Where to Shop
This page lists some of the main bookseller and auction
websites, and other related sites, with comments.
1. GENERAL SITES
Addall Book searching and price comparison.
Very useful!
Advanced Book Exchange (ABE) The main site (together with Bibliofind) for rare and
secondhand bookdealers. It's the one I use most of the time. It has a
nice interface and does some good educational feature articles. They
also post up a very interesting
page of users' questions and ABE's answers. Watch out when you
order, though. Their order form cannot encrypt credit card details,
and information always seems to take a few days to get through to the
bookseller. I find it's more efficient, once you've found a book on
ABE, to e-mail the bookseller direct.
Alibris
You can go wrong on any of the
major sites, but these are the only people I would recommend you stay
away from as a matter of course! Most of their "stock" is in fact not
theirs at all; they are simply selling other people's stock at a premium.
Check the major search sites and find the original seller; save yourself
some money and don't let these people grab any more of the market!
To other irritating features are that they also show up on Bibliofind,
and they frequently do not delete books even when they have been sold,
so you waste time making fruitless enquiries. Unless they really have
the only copy of that rare book you want I'd stay clear of them.
Amazon
This is (together with
Barnes and Noble) the main
internet outlet for new books. From their home page you can access
Amazon auctions and Sotheby's online. They're both OK (Sotheby's
guarantees authenticity of items and is rather more pricey), but
frankly most of the best stuff is going on eBay these days
(along with a lot of trash!).
The Amazon site also features something called ZShops, where bookshops
and private sellers offer a huge range of books. You need to register
to bid, and you can give Amazon your credit card details (encrypted) so
that many transactions can be done just by clicking the mouse.
Books and Book Collecting (1) Go to this site for a more complete list
(and a much more sophisticated interface!) than the one on this page.
Books and Book Collecting (2)
Another site which gives a
lot of really useful links.
Bibliofind
Owned by Exchange.com,
which is in turn owned by Amazon.com. The interface and interactiveness
are less good than ABE. Some traders advertise on both, but there's a
lot here that isn't on ABE.
Bookfinder This is the site to
use for comparing prices. It combines the contents of the Advanced Book
Exchange, Bibliofind and others (such as Antiqbook) and items are
listed in ascending order of price. It can be used equally well to
find new books. Be warned, though, it does a sweep of the major sites,
and comes up with a good selection, but it is just that, a selection.
To
get a complete list you still need to go to each site in turn.
The Catholic University of America
You may think this is an odd site
to be linked here, but they do give a very good series of links to a
wide variety of high quality booksellers.
Dealers of Antiquarian and Rare Books This gives a comprehensive guide to who is
selling what where.
eBay This is the biggest auction site. It's got a
more racy feel to it than Amazon, but there's a lot there and some
good bargains can be had. Like Amazon, it does not restrict itself to
books and you need to register to bid. You can pay online and now that PayPal
has gone international that now applies to those of us who do not live in the United States!
International Society of Appraisers Professional advice on whether what you're buying or bidding on is worth the price.
2.
TRACKING AUCTIONS
To find out what's being offered on all the major auction sites, click here and download Auctiontamer. It doesn't catch everything, though, so it's still worth checking the individual auction sites.
3. A SELECTION OF INDIVIDUAL TRADING OUTLETS
Bernard J. Shapero Rare Books (find them on ABE). Julian Mackenzie and Lucinda Boyle have been consistently competent and provided me with books of very high quality for a very fair price.
C.R. Johnson Rare Book Collections (also on ABE). Chris Foster at C.R. Johnson gave me very fair treatment, and a clear, competent description of the book I was interested in.
Philadelphia Rare Books and Manuscripts I haven't actually bought anything from them myself, but they are a major supplier, with a very educational website. They do not advertise on ABE or Bibliofind. They weren't very helpful when I approached them with a request, but you may have better luck!
Ron Lieberman Don't buy a medieval manuscript without talking to this man! (He's probably pretty good on a lot of other topics, too, but this is the context in which I know him.)
Ximenes Rare Books (ABE). Steve Weissman at Ximenes really knows a lot about books, and he is very helpful, steady and methodical.
