The advantages of secondhand bookshops

[Ouroboros]

Yesterday I was passing what is probably the largest secondhand bookstore in Dublin. They've got as much space devoted to SF and Fantasy as any other genre barring general fiction, and if you were looking for any of the major series then chances are you could pick them up in their entirety at this place for a fraction of their cost brand new. Equally, it's the place to go for imports and rarities that people have brought in to sell or trade, and because it's a fair size the turnover of books is better than in most stores- Usually a good amount of new stuff every week.

At the moment my backlist is pretty full up, although I'm making headway thanks to a decision to work through the stand-alones first and put some of the heavier series on the backburner. I wasn't particularly looking to buy anything new (hard to justify, especially with a huge credit card bill on the way after Christmas).

Still, I ended up going in. Because when it comes to second-hand bookshops you simply never know what you will find inside.

Sure, a lot of it will be crap that has been sitting on the shelves for literally years- The kind of thing that didn't sell when it was new, let alone a couple of decades on. And they're probably guaranteed to have seven copies of each of the major beststelling works you've owned for years.

But there's just a chance you'll find something totally out of the blue, and this has happened to me quite a few times. I'd have been planning to order a few books from Baen or someone else whose catalogue only sporadically gets onto shelves in the UK and Ireland. And then, lo and behold, I will look down a secondhand bookshelf and find exactly the book I was thinking of ordering, and sometimes for sale at a pauper's price.

Yesterday, for example, I found Timothy Zahn's 'Blackcollar' and 'The Backlash Mission' available in very good condition and costing only three euros each. Both of these have recently been repackaged as an omnibus costing four times that much and only available to me online. Nice score!

There was also a full set of his 'Cobra' novels, the omnibus of which I'd only recently received before Christmas.

I think there will always be a place for secondhand bookstores like this. Yes, while you might find the same volumes online more consistently, it's not quite as satisfying as coming across a bargain through pure good luck.

[redhead]

i may only make a purchase during less than half of my visits, but I adore second hand book stores. it's a total treasure hunt in a room of comfy chairs, classical music, out of print gems, and completely lacking the sound of an espresso machine whirring.

my local second hand shop is one of my saturday hang-outs. they take my trade ins for store credit, and I feel like one of their employees is my personal "book-guy". He knows me by name, what I like to read, what my husband likes to read, that my husband is allergic to the cat that lives in the store, that we both enjoy Harry Potter, and can always be found in the basement of the store, me in scifi, my husband in history. try getting that kind of service at Barnes & Noble.

if i'm going to buy a book (instead of getting it at the library, my first choice), it's the local second hand store.

[ArthurFrayn]

To me, going to the fly crap speckled used bookstore and SF are entwined in my memory. Some of my seminal best reads come from used bookstores. The classic used bookstore is getting harder to find where I live, or it's wares are overpriced(which defeats the point of buying used), but when you order online, you're getting it from some classic used bookstore in Utah or Wyoming where they can afford to exist on that essential nominal level, probably with the guy in the t-shirt in front smoking a cigar. I would probably start to weep tears of nostalgia if I actually was in the store. So while it lacks the mystery of discovery to order online, it has the authenticity of finding oop things you can only find under a pile of fly crap and dust.

[Bluestar]

I love used bookstores for the treasure hunt aspect, but I feel guilty buying anything there since the author doesn't get my money. How do you guys deal with that aspect?

[Bridie]

I found The Shadow of the Torturer for £1 in my local secondhand bookshop. I couldnt resist buying it, since its now all together with all the following books.... plus who can resist buying a book you want to read for £1?! I havent read it yet though... but ill get round to it... my list is long!

I do feel abit bad when buying second hand books, what with the author not recieving money from the sale but if the books good enough, and they have other books out ill probably go buy them first hand.

[Ambidexter]

I love used bookstores for the treasure hunt aspect, but I feel guilty buying anything there since the author doesn't get my money. How do you guys deal with that aspect?

The Author should have already received something for the book and the after market for used books is something that encourages many to buy more books knowing they can recoup something on it.

Used book stores are also Book stores Meaning that they sell firsthand books as well. They also help keep some authors in the reading publics eye when they are dropped etc.

Overall I would say the good far outweighs the bad here in My Opinion.

[manephelien]

Indeed. And they'll give new readers a chance to read something the original owner might otherwise have thrown away. Perhaps later to buy later books by the same author. Used bookstores are often the only place to find out-of-print books.

[Vinnie T]

I love used bookstores for the treasure hunt aspect, but I feel guilty buying anything there since the author doesn't get my money. How do you guys deal with that aspect?

My guess is that authors would rather sell firsthand copies of their book rather than seconds to make some dough. But, from the friends of mine that are writing, even secondhand sales are good, as they spread the work across the market and potentially draw in new readers.

[ArthurFrayn]

But, from the friends of mine that are writing, even secondhand sales are good, as they spread the work across the market and potentially draw in new readers.

That's how I imagined it to work. Any given book basically functions as an advertisement for future work, and the back catalog.

[SaltatrixTonsa]

Yesterday I was passing what is probably the largest secondhand bookstore in Dublin. They've got as much space devoted to SF and Fantasy as any other genre barring general fiction, and if you were looking for any of the major series then chances are you could pick them up in their entirety at this place for a fraction of their cost brand new. Equally, it's the place to go for imports and rarities that people have brought in to sell or trade, and because it's a fair size the turnover of books is better than in most stores- Usually a good amount of new stuff every week.

At the moment my backlist is pretty full up, although I'm making headway thanks to a decision to work through the stand-alones first and put some of the heavier series on the backburner. I wasn't particularly looking to buy anything new (hard to justify, especially with a huge credit card bill on the way after Christmas).

Still, I ended up going in. Because when it comes to second-hand bookshops you simply never know what you will find inside.

Sure, a lot of it will be crap that has been sitting on the shelves for literally years- The kind of thing that didn't sell when it was new, let alone a couple of decades on. And they're probably guaranteed to have seven copies of each of the major beststelling works you've owned for years.

But there's just a chance you'll find something totally out of the blue, and this has happened to me quite a few times. I'd have been planning to order a few books from Baen or someone else whose catalogue only sporadically gets onto shelves in the UK and Ireland. And then, lo and behold, I will look down a secondhand bookshelf and find exactly the book I was thinking of ordering, and sometimes for sale at a pauper's price.

Yesterday, for example, I found Timothy Zahn's 'Blackcollar' and 'The Backlash Mission' available in very good condition and costing only three euros each. Both of these have recently been repackaged as an omnibus costing four times that much and only available to me online. Nice score!

There was also a full set of his 'Cobra' novels, the omnibus of which I'd only recently received before Christmas.

I think there will always be a place for secondhand bookstores like this. Yes, while you might find the same volumes online more consistently, it's not quite as satisfying as coming across a bargain through pure good luck.

Oh man! can you pass me the address?

[DDCOrange]

Interesting thread. One thing I've noticed about used book stores in my area is that many of them have gone out of business. A lot of this may be due to the lack of business in an area where one-eighth of the working population is unemployed but I also think that with the rise of e-books, Kindles and Nooks it will be a trend that will continue (even the regular bookstores are hurting). We still have two local used book stores in operation. One is a highbrow operation that makes it's money selling rare, first edition types of well-preserved tomes to collectors and hosting lots of author book-signing events. Not much Sci-fi there, they tend to specialize in mystery-detective types of novels.
The other store is more in line with what most of you have been discussing above. They have a pretty decent-sized Science Fiction section and I've taken a list of books recommended here hoping to find a bargain but no luck so far. The stuff they have is either books I have already read or books that I'm not very interested in. Still I keep going back and once in a great while discover a rare gem (usually a recent trade-in).
I tend to have slightly better luck at the local library which has a used book store of it's own with ridiculously low prices even by used book standards!

[Loerwyn]

There's one in the Queensgate Market in Huddersfield, and I've forgotten the name. Not a lot in terms of genre fiction, but more than some bookstores do. There's a fair bit of Moon, that Card bloke, Gemmell and a host of others, but the prices aren't too great for the most part. I got the first MS&T book (Williams) for £3 used in the old Orbit edition, but they had used copies of Tchaikovsky's books for, and I kid you not, about £7 each.

I like second hand stores for getting the covers I want, but there's rarely anything that really grabs me.

[renatria]

Interesting thread. One thing I've noticed about used book stores in my area is that many of them have gone out of business.

I'm not sure what the reasons are for this, though I hate seeing it too. Pretty much the only used book shopping I do anymore is the annual sale the local public library does, and the annual book bazaar (entire gymnasium filled with tables of books that they keep filling all weekend) for a local college. I know the reasons I've not been hitting the used book stores so much is that I haven't been finding much. I think sometimes its just because people are keeping the good books and I think a lot of the science fiction and fantasy fans are finding they can get more money by selling on amazon or in lots on ebay.

I mourn the last local bookstore that closed here recently. While I mostly bought children's books and special orders from them- there's something to be said about browsing. The chain stores always make me feel like they're trying to con me into a sale item (20% off this box set of tea leafs with a 3 page pamphlet on how to read your future!) with the feature tables.

I've found a lot of authors over the years by stumbling across them in the bookstore. If we lose the bookstores, it'll be that much harder to find new authors. Amazon's suggestions are often good, but its just not the same.

I like my paper books. I have a lookbook ereader, and will probably switch to a nook in the near future. I do have issues with paying cover price for an e-book if I already own in print. Doesn't bother me so much if I don't already have it, though the format wars are bugging me (not as much since I found calibre though)

I'm sure you folks will help me keep a healthy "to read" list though

[Sonja Ravenscroft]

I know my experience today with a chain book store (Coles-I'm in Canada), it was one of those small mall ones, not the big box stores, and I was trying to find a couple of authors. Well, it seems that they only carry certain books for a certain amount of time, and if they aren't "popular" once they sell out eventually they don't re-order. They're in an a mall that is admittedly seeing stores emptying left and right, and I don't think they'll be in that mall in 5 years. It's either order from Coles or browse around the declining second hand shops. I'm still really not comfortable online-my age I guess

The independents are disappearing up here too, and only in the bigger cities can you find somewhat "healthy" second hand books stores.

[JunkMonkey]

Here's another special one:

Armchair Books just off the Grassmarket in Edinburgh (That's the Edinburgh in Scotland, Rob B.) Spread between two adjacent shops with floor to (very tall) ceiling books. The staff are friendly and approachable and seem to know their stock. Daughter number one asked if they had any books by Joan Aiken and was lead straight to them. Prices from £1. A good selection of alphabetised Fantasy / SF and a shelf-full of Graphic novels (Though, curiously, in separate shops.)


Daughter Number One by the_junk_monkey, on Flickr

Opening Times:


Untitled by the_junk_monkey, on Flickr