A book that looks like nothing.

[satnrose]

There are quite a few books that don't look like anything special. Here's one: Security Analysis

[gargoyle-books]

Good job Emmabook! Don't you love that real book knowledge still counts for something! I love outwitting the "pod people." Went to am estate sale this morning with 1000s of books, ALL without bar codes. I was in heaven!

[oldbookshopnj]

Good find on the Klarman book! I've read about it, but never seen a copy.

Here's the Wall Street Journal article on Gates and Business Adventures:

http://www.wsj.com/articles/bill-gatess-favorite-business-book-1405088228?autologin=y

[oldbookshopnj]

Reminiscences of a Stock Operator by Edwin Lefevre is pricey in any of the pre WWII editions.  It was first published by Doran in 1923, reprinted in 1930 with a Doubleday, Doran imprint, and reprinted again by Sun Dial in 1938.

Copies described as the 1923 first edition without jackets have sold for $895 & $2500 on ebay recently--one had a green cloth binding and the other was tan. I suspect the tan is earlier, but I do not have any information.

A copy of the Sun Dial edition with a jacket is currently being offered for sale on a fixed price site for $850.

[jkachelmeyer]

I'd like to thank whoever pointed out Security Analysis.  I've known about it for years, but found my first first edition of it this year and sold it for $1500 this morninng.

[maxine*j]

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@jkachelmeyer wrote:

I'd like to thank whoever pointed out Security Analysis.  I've known about it for years, but found my first first edition of it this year and sold it for $1500 this morninng.

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That was satnrose, who started this thread, in his first post to the thread, on February 26, 2003.  He casts a long shadow here, eh? 

[gargoyle-books]

Great Find! Where'd you get that price on it! I want to list mine (found it for $.50 at a church rummage sale last year, & only knew about it 'cause of this thread). Thanks to everyone for keeping this thread going, & many thanks to Satnrose for starting it so long ago!

[jkachelmeyer]

Sold it on Ebay.  Had it at $500 auction, but got an offer for $1500 for BIN.

[gargoyle-books]

Good job! I'd been worried that eBay had turned into all bottom feeders, so nice to hear you can still get a good price for good books...

[picture*books]

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@picture*books wrote:
The 2005 first Stephenie Meyer Twilight book is fetching a tidy sum ($255).

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Did that book ever amount to anything?

[gargoyle-books]

Because of this thread long ago, I've always kept my eyes open for "Security Analysis." Sold a couple of later editions over the years, but just sold a copy of the First Edition, Second State for...$6800! I was astounded! and ALL the scanner people at this library sale had gone by already & completely missed it!

[jkachelmeyer]

Congratulations.  A few months ago I had sold a copy for $1500.  Any idea why yours went for what it did?

[gargoyle-books]

Thanks, I remember being so impressed by your sale when you did it! No idea why this thing has gotten so valuable, & I sold it to another dealer. I researched eBay sales first, & decided to sell it privately...It was a second state (the true first itself, with Black boards, goes for upwards of $10,000, consistently). Mine had the maroon-brown boards. Anyway, it was in VG+ condition, nicer than others out there. eBay seems to hav become a site for those looking for deals, not real collectors...just my opinion...Kathy

[picture*books]

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@gargoyle-books wrote:

[...] eBay seems to hav become a site for those looking for deals, not real collectors...just my opinion...Kathy

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So real collectors don't look for deals?

I guess I am disqualified from being a real collector. Sigh. And all these years I thought I was doing so well ... it just goes to prove, you never know what you never know.

[gargoyle-books]

No, that's not what I meant. I love a good deal as well as the next person, but am willing to pay more for something for my own collection than I would if I'm only buying for resale. Ebay seems to  have morphed into a lot of "bottom feeders" looking just for the lowest price, which is not what it's all about.

[sigmapsidelta]

Possibly seen by some in another thread.....

A Phoenix in the Blood by Henry Patterson (Jack Higgins) 1964 Barrie & Rockliff.

Pay the Devil by Henry Patterson (Jack Higgins) 1963 Barrie & Rockliff.

Neither yell, "look at me, I'm really quite scarce and desireable!" 'Pay the Devil' looks like a basic western, probably written by a solicitor in St. Leonard's-on-Sea, and likely the furthest west he'd ever been was a holiday in Ilfracombe.

But Mr Higgins has published many titles, sold many millions of books, and has lots of fans and collectors. They don't care that the wrapper illustration is a man in Confederate civil war officer's uniform sitting on what I presume is a horse, with a strange green landscape behind him that seems to have a medieval ruin poking up from within it. The story apparently takes place, for the most part, in Ireland, so the ruin and general greeness is thus explained. But if he's left the US after the civil war, did he travel so fast he didn't have time to get changed?

The more common of the two, 'Phoenix', of which I could find about half a dozen copies being offered (though several of those may have been the same copy listed on different venues) are priced from £200 to around £220. 

The less common 'Devil' was difficult to pin down. I never found record of one being sold, but did eventually find one listed under 'Jack Higgins' and being dangled beneath the noses of those aforementioned collectors, and he'd probably have sold it by now if he'd just listed it as by who it says its by and mentioned the Higgins pseudonym in the description. Its a very nice price, though. Well, it is if you've got a copy. £750 is quite hefty if you're a Higgins/Patterson collector and you don't have £750.

.