The Book Rescuers - Giant Used Book Warehouse in Pinellas Park

 

The Book Rescuers boasts over a mile of book shelves. 

     See for yourself on their facebook page, The Book Rescuers in Pinellas Park claims over a mile of book shelves, and I would say that is not an exaggeration. There is no parking or AC, but the fans down the many aisles of books are blowing away the dust and heat from outside and keeping the customers and the books cool. Tucked away in an industrial complex in Cross Bayou Industrial Park between paint shops and car repair places is a huge warehouse with what can only be described as mountains upon mountains of books.

She didn't catch me taking pictures. I swear.

     No shortage of customers. The pictures on their Facebook don't do it justice, and they have since added DVD's, VHS tapes, old media, records, banned books.. you name it. Their aisle of Fantasy and Sci-Fi was amazing, but the books I saw online that they took in a few weeks ago, were no longer available. Their pricing system is based on little colored stickers, but 99% of the books are yellow-dot, which are $2 each, and those are the only books I grabbed. 

It was hard to get a picture of how large this place is.

     I would say this has the largest selection of vintage Science Fiction I've ever seen in person. Older books were wrapped in plastic, and still $2. Looking for Ace Doubles? 100's of them for $2. 50's and 60's pulp paperback? Fill a whole shopping cart. This is not the store you will complete your Dragonlance collection at like the last store I went to, but holy crap can you find some really old cool stuff for cheap. I did notice a lot of books have seen better days, covers tattered and dirty, some missing whole pieces. Some books I was really excited to see by popular authors were in such poor condition, I had to frown and move on. I was easily able to find 20 books for $40 that have a much greater value; some to add to the collection, and some to list. The Dune books are eBay fodder, Laser books are always awesome and have unique covers, tons of Gibson there I passed on..

     I'll be coming back to this place when I can make it down there, at least once a month. Lot's of good scores, and I left tons on the shelf that I wanted to take. I spent about a half hour, and could have easily spent a couple of hours and really found some gems. Great place overall. Awesome staff, just a really cool find if you are in the Tampa area. 

**Edit** - I visited here again two Saturday's later with my wife, on April 6th and we walked out with 5 books that were worth listing, and my son bought some cool old VHS tapes. They gave my wife a teacher discount! Super cool place and we plan on going back often. 

Until the next adventure..

Endless Quest: Crimson Crystal Adventure Series

    What was really popular in the early 80's and through the 90's was Choose Your Own Adventure books. Dungeons and Dragons and TSR, not be left out of the action, made their own series called Endless Quest. They were printed on acid free heavy card stock paper, had great illustrations from the great artists who also contributed to Dragon Magazine. They were short little adventures with character sheets inside to keep track of your stats and faux predetermined inventory. 

     How do you make it more fun, bring in some science fiction, and skew a little younger? You bring in those same artists and tell them to paint in red over the art, and include a "Crimson Crystal" in each book, essentially just a small red see-through piece of plastic so you can reveal the secret imagery. The pages that have red printing on them are also printed on that same heavy card stock that the Endless Quest books are printed on. At the time, this was a huge level up from the normal Choose Your Own Adventure, and made it much more interactive. For the same $2.00 you would normally spend on a book, now you get little puzzles and more action for your buck.

    TOR, not to be outdone by the masters of roleplaying, licensed very popular fantasy series of the day, and created their own Adventure books, Crossroads. They were longer, had more options, and you could run into the characters you know and love from your favorite authors. I have the two Xanth ones, written by Jody Lynn Nye, signed by her and purchased at a convention in person. All the books I've mentioned in this little article are pretty rare... 

• Crossroads books, any, are around $15 each, from ebay sold auctions
• D&D Endless Quest books are $10 to $20 each, ebay sold auctions, and are always in great condition
• Crimson Crystal books are the rarest of the bunch at $50-$100, more if they have the "Crimson Crystal" intact

    CYOA did their own version called Time Machine, and Archway licensed Star Trek and made Which Way Books. The list goes on and on, all actually pretty rare with single print runs. Famously, the most rare and expensive and is really considered the first Multiplayer Book Game ever, which uses the most complicated tables and algorithms and requires both books to play: Combat Heroes. See the video below to learn more about that unique book series. 

The Book Swap in Palm Harbor - Insane Selection

 

It's not the best, but it has what any new collector needs.

     The Book Swap in Palm Harbor was not what I thought, and I think that's a good thing. It's a true paperback exchange: you return the books and get half as credit towards your next purchase. The shelves were lined with books, and the Fantasy and Science fiction shelves were brimming with great classics, completed trilogies, and all the series you could shake a stick at. If you are looking to complete.. let's say, your Dragonlance collection, come here, they are all in perfect order, alphabetized, and even sometimes banded together for a bundle price.

Science Fiction Section

Huge Fantasy Section

Speaking of prices, they are marked on the cover with an easily removeable grease pencil that leaves no mark behind. They do use sharpie to black out the prices on the covers, which is super frustrating. The prices are a mixed bag; if they are popular, the books are around $4 each. Older less known books, no matter the rarity or printing, are around $2. I was able to use this to grab 6 books for pretty cheap, and have enough cash leftover to hit the Rita's Italian ice up next door. For all the organization, selection, and decent prices, I do have a few gripes:

• No air conditioning. It was 60 degrees outside and I was wearing a sweater. When I walked in, it was easily 85 degrees.
• They do not take credit cards. When I inquired, they mentioned the fees, and that they had been open for 40 years, and have no intention to change. I had to hit an ATM and come back to pay for my books, which took 15 minutes and a $2 ATM fee. I did notice when I was looking, two customers left their books and did not come back to get them because of the payment issue.
• The prices of known rare books or things that sell online are high-ebay list prices, not sold prices. 
• Aforementioned sharpie over the prices
• They have little online presence.. just a facebook, but no ebay store, landing page, nothing. 
• It's picked over. Someone got to this store and took anything of value over $10 out of it. I was lucky to get what I got. 

The Take

Dune anything is selling right now. Whatever old and beat up crusty Frank Herbert books hanging around are selling in less than a day after we put them in the ebay store. I always pick up Fritz Leiber and William Gibson.. Gibson is an awesome read, and bundles well. The other books were rare enough to grab and in decent shape with is a good combo. I have not seen two of these books in the wild, ever. It's worth mentioning if you are a fan of Piers Anthony like me, they have damn near 100 of them, all series, ready to go for an early collection.

**Edit** - I went back here today on 4/12 and the AC was working. I found a couple books I missed the last time, and noticed some hard to find series fantasy books that I would be interested in, but passed on. The lady working the front and I had a nice conversation, and she told showed me some rare books they had, and right away I noticed a Dune Messiah BCE in the stack, which had a price of $125 firm on it. The condition was.. passable, but for a BCE $10 would be all it is worth on eBay. I let her know, showed her how you could tell, and urged her to sell it for $8 with the other BCE stuff they had. 

Thanks for reading. 

$50 fill a bag - Small Business Saturday Returns

 

The Paperback Exchange Bookstore is my kind of place.

     The Paperback Exchange Bookstore has been a once a year visit for me since I moved to the Tampa area. They don't get much new in the way of Science Fiction and Fantasy, and heavily rely on the donations from their frequent customers. Once the owner told me they had so many books dropped off during covid to keep them in business and the shelves full for 10 more years. Books are priced by Ebay sold value when the tags were put on them years ago, which is fair to today's market being the prices of everything went up. Condition of the books I would consider.. fair. Items that are labeled as "rare" almost always have pretty bad condition issues and are essentially worth just a fraction of what they are listed at. I did not get to take any pictures inside today as it was very crowded and the aisles are VERY close together; if you want to bend over and look at the bottom shelf, you have to take a knee so you don't hit the case behind you. Walking past someone requires them to leave the aisle you are in, and then you take their place. For those following along, I did the fill-a-bag deal with them two years ago today, the post is here.

The rules are a little different this year:

• Nothing newer than 3 years old
• Price has doubled to $50 - $45 if you brought your old bag
• No "rare" stickered books
• No store credits
• 20% off New and Rare books
• 10% Merch

     White tag books are no longer a dollar each, rare books are no longer BOGO which is fine, there was not that many rare books left in the sections I was in to speak of. A tent was located out back Garage Sale style with boxes of books and movies, and those you could fill a bag for $20. I feel bad for the poor owner, every person that came in was explained the rules and regulations of sale. Details are a little foggy, and the only thing I could find on their facebook referenced a Swag Bag sale, which people have no idea what that means when she talked about. Just call it Fill a bag for $50? Either way, I understood as I've been coming for a little while. 

     All said, I put 51 qualifying books in my bag, I could have fit some more, and she told me to top it off before I left, which I tried to do, but I could not really find anything else that I wanted to take home. At this point in my collection, 75% of it is in boxes and I can't even look at it, so anything that goes in the bag may not see the light of day anytime soon.

Here is the take, a good few little stacks, more than worth the average of $1.00 a book. I think there was a lot more value last time at half the price, but I digress. 

The final small stack is some books I set aside as being better condition, worth more, or just stood out to me initially when I took them out of the bag. 

     Star Smashers of the Galaxy Rangers was in great shape, and was not considered rare, but I have never seen one in the wild, not even in specialty stores or on Instagram. Phillip K Dick and Zelazny collab really stuck out, and was mixed in with the ton of Zelazny stuff they have piled up. I should mention that if you are looking to complete a series, this store has a ton of those books, all organized by alpha and series. It's really great, and I took advantage of that with a few books today.

     I spotted these really interesting compilation books mixed in, and married them up for a little impromptu reunion. I noticed Piers Anthony on the cover of one, and some of my other favorites mixed in, and those covers! I had to grab them and make them part of the collection. These Anthology books to me are kind of crazy in how many there actually are. I've been collecting for 25 years, and I keep finding new and interesting ones, hardcover, paperback, different themes.. you name it. They keep coming. 

Thanks for stopping by. 

Yet another package from Arizona

    Mom comes to the rescue again with some great vintage science fiction. What was thought to be a wife-requested box of flannel pillow cases, turned out to be quite the little score of paperbacks.

   I left the bags on, but you get the idea. I love me some Ace Doubles. I don't have many Farmer ones, and he is by far one of my favorites. He did some collaborations with Piers Anthony, and that's when I started reading some of his older stuff back in high school.

The Mad Goblin cover is really great and embodies the cheap/quick and dirty art of the day. Super iconic. The K. Dick Flow My Tears, The Policeman Said is in pretty decent condition, and I have never owned a copy. I called my mom to let her know it sells for around $100 on ebay in used/worn condition, and told her I would never sell it and it's safe with me. It's good to build the Phillip K. Dick collection back up from when I sold some off, and have good examples of that era.

Cheers.

Huge Hardcover Score at Life's Treasures Thrift

Don't sleep on thrift stores, ladies and gentlemen. 

My wife woke up this morning and declared it a Garage Sale Day, and by the rules of Mother's Day weekend, you are not allowed to say no.. and I wanted to go anyways. We drove around for what seemed like an hour, and it was so hot so only saw a few sales. After a quick coffee, we decided to hit the thrift stores in our area. I've been to life's treasures only once before, and it was more of a clothing store than anything, but things had changed in the year or so since I've stopped by.

While my son went straight to the VHS tapes, I went over to the book shelves. First thing I noticed in the bins were 100's of science fiction and fantasy books, all .50 cents each and in really good shape.

Bins and bins of 80's and 90's modern fantasy and science fiction. Nothing really crazy in terms of value, but if you were looking to complete a lesser known series without hitting ebay, you could easily get that done here. A quick inspection and I only picked out four paperbacks that had a value of over $10, all Timescape novels by Pournelle. Not sure why, but Timescape is really hot right now. I was ready to leave when I decided to just give the hard covers a once over like I always do, and I never expect much to be honest. Hard covers are heavy, take up a ton of space, and the liklihood of me finding anything rare is.. well, rare.

The motherlode 

The first bookcase I looked in, you can see in the brown bookcase above in the first picture of the bins. It was 100% filled with 60, 70's and early 80's first edition and book club edition science fiction and fantasy hard covers in amazing condition. All but a few looks unread, or near mint. Two full bookcases! I asked the wife to bring me over a cart so I could unload some of the more familiar authors and see what I'm looking at. I'm nervous even writing this; I left about 100 more hard covers at the store. I right about to buy new tires for my truck, so I'm making some kind of attempt to save money, so I grabbed the 30 I thought would be the best at the moment.

What a find. It's been since I went back to the Book Rack over two years ago since I've seen some BCE and old school hard backs in the wild, but these were only $2 each, and the book rack charged low eBay pricing. BCE Books from the late 70's must be made out of different paper or something, because they always look pretty decent and the when the dust jackets are on, they are in great shape with little wear.

These all-in-one series anthonologies always peak my interest. I like boxed sets, and this has the same appeal. These are mail away first editions from 1978, have all the maps and fun of the original first editions and have unique cover art. The Boris cover Zalazny's were really awesome, shared the same cover, and I'm glad I picked them up. Overall, a great score, and I hope I can make it back soon with some more cash to pick up another haul of these books before they are gone. I secretly hope someone is reading this and heads down to Life's Treasures Thrift to pick up some books and benefits from this in some way. Even the paperbacks would be special to someone who is just starting their collection and wants to pick up a couple of boxes on the cheap.

Thanks for reading. 

Neighborhood Garage Sale Finds - H.P. Lovecraft & More

      

     Well look what we have here, a community-wide garage sale! I have been seeing the signs in the adjoining neighborhood for weeks, and today was finally the day. I somehow managed to get my teenaged son out of the bed to come with me, which was welcome indeed. It was on of those events where there were so many cars, you kind of had to park somewhere on the street and plot your destination. If I had to guess, I would say there was over 50 garage/yard sales total. As you can see from the above pictures, I did find a bag of books for 50 cents each! I spotted a bunch of very bad condition fantasy 80's novels in a box, and just keep looking around. My son was finding win-after-win and I was empty handed right up until the end. The picture on the left is the actual sale, and that's me on the right walking back to the car with the loot. Don't mind the wrist brace.

The garage sale loot.

     

     When I saw the HP Lovecraft book, I knew I was in the right place. A few other little gems and some unknowns caught my eye right away and I knew for 50 cents each, I could not go wrong. Most notably the two Lovecraft books, Charnel house, and Heart of Darkness all have eBay sold listings for well over $20 each recently.

All the books had that white tag with the price on them.

     Really great covers, especially on the early Burroughs trade paperback. I have not been going to many garage sales lately because of the price of gas, and the amount of garbage you have to sift through to find anything. Back in the early days of the blog I use to live off of Mcgregor Blvd in Fort Myers, by the Edison Home and Ford Estates. Very high end area, and their yard and garage sales are licensed with the city in that area. Not sure why, but there was always something good to find. Maybe one person paid to have their garage sale licensed and all the neighbors brought something over to sell? The cost of the houses? Rich people do throw away cool shit. 

Anyways. Thanks for reading.