quote: Serendipity HAS to be good, because that's the only way you'll find anything.
At this book sale I was one of the few people combing the science fiction section. What I came away with was a fabulous collection of some of my favourite books.
The Classics and children's sections were the same. I just went through and amassed book after book after book.
Posts: 8473 | Registered: Apr 2003
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The other day I was figuring out the dollar value of my book collection for insurance purposes. It comes to about 15K. Some of that value is attributable to first editions of various books, but mostly it's due to sheer volume. I've got far more books than I have shelf space (and have thought about turning my spare bedroom into a library, complete with stacks, so as to actually have room for all of them.
Anyway, a decade or so ago one of my friends had his CD collection stolen, and the insurance company cut him a check, but insisted on seeing receipts to prove that he'd spent the money on CDs. That seems odd to me--why would they do that? Why not just cut him the check and let him do what he wanted with it? I figured I was misremembering, actually, but I asked him about it last time we talked, and he confirmed that that was how it had been.
Which leads me to the point of this post. If all of my books were destroyed, and my insurance company gave me the 15K, but stipulated that I had to spend it on books, I would take a buying vacation, travelling from library book sale to library book sale, picking up book after book for a quarter each. I can't even begin to tell you how much fun I'd have doing that.
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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When my library has a sale they sell books for $3.00 per paper grocery sack. With careful packing and choosing you can easily get over a dozen books in a bag. Of course they also sell them individually depending on the book from ten cents up to a dollar. The only odd thing is that at the sale there are only two categories the books are separated into, paperback and hardback, which means that you have to do a bit of sifting to get to the good stuff, but its worth it.
Posts: 349 | Registered: May 2003
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My library does the paper bag thing, but only for the final couple of days of the sale. They gradually decrease their prices as the sale wears on, and then finally have the bag sale. The SF is all pretty picked over by the time they get the bags out though, (and I expect that everything else it too, but SF is what I tend to focus on) so there isn't all that much point in buying by the bag. You're liable to end up with sacks full of broken backed copies of Piers Anthony, L. Ron Hubbard, and Alan Dean Foster books.
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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Mmmm... library sales... I just went to one this weekend, yum...
Anyway, I like small stores because I can chat with the staff and talk about books and get recommendations. The only time a staff person at Barnes & Noble ever talks to me is to ask if I have a membership card (and would I like one) (No! I hate getting on stupid mailing lists, and I don't want my buying patterns analyzed for how to sell me more stuff!!)
I go to Barnes & Noble sometimes; I like the wide selection... but small bookstores often have a more *interesting* selection of books I've never heard of. And the stores are just more... comfortable. B&N stores feel too big and sterile to me. I wouldn't want to work in a B&N store, so why give them my money?
Anyway, politically/economically speaking, I don't like large organizations. Power corrupts and all that; if it's a choice between giving my money to a small business or a big business, I'll go with the small business.
Posts: 2911 | Registered: Aug 2001
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quote: If all of my books were destroyed, and my insurance company gave me the 15K, but stipulated that I had to spend it on books, I would take a buying vacation, travelling from library book sale to library book sale, picking up book after book for a quarter each. I can't even begin to tell you how much fun I'd have doing that.
Crap. You know, now, that we're going to have to testify at your arson trial.
Posts: 8504 | Registered: Aug 1999
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Yeah, but I figure I could buy everybody off with free books, and get a heap of character witnesses saying that I'd never do such a thing.
Posts: 16059 | Registered: Aug 2000
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I know I'm risking attack here, but I really like Amazon.
I can find things quickly. I can read reviews, and a little research tells me which reviewers match my tastes. I can grade books I've bought (and books I already own) and get some fairly accurate recommendations on the page and in my e-mail. I can usually get good prices. I can buy used books (from smaller booksellers) if I wish.
One of my favorite used bookshops now gets most of their income from ebay, abebooks, and Amazon sales. Every time i stop by -- and I do still hit the local shops regularly, since Amazon hasn't yet provided a virtual alternative to bookcovers catching your eye from a shelf away or slightly off-center booksellers who will sit and talk for hours -- I don't see where Amazon is hurting them at all.
Posts: 7790 | Registered: Aug 2000
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Wait, a body switch for James doesn't make any sense at all -- I mean, I thought it didn't make sense before, but then I was thinking about how James's ghost/echo/whatever shows up at the end of book 4 -- he's definitely got to be dead, dead, dead.
Posts: 2911 | Registered: Aug 2001
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I like amazon too I love being able to see what other people have bought who bought something I like, and i love reading people's recommendations, and I love reading reviews and listening to music clips to learn about bands. It's like my encyclopedia for books and other media.
Posts: 105 | Registered: Nov 2003
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