Arkham House Books are instant collectibles.

What I like about Arkham House Books is that they hold their value. Arkham House is a small publisher of Horror and Fantasy Books. They are perhaps best known for their ties to H.P.Lovecraft and his circle.

Lovecraft is still popular today...although few think of him as a technically great writer. Lovecraft's influence on entire generations of Horror writers is well documented. Indeed Stephen King arknowledges his debt to Lovecraft's books in fashioning his own writing style.

But even Lovecraft had mentors. Lovecraft considered himself to be influenced by Lord Dunsany and Poe who were early writers experimenting with the Horror/Fantasy genre which became so popular in the later part of the 20th Century.

Arkham House still has a large number of books by Lovecraft and his circle in print. And they are probably good investments as well as good reading.

What sells...in cookbooks

Deluxe cookbooks sell...unless they are out in massive editions.

Certain famous authors like Beard are easy to sell especially the older editions that are now considered to be collectible.

Regional cookbooks...especially from the South.

Books about hot and spicy foods...like chilli and hot sauces...

French cooking and particularly introductions to French cooking are very fashionable in NYC.

The Tale of Peter Rabbit, or "Wept Big Tears!"

I was researching my vintage copy of the Tale of Peter Rabbit, by B. Potter... This is an early Warne printing...it's kind of in rough shape as most of these books are, after generations of little hands handling these small books. And amazingly Potter insisted on the smaller size format for that very reason...so children could actually hold the book while it was being read.

Interestingly the main "point" on Peter Rabbit is on page 51. When Peter gets caught in the farmer's net...He...in the first few printings..."Wept big tears." In the fourth printing and following that is changed to "Shed big tears...."

Alas, my book caused me to "Shed big tears..."

See the link for more on this at Bookride.com a really good link that every book person should keep...

What books sell?

The common newbie bookseller question is: What books sell...?

And of course the answer is everything and nothing... For most B&M (Bricks and Mortar) bookstores...the books that sell are the books that just went out the door...

Essentially, people are looking for entertainment, enhancement, self esteem, or something different when they buy a book... A book is something you do for yourself...or for the person you're buying the book for... But in the end picking a book is a selfish pleasure... Sort of like buying the fancy french mustard instead of the $1 yellow plastic squeeze jar...

I like to buy (drum roll) the OLD, ODD AND OUT OF PRINT...

These are the books that are hard to find... The average Bookscout on Amazon (AZ) isn't going to pick these books.... They usually go for the recent stuff...with 29.95 on the glossy DJ...

I like the out of print stuff...defunct publishers...granular topics... eg. The Third Day at the Battle of the Somme...

Granular topics and highly specialized books...are usually printed in very small editions... And most of these books are eventually remaindered... or just scraped... Who knows how many are available...

Generally, I like to see 20 or fewer available GLOBALLY...

You can find this out by going to Addall.com Addall is a great aggregator site of all the bookselling sites in the world...
They don't list books...they list the listers of books for sale...

A great way to check the price on an odd book....

Hit 300 feedbacks on Amazon....

Today someone posted the 300th feedback to my Amazon account...! Of that number 299 were positive...one was neutral... I sent a MMPB to a guy in Hawaii..."Spitfire," a WWII book... Great condtion... He gave me a neutral "3" saying: "Aged Brown"... Now the book was perfect and there were only a few available globally and I think he paid $10 for it... And it was not seriously age browned... Perhaps a bit around the edges like you'll see in older MMPBs... But not like the old pulp paperbacks that were seriously brown...

But what can I do... I emailed him to complain... But then I just said What the Hell let go... move on...

Welcome to Used and Rare: A Booksellers Blog.

The Honest Blog of an On-line Bookseller...