DO YOU HAVE A BOOK QUESTION?

[manor_house_books]

Hi all, pippy_oak here, posting under my brand new user name. Hopefully, Richard will pin this thread, as it seems a nice tidy place to pose specific questions about a book (Is it a 1st edition, what's it worth, where to find it etc. etc.) Don't just come here with a question. If you think you have the answer, then let's hear it.

Or we could just mooch around and learn a few things.

Cheers

Paul

[heggadon]

Hi

Why is it so difficult to sell books on Ebay ?  If you look at the listings most of them finish with no bids.And lots of them are l;isted at 0.99p. It's ok if you're a bookseller anyway and you have thousands of books, so you can list in a shop and not pay so much in fees and get discounted postage rates. But for the ordinary Ebay seller it seems almost hopeless. Has anyone got any positive ebay book selling experience ?

regards

heggadon

[rogersbooks32]

Hi, the truth is there are millions of books that no one is going to pay money for,so if 100s of copies have not sold there is no point listing the same book and thinking it will sell. If you look in the closed listings you can find books that do sell well.  Research and experience are what helps in the end. 

[3976duguid]

Is it just me, or has the market died somewhat in the last few months. My books are either not selling or getting rubbish prices. Any advice?

David

[citygent1894]

Hi;

Does anyone know if Dominick Dunne's,1999, autobiography, 'The way we lived then,' is, currently, available in audiobook form? (Preferably in, either, Audio cassette, CD or DVD, rather than digital download) and, if so, whether any amazon retailers, out there, currently have it in stock

I am thinking of buying it as a Christmas present for my mum, who, now in her eighties, has great difficulty in reading the printed page.

An exhaustive search of the internet, over the last few days, has, unfortunately, proved to be unsuccessful.

Any advice, that would assist me in this matter, would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

[citygent1894]

Oops sorry, Any advice on how to edit messages from mobile....Shudda said e-bay retailer there 🙂

[daffodiltulip]

There was an article somewhere not too long ago about a bookseller in Saltaire who gave figures of his sales on some sort of social website and that prompted people to go to the shop and, temporarily at least, boosted his sales.  The problem seems to be general lack of interest in reading, and for those that do read, eReaders are providing an alternative.  There is a website called webuybooks (is it alright to mention that here?) that might be worth looking at if you're not a dealer.  If you sell on eBay at 99p, by the time the fees are deducted, I don't think there'll be that much of a difference in price got, and it's a more straighforward transaction.  Having said that, they don't accept all books.  I haven't used it myself, so I can't comment on if it's any good.

[jeffbrg23]

Webuybooks is a good website if you just want to offload some books to clear space and your not too worried about how much money your going to make and if that's your aim then its certainly a lot less hassle than Ebay.

But they are a business so they only offer money for books which they can resell and these are generally the books you can sell yourself on Ebay and Amazon and make a better profit on.

They don't accept the majority of books, so the books your trying to sell on Ebay for 99p are unlikely to be accepted by them and they offer pennies on most books. The only books which tend to go into pounds are relatively recent student textbooks and academic books, again you could get more profit selling these on Amazon but if you just want to offload and generate some cash in the process, its a good no hassle site.

My Mum uses them at the local charity shop she works for and it brings in very good money for them on the books they would otherwise be unable to shift in a small village shop. The process is straightforward you package the books, take them to the local Collectplus store (or they will collect depending on weight and volume) and a cheque turns up 7/10 days later or they can transfer the money straight to your bank account which is a bit quicker.

[queenelsa83]

Has anyone read Stephen King's Firestarter? If so is it any good & a worthwhile read? 🙂

[jeffbrg23]

I read it as a teenager (sadly almost 25 years ago) and remember enjoying it, although I can't remember much beyond the basic plot now.

It's not as good as some of Stephen King's others from the same period like The Shining, Salem's Lot, The Stand or It, its still good in my opinion.

[queenelsa83]

Thank you so much, I'm going ahead with doing so & hoping that I'll enjoy reading it, which I'm sure I will 🙂

[diebe.uk2015]

Hello book addicts 🙂

I have been able to buy the book: The Beauties of Bloomerism by Deborah Dreadnought (1852). It contains 12 stunning handcoloured lithographs from different types of woman and their clothing (it's a satire about emancipation) . The images can be found online at flickr (https://www.flickr.com/search/?text=bloomerism).

I have been searching for hours but it seems to be very rare. I have been looking for prices, but can't find any. I was able to find 1 auction... in 1911, the book sold for 17 GBP.   Anybody know how many that would be today? 🙂

Anyway, I am not able to find any other for sale or sold. To me it seems the book should have some value because of the beautiful images and the subject. (early emancipation)

Thanks all for your help,

Karem.

[ok-mrs-bee]

Hello Diebe,

Unfortunately, I don't think any of the posters who could have answered your question are still visiting the Books Board.  You will see that the post previous to yours was well over a year ago.  This thread had withered!

It would be well worth trying the very active Booksellers Board at eBay dot com.

http://community.ebay.com/t5/Booksellers/bd-p/24

[ok-mrs-bee]

Sorry, Karem, I quoted your Username rather than your proper name.

[jeffbrg23]

Some of us still surface occassionally.

This certainly seems to be a bit of a rarity and not a book for Ebay. I'd be looking for a proper auction house to do a valuation.

Your could try:

http://www.dominicwinter.co.uk/

[ok-mrs-bee]

Hi Jeff, thenks for responding here.  Do you suppose Karem will ever return to acknowledge our answers?

[diebe.uk2015]

Hi Mrs Bee (and others)

Thank you all for your answers.. although it didn't help much 🙂

I thought: since the tread is dead, I don't bother answering 😉

[superhans87]

"THE SUBTLE KNIFE (Scholastic Children's Books, London, 1997): Signed by the author on the full title page. The correct numbering sequence of "2 4 6 8 10 9 7 5 3 1" is present on the copyright page as required for the first state."
In the absence of further research, I would say that you most likely have hit the jackpot here."

Uh, no, going by this quote here you would need the full number line for the first state, and therefore for the "jackpot". In all likelihood this was a 2nd print run where the number 2 was omitted in error.

[edenwo72]

Hello Pippy

Nice to hear from you, if you have a book that needs restoring I can help you.

[bdoggie1]

I googled the first line of Dell's House, and this post came up. I only remember the poem this far too. I would've been reading it around 1965 ish. If I can't get hold of a copy, I would love photos of each page, to bring back those memories. 

[schmowman]

Did you find out about the book? JB (John Brahms) Trinick was an Australian soldier in WW1. If you still have, and would like it to find a suitable home perhaps offer to the Australian National Veterans Arts Museum. www.anvam.org.au