Where to sell book of some value? (Robert Jordan leatherbound autographed etc.)

This is a good thread.

i want to know if milo managed to sell it

Books I'll probably sell someday:

-First edition of All The Pretty Horses
-Early edition of McSorley's Wonderful Saloon

When I was 20 and in Seattle, I passed up the chance to buy a copy of The Importance of Being Earnest, inscribed as a gift to George Bernard Shaw from one of the show's original producers.

So, in the light of emigrating to England per January, I need to do this. I need to get rid of some dear, dear books. This is very much a mash-up between this thread (ratio) and this fantastic one (emotion), but a large quantity will have to go. I didn't want to derail Gamaliel's wonderful thread, and need to pout emotion aside and look at the practicalities, so I'm putting this here.

It goes without saying that I will keep my most cherished books, but I will have to part with a good deal of my collection. It's just too much to ship and we probably won't be able to store it all - either at our new place or somewhere else.

So how do I go about this, selling the books that are of some value? I don't really know where to start. Of course I've looked at bookfinder and amazon, seeing what others charge for the same books, but where do I take it from there? And what do those prices tell me?
For example, I've got some John Fante books special editions I will have to part with, first editions ltd to 500 (Dreams From Bunker Hill, The Wine of Youth, West of Rome - all in fabulous hard cover editions). Now, these are on amazon ranging in price from 100 to 500 quid, but what does that mean? Are they reasonable prices? Or are those sellers in no hurry and prepared to wait forever and just see if some idiot, one day, wants to pay that asking price?

Or is eBay the way to go? I can't wait around like an amazon seller for who it's ok to have something for sale for three years, it needs to go rather sooner than later.

I'm in the process of making a list with all the books that will go, but I keep running into the same thing: all well and good listing it all, but then what? Where to go and how to do it?

Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Wasn't there some WDYLL where Drew D had a really nice book? Maybe he'll buy them.

Yeah, wasn't that Milton's 'Paradise Lost'? That photo belongs in the "People that've figured out how to live"-thread.

The two avenues most often taken would be selling to a dealer who handles rare or valuable used books, or to sell directly using the internet.

In the first case, you would need to identify the dealer and arrange to bring the books to him or her for evaluation, or for the dealer to come to you. This somewhat supposes you live near to a big city, where such dealers tend to concentrate, or that you're willing to drive a distance on the chance that the transaction will be satisfactory enough to justify the effort.

In the second case, you would need to familiarize yourself with the ins and outs of internet selling (probably through ebay or amazon) and be prepared to cope with inquiries, balky buyers, shipments and possible post-sale attempts at returns. Which is not to say that things won't go as smoothly as grease through a goose, but these possibilities exist and should be considered beforehand.

My final word would be, book owners almost always overestimate the value and the potential market for their most-preferred books. No matter what you paid for the books to begin, do not expect to make that back, or even half that, because it is pretty safe to say that if you make more than a fractional return, you are one extremely lucky fellow.

Not sure where else to post this, but going through my book collection I noticed one book is going for close to $400 on Amazon, eBay, abebooks, etc. Heliogabalus by Antonin Artaud.

I'm not sure if it's a fluke because i have no idea why that book would be worth so much. I'd consider selling it if I could remove my awful college-age philosophy I scribbled in the blank pages in the back.

Don't try to remove your embarrassing scribbles. The damage they do is probably less to a collector than the damage of razoring them out.

Why a reissue would be worth that much is puzzling. My only guess is that the cumulative number of physical copies in existence, regardless of edition, is smaller than the demand for them among Artaud afficionados. If my guess is correct, then that would be a precarious state upon which to base such a high valuation, because if that title were reissued once more then the value of your own reissue might plummet, as the market became saturated.

NB: I am speculating big time here.

Someone's selling it on ABE for US$1,893.44. Tere are only 3 copies listed worldwide there, so it does seem rare.

http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?isbn=0971457808&cm_sp=mbc-_-0971457808-_-all

noticed those crazy prices a few months ago. $10 well spent a couple of years ago, except i'd rather hang onto it. this was the first english translation (by lykiard who did the collected lautreamont too) as far as i know, which might explain the price. it's actually quite an ugly looking production, so i dunno... artaud fans i guess?

algorithmic pricing mishap most like

^^

If you check abebooks for a book with a bunch of different versions, there's often one or two that are insanely overpriced.

i think i'll hold onto it, too. it's mystifying because it is an ugly and cheap looking paperback, but if somebody wants to read it then there doesn't seem to be any copies floating around except in the $100-400 price range, which might be influencing the pricing algorithm.