Paper Back Exchange Pickups & Blog Update

 

     I've recently moved again within Florida, (which I'll explain later on in the "Blog Update" portion of this post), and today I find myself in North Tampa in New Port Richey at The Paperback Exchange Bookstore. Great little store with both used and new books, an exchange and accounts membership, and a huge selection of everything that I like to see when going to used book stores. 

    I love little narrow aisles with nine foot tall shelves full of fantasy and science fiction. I love the old stuff, and there was no shortage of it here. The owner Joanie let me know she was in the middle of overhauling the section, so there was boxes piled up in about the last 20% of the section I was in. Not a problem at all. Right away I could see that there was two kinds of books, those that are marked with a regular price which was about $3-$4 on average, and those marked "Rare" that were $5-$10 on average. Anything that I was interested in, or was from the 80's and back was marked as rare weather it was or not. It looks like about 5 years ago, Joanie went through the thousands of books and checked them quickly on ebay, and took their average listed price on there and that is what she is charging. I don't have an issue with this, the prices are stated clearly, and she was up front about the trade-in and membership values from the very start.

     If these were $1 books from the flea market, I would be filling up shopping carts. I would get excited about seeing something pretty awesome, then turn it around to find out it was $15 or more. I would look it up on ebay right there, and sure enough, that was a somewhat accurate ebay sold value. While looking online and taking my time checking things out, Joanie let me know that it was $25 Fill-a-bag sales on Black Friday and Small Business Saturday next week coming up on everything I was looking at. Fill a bag! I will 100% be back here to get some of these great old pulp trade paperbacks.

    Right before I left, I saw a few more sections of books, 1/2 off the whole area, and all hard backs and magazines. I didn't see any crazy value items, but some old 1984 mags and 70's BCE hard backs were a really good value. 

    I ended up only buying one book to get my name in the system to qualify for the upcoming sale. Being a paperback exchange, I'm going to put some books together I don't want so I can get some credit started. Conan the Conqueror #5 for $5? That's quite the deal, and anything Conan is super hard to find these days. She had some other Conan stuff, but was priced kind of high for the deals that I look for. I messaged my buddy @ Collectible Science Fiction and let him know the deals to be had and shot him some pictures. No k.Dick or s.Lem so I didn't think he would need anything, but was just trying to be a bro.

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Life update! 

I saw this mix tape for sale the same day I went to the book store and thought it was appropriate.

     I guess I should catch everyone up on what's going on with me. This may take a second, so let's just use bullet points and explain the timeline.

• I moved in December 2017 from our home in Cape Coral leaving behind our forever home, and my custom made bookcases. We rented the house, and eventually sold it 2 years later. This would be the last time I made a post to the blog because of all the chaos. I started a new job, quit that job, started another which transferred me to the other side of the state. Left without options, I moved.
• We moved to West Palm Beach in  2017/18 and I started my new job there with a new title in a place I was not familiar. We were renting, and the price of housing was crazy, so we couldn't get something with another room for a library.
• December 2018 moved again to another place in West Palm. Still no office or Library. Before I moved, I sold about 75 books to the great dude over at Collectible Science Fiction, and he paid me a fair amount. Yes, I still have 99% of my collection and I did not sell anything super valuable with the exception of my Dune first edition paperbacks, which we traded in kind of a first edition of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep 1st/1st.
• December 2019 moved yet again! No library and have not been buying or looking at my packed up book collection for about 2 1/2 years now. We lived here until 2021.
• January 2021 moved AGAIN to another place in West Palm. Horrible housing market made it so expensive to get something bigger, even with my decent wage and living situation. No Office/Library.
• Moved AGAIN in November 2021 to my current residence in Tampa Florida.. after the previous landlord sold from under us, and my company sold at the same time. However this time, I have an office/library to store and display my books! I'm down to two active bookcases, but I'm going to get two more soon. After 4 long years, the marathon is over.

     I have 26 large packing boxes full of books in various closets, and I went to my first Goodwill in Oldsmar and bought a bag of cool books just last week. It feels so good to be settled and away from West Palm with a great job where I won't have to move, in a nice area with a larger home again. My hobby is not something where you can do it with a very limited amount of space, and always moving, I didn't want to unpack everything just to have to start over again in a few week. In the next post I will show you the state of my current library, and any new finds in the new area I reside. I moved 5 times in 4 years. Never again!

Living Room Book Case Update

     Not sure If anyone remembers my book case, hand made from oak keg pallets from Miller Brewing Company, my previous employer. (Link for the curious on how it was made.) Well here is a quick update on the books that have found their way in there over the last few years.

Book case dimensions: 15.5 feet long by 8.35 feet high by 18 inch depth. Holds 3 rows of paperbacks per shelf, or two hardbacks. 36 books per row, 3 deep, with some stacked on top and piled in front. Runs the whole length of my living room, end to end. The TV pictured is 70 inches, for scale.

Vintage Science Fiction Book Covers Part 4: Ace Doubles

     Yes I know, it's been a while. In the effort to put together an article documenting Ace Doubles, I was taking pictures for said article, and realized it's been a while since I've done a book covers post. So, here you are. Ignore the price stickers and so on, I did not get around to taking them off, and I kind of like them on. 

                         Check out Parts one, two, and three of the book cover series.

Check out Parts one, two, and three of the book cover series.

Easton Press Neuromancer (Happy Birthday to Me.)

     A gift from my mother for my birthday on Saturday; Neuromancer Easton Press Signed Edition. I'll be honest, I did not take the shrink wrap off the book, I'm going to leave it exactly how it came to preserve it. Not that I don't own several other copies of the book, it being one of my favorite science fiction novels of all time. Learn more about how to get one at Easton Press here.

    Little known fact: The picture of the cover scan on Wikipedia (linked above) is a book I sold on eBay. When I previously found first editions of the release paperback for sale pretty often in the late 90's and early 2000's, I sold quite a few on eBay to earn more money to.. buy more books. I wrote a few small articles on why the paperback is scarce, and thus the picture was used almost everywhere, pre-google images.

    Read a post I wrote about Neuromancer back in 2012 here.

(Picture from Easton Press)

 

Lets Organize Your Library

     I've spent all weekend, literally six hours each on Saturday and Sunday, organizing the books in my bookcases around the house. Taking in to consideration the amount of time I put in to just getting things loosely sorted so I can see things better, I thought I would put a few minutes in to a post about keeping your library organized.

On having too many books:
     I have too many books. Once you have three layers of books on the same shelf, you will never know what is in the back two layers, or the few books perched on top. My way of combating this is simple, I put all the one off, lesser known authors in the back. With those books, any new or non series paperbacks get tossed in there with them. If I'm pretty sure that I will not be completing a series, or it is not a desirable author, then you get to the back of the bus. My advice is to buy more bookcases until your significant other gets pissed, then get one more for good measure.

By series, or by author, or.. or... by publisher?
     If you have under 500 books in your collection, alphabetizing may be an option for you. The question remains, do you split up the series if they have different authors? Do you keep all your Del Ray books on it's own shelf? What about the yellow cover DAW originals? I kind of do both, depending on what I'm looking for at the moment. Moorcock, you get your own shelf, but if it has a yellow cover, you go with the DAW's, because I'm after those right now. Asimov, your all alone in your triple stacked glory. No real answer here.

Forgotten Realms, Dragonlance, Spelljammer and Eberron, oh my.
     I'm a complete nut for Forgotten Realms. Each of these series of books has series within them, and sometimes another one to spin off of that. Example: The Harpers, and the Finder's Stone Trilogy, which both have books that cross over in to the other series, and back again, and have several spin off series, one off books, etc. It's a mess, but one I was more than excited to tackle in 11th grade, 20 years ago. I read every single one. In these cases I just put the series together, and try to keep them on the same shelf, or layer, in the same book case. It's very satisfying to see everything lined up by number.

Clean your books.
    Stickers, gunk, pencil marks, even pen needs to be taken care of when you are organizing your books. Get a rag and eraser, some alcohol and set up a little prep station. Some may only need a light dusting, and once the shelf is empty, dust that too. The frequency you do this is up to you, I bet I clean off the shelves and look at my books every three months or so with my son. He likes to look at them and help me while I organize, which is great.

Harcovers.. 
    They are all different sizes, height and width, what gives? They take up a ton of room on your shelves, but man, do they look great. I have a great answer for hard covers; just toss them on the shelf in size order, and don't double stack anything that is above the bottom shelf, the shelf will bend over the years. If you can marry up a series or author and the size is similar, go for it. I typically do not buy hardcover books unless they are something special, vintage or first printing.

Taking notes! Damn you Piers Anthony.
    I make a few notes of books that I thought I had, but are mysteriously missing from library. This happens constantly. I was wondering if people were just borrowing my books when I was not home, but ruled that out. Dust jackets go missing, covers get ripped, I just write it all down as I see it, then when I'm in the wild I try and get those books to replace the abused ones I noticed. All of the above is especially true with my Piers Anthony collection; he frequently writes more Xanth books, books are re-released very often with new covers, some of his books are so old they are literally deteriorating as I dust them. I pride myself on having a complete Anthony catalog, but I'm no longer up to date, and I'm always on the lookout for better versions of the rarer, older books.

All pictures taken by me with a broken iPhone.