHR is a historic Evangelical publisher, but this book freely speculated about praying for the dead, opportunities for salvation after death, purgatory,
even universal salvation. The price- 10 cents.
In Nashville, IN, there is a Christian used book store- HIS Book Shop. It was there I found the Knox Catholic Bible for $7. I have also gotten the hardbacks of the 1910s Sydney Watson novels In The Twinkling of an Eye and The Mark of the Beast, probably the first Rapture novels, for $3-$4. And last year- for 50 cents,
a 1950s HB, possibly first edition, of Billy Graham’s Peace With God…
autographed! (I haven’t had it authenticated, but I did compare it with a known signature of Billy Graham & the similarities are uncanny!)
