Classic books/literature for a good deal? Used is fine

[kidwithshirt]

Hey. I am a slickdealer and I love books! I just couldn't stand it to go to borders or B&N to drop $15 for a stack of paper bound together by some threads or glue. :mad:

I use to live in a town with a great used book store that prices every book at about $2 so it's a great deal to pick up some great literature to read.

Anyway I read mostly classics stuff so those are easy to find. But on ebay most of them are stuff that had been sitting in people's shelves for decades. Though the text is the same, I just prefer something newer in condition.

I have checked out "mass marketing paperback" or "enriched classics." They are priced at a pretty fair pricetag, around $3-$7. I was wondering if there's a way to buy them in bulk (a lot of different books, not 100 copies of the same book).

Shipping might kill the deal, but if you know some obscure merchant that sells these things. Please let me know. Meanwhile I will look on amazon

[Talyssa]

would you read books on your computer? or do you have a device to read books on? You can get most classics free for download from websites like Project Gutenberg.

[radford]

Hey. I am a slickdealer and I love books! I just couldn't stand it to go to borders or B&N to drop $15 for a stack of paper bound together by some threads or glue. :mad:

I use to live in a town with a great used book store that prices every book at about $2 so it's a great deal to pick up some great literature to read.

Shipping might kill the deal, but if you know some obscure merchant that sells these things. Please let me know. Meanwhile I will look on amazon

I used to live in LA where there were multiple stores from each large chain and also many small shops too of course. They used to have tons of bargain books they wanted to get rid of in their superstores. They had tons of business books and also classics , hardbound but not of the best quality. They had stuff like the complete works of Shakespeare though that was in a cheap paperback version. They also had Dickens, Jane Austen, Proust --- stuff like that.

The other type of stuff --- Hesse, Thomas Mann etc, that kind of stuff you have to get in paperback.

Thats another thing. I bought tons of paperbacks cheapos --- greek philosophy, econ and more modern stuff as well as all the popular writers like Bellow, Updike, Carver, Barbara Kingsolver etc and a lot of them turn brown. I think its the acidic content of the paper they used. They actually look like they were in some fire. The pages turn dark brown. Ive seen some better quality paperbacks that that say they use paper that doesnt have such high acid content.

Heres an article way back in 1998 from NY TIMES about it. If you read it it sounds like there was a start of some trend back then which I hope has caught on everywhere but I started seeing it on some books in the late 90s in the stores.

http://www.nytimes.com/1989/03/08/nyregion/publishers-swear-off-acidic-paper.html

Try half.com and look for any sales at Borders and Amazon. Amazon really is the place to check first they usually match or beat the chains even with the 40% -230% off coupons.

Libraries often have sales of old books too but they tend to be pretty crappy.

[Talyssa]

by the way one major used book retailer i ahve actually bought stuff from before (although it was in their store in Portland OR) is Powell's -- they have a store that takes up an entire city block and a website yo ucan order from. shipping does add up on books though ,they are bulky and heavyish.