28Feb Collecting the Hugo and Nebula Awards #1: The Most Nominated Writers
I've spent the morning putting together statistics for the Hugo and Nebula awards and plan on sharing the data over a handful of blog posts. I've only looked at the awards for novel, novella, novelette and short story. That's not to demean the other categories, rather these are the categories…
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08Jan Matrix Collecting - An Alternative Method of Book Collecting
When I dismantled and sold my first collection nearly a decade ago it was nearly a decade old. When I look back, it was an unruly collection, with more than a smidgen of simple amassing. It was my first collection and I enjoyed it immensely. I enjoyed receiving the books.…
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07Jan A New Website Collecting Together Collections
I'd like to introduce you to a new website we've put together. We thought it would be nice to allow our clients and readers, and anyone really, to post photos of their book collections online. It's not for comment and it's entirely anonymous, just a place really to let people…
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07Nov A Word about Market Value
One thing that I've been hearing a lot about of late is market value, so I thought I'd take a moment to offer my take on how market value works in the rare book trade.1. Markets are many and varied.When most book collectors talk about market value, what they're actually…
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07Jun Things to be Aware of when Buying Rare Books
This is an article that shouldn't need to be written, but sadly it does. There are sharks out there, but thankfully most of them are amateurs and shunned by the professional trade. This is by no means endemic. It should also be noted that these issues have been around as…
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24May Collecting First Editions as Financial Investments.
Reprinted from our previous blog firsteditionsbooks.co.ukA lovely copy of William Morris’ Kelmscott Chaucer came to market recently (last year, but that is recent in book collecting). It sold for in excess of £100,000, quite an increase on the £20 it originally sold for in 1896. If you’d put £20 in…
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27Apr How to Collect Books
Previously published on our blog firsteditionbooks.co.ukNow and then we get asked for advice on creating a book collection. Most of our collectors know exactly what they want to collect and how to go about it, but for new collectors it can be a difficult task.One of the biggest sticking points,…
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29Mar Editions, Printings, Impressions, States and Issues
Whenever I talk about rare books to someone outside of the world of book collecting, they're invariably familiar with the idea of a first edition. Most in the world of book collecting are familiar with the notion of first printings, many understand that books can have different states and issues.…
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14Feb Britain vs America - What Editions to Collect
NOTE: This first appeared on an earlier blog in July, 2016.Nope, this isn’t some whimsical hammering on the chest, it’s a brief look at which editions to buy when collecting rare books. As a little spoiler; this won’t provide a set of rules that determine which edition to collect; it’s…
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30Sep Collecting Arkham House and H.P. Lovecraft First Editions
// An introduction to our 'Collecting Arkham and Lovecraft' category in the ideas section above (here) //One of our most common requests is for books published by Arkham House, often specifically with an interest in H. P. Lovecraft. Let's just a look at a background of the two, and their…
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