February 09, 2005

• Someday, maybe. Stephenson is probably a good bet to be worth collecting, but they print many thousands of those promotional copies and for the most part, in my experience, no one seems to go crazy over them. Also, the industry term for one of those promotional or pre-release books is "galley", which might help in finding comparable items...
• I may be wrong, but unless there is something different about it, I don't think it is worth any more than a normal book. I've got several "promo" cds that I've bought out of the used bins for example and it seems that a good number of the used academic books I buy from amazon and half.com are promo copies as well. I have a friend that recently published a book and had to buy a galley copy of his own book with a different cover off of ebay! It didn't cost very much though. Maybe they are worth something and I'm sitting on a gold mine! Hookers and blow here I come!
• Someone who lives in my building must work for a publishing company, because I find piles of advanced reading copies and uncorrected proofs in the basement, and I pillage them regularly ( I grabbed about 30 just last week). Unless the book goes on to be Harry Potter, I don't think these types of books have any more value than regular copies. But if I find out differently, I am with you, jccalhoun. Hookers and blow fo evahbody!
• try www.abebooks.com for an idea of value
• I used to work for a used bookseller, and advance reader's copies were always pretty nice, as long as the author is reasonalby popular. If you've got these before the official release date, you can ususally flip them online for around the hardback price, sometimes more.
• I have seen ARC's sell from $1.00 to $400 for an ARC of stephen King's "everythings eventual"
• It always helps to have the author sign them. Just with their name, no cutesy messages or even "To Joe". Find out where the author's having a book reading and line up.
• Interesting. Some of the ARCs of Neal Stephenson are 50-100 dollars on abebooks. I think they may be different - uncorrected or first edition. I will have a look next time I pass by the shop as they seem to have a few of that sort of thing.
• Lokispeak!!! Holy crap! Would you believe that King's "Everything's Eventual" was one of the ARC books that I passed over? Just not a King fan. Fuck. I've got to see if it's still down in the basement. I guess I've been schooled.
• That's a shame kimdog. There were 2 versions of it, one with a cd that's worth $400 and one without that's worth $100. (LokiSpeak is diving into the action packed world of book collecting)
• What makes a book valuable? Two things: quantity produced and (eventual) popularity of the author/title. Ideally you want to have the ARC or 1st edition printing of a book that noone cared about when it first came on to the market (and thus, not too many were produced), but that became incredibly popular with many later editions appearing. For instance, an ARC or 1st of Steven King's Carrie will fetch you a pretty penny on the market, but 8 Stories From A Buick probably won't cause much of a stir ever mainly because they printed 500 million of them and now they've been remaindered to used book stores everywhere. There are of course exceptions to the rule, for instance producing limited and numbered 1sts, or having two variant ARC's, one much rarer than the other (including a CD with "Everything's Eventual"for instance.) In other words, don't get too excited. Neal Stephenson's an author who already has a fair amount of popularity. Chances are that your ARC is not particularly rare, and therefore, not so valuable. Dig up an ARC of Snowcrash and maybe you've got something.
• I have a feeling that the person who is dumping all of these books is probably savvy about this whole book collecting aspect. Most of the ones that I have pulled are from 2000-2002. Makes me think that this person is holding on to them long enough to see how they fare, then getting rid of the flotsam. Not that I am complaining in the least.(I loved Snowcrash.)
• Nickdanger's got it right regarding the variables about the value of first editions and ARCs (and to limited pressings, first paperbacks, remaindered pressings, etc.). My nephew is a part-time dealer and he flips sales of these things all the time. Half of them he finds in junk shops, and the rest he buys online. He doesn't put much time into it, but he clears about ten thousand dollars per year from it, so if you have the interest, develop your knowledge and make some cash. On the charitable side of things: the books he buys which won't sell (and the chaff that comes with the wheat at auctions), he donates to local libraries, charity booksales and to literacy programs.