Darwination Posted July 7 Share Posted July 7 (edited) On 7/7/2024 at 9:59 AM, Surfing Alien said: 1939 in the USA. Pocket Books began in earnest with print runs of 100k per title after sold out trial runs of 10k for the first 10 titles. Yeah, 100k is solid but hardly taking over. I'm thinking more of Mickey Spillane selling millions. Do you know of some sort of data or chart that tracks total pb sales over the years? I'd be curious to see the trends. Edited July 7 by Darwination jimjum12 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Calhoun Posted July 7 Share Posted July 7 1950 important in this topic too as Gold Medal made PBOs (paperback originals) their thing whereas before PBs were mostly reprints of hardcovers, the rights of which could be had for a song. jimjum12 and Darwination 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Surfing Alien Posted July 7 Share Posted July 7 (edited) On 7/7/2024 at 11:49 AM, Darwination said: Yeah, 100k is solid but hardly taking over. I'm thinking more of Mickey Spillane selling millions. Do you know of some sort of data or chart that tracks total pb sales over the years? I'd be curious to see the trends. Pocket sold over a hundred million in their first couple of years. They even ran the number total on the top of the books for a while like McDonalds. They completely revolutionized publishing to the masses. Avon and Dell joined in 1941 and 1942 and all of publishing changed Edited July 7 by Surfing Alien Darwination 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darwination Posted July 7 Share Posted July 7 (edited) Wild, the Smithsonian point's to Penguin as the predecessor for Pocket, the Brits kicked off pbs?? https://www.smithsonianmag.com/arts-culture/how-the-paperback-novel-changed-popular-literature-11893941/ The Smithsonian's also celebrating the design and branding which seems so bland to me A much better intro to the topic for me, though SF based: https://www.kirkusreviews.com/news-and-features/articles/rise-paperback-novel/ Edited July 7 by Darwination jimjum12 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Sarg Posted July 8 Share Posted July 8 (edited) Reclam and Tauchnitz were printing paperbacks in Germany in the 1800s. Westbrook and others were doing them in the USA in the late 1800s. Dime novels (originated 1860) can be considered paperbacks. I have a Reclam paperback of Tacitus's Agricola from 1900. Penguin was inspired by Albatross, another German brand that printed English books. Pocket Books was probably inspired by the success of Penguin, not their brand, or their books. Pocket Books introduced unique illustrated color covers, something that Reclam, Tauchnitz, Albatross, and Penguin did not do. Edited July 10 by Sarg typo jimjum12, Darwination, PopKulture and 1 other 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Surfing Alien Posted July 8 Share Posted July 8 On 7/7/2024 at 8:22 PM, Sarg said: Pocket Books was probably inspired by the success of Penguin, not their brand, or their books. Pocket Books introduced unique illustrated color covers, something that Reclaim, Tauchnitz, Albatross, and Penguin did not do. 100% ... The winning combination. Darwination and jimjum12 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimjum12 Posted July 16 Author Share Posted July 16 (edited) You guys are almost all readers still. I promise not to do this often. I just finished the 4th and final installment of Carlos Ruiz-Zafon's masterful series 'The Cemetary of Forgotten Books." It is set in Spain, in the years slightly before and during Franco's fascist regime. It's a kind of Gothic Horror, with a seasoning of Noir, that can turn the series into quite the page turner. This final volume is an 800-page behemoth, filled with magic and despair. If you haven't given CRZ a try, you can no longer say I didn't try. If you want an entry into his style that's a tad more manageable, "City Of The Mist", is an anthology of 11 snippets that parallel, but don't ruin the series. It is CRV's last published. I believe. GOD BLESS ... -jimbo(a friend of jesus) Edited July 16 by jimjum12 Darwination 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OtherEric Posted July 16 Share Posted July 16 On 7/16/2024 at 11:08 AM, jimjum12 said: You guys are almost all readers still. I promise not to do this often. I just finished the 4th and final installment of Carlos Ruiz-Zafon's masterful series 'The Cemetary of Forgotten Books." It is set in the years slightly before and during Franco's fascist regime. It's a kind of Gothic Horror, with a seasoning of Noir, that can turn the series into quite the page turner. This final volume is an 800-page behemoth, filled with magic and despair. If you haven't given CRZ a try, you can no longer say I didn't try. If you want an entry into his style that's a tad more manageable, "City Of The Mist", is an anthology of 11 snippets that parallel, but don't ruin the series. It is CRV's last published. I believe. GOD BLESS ... -jimbo(a friend of jesus) I just bought the first book purely on your recommendation, jimbo. jimjum12 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat Calhoun Posted July 16 Share Posted July 16 my wife raved about 'Shadow of the Wind' so I picked it up intending to check out the first few lines and ended up devouring the whole utterly delicious first chapter. way beyond fabuloso. jimjum12 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimjum12 Posted August 1 Author Share Posted August 1 On 7/16/2024 at 3:37 PM, Pat Calhoun said: my wife raved about 'Shadow of the Wind' so I picked it up intending to check out the first few lines and ended up devouring the whole utterly delicious first chapter. way beyond fabuloso. His final effort before his death is The City Of Mist and is just so very impressive. It picks up themes and threads that were present in the 4 part Cemetary of Forgotten Books series. This appears to be that one volume not available in an autographed edition. I really do like the hardbacks, but man, do they take up space. If I was still able to work, I'd focus more on some of them. You can get some badazz stuff from the 1800's in first editions for a couple hundred bucks. Me. I'd chase Arkham House if I still had it in me. Gnome Press and a couple other publishers are also noteworthy. Here's a new one that was very reasonable, the hallmark of my collection these days. I'm sure this is fairly common, but I don't see tons available in grade. Probably just too cheap and too cool to sell. GOD BLESS ... -jimbo(a friend of jesus) OtherEric and Pat Calhoun 2 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OtherEric Posted August 15 Share Posted August 15 A couple recent items in the Pulp Connections thread reminded me that I wanted a copy of this one. It's not particularly hard to find once you look, but I love that there's a Bradbury book with a Chas Addams cover that was done, if not specifically for the book, at least for one of the stories in the book. jimjum12 and Pat Calhoun 1 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
OtherEric Posted August 26 Share Posted August 26 Not in great shape, and a later printing... but I never see the Scribner Heinlein juveniles in the wild, so at $10 I had to give it a good home: pmpknface, Pat Calhoun, jimjum12 and 1 other 3 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Number 6 Posted Thursday at 10:28 PM Share Posted Thursday at 10:28 PM For those of you who collect 1st edition hardcover books, I wanted to ask a two-part question and get your opinions and some additional viewpoints: a) There are instances where the true first edition of a novel is in a language other than English. Do you chase the actual true first even if it's in a language that you can't read? Or do you acquire the first edition/first printing in your native language? The knee-jerk answer to this may be "why would you buy a book you can't read" but for myself personally, on really popular titles that are expensive regardless of whether they are a true first or a first-thus-in-English, because of the price point I wouldn't be using this as a reading copy anyway. b) While in many cases the true first edition of book is a hardcover, sometimes it's a paperback original. In many cases the paperback 1st edition will be followed by a hardcover 1st edition with a few months or a year or two. Since I tend to prefer hardcover firsts, I will usually opt of the later if only separated from the true first by a few months/a year, maybe two. But what about instances when the hardcover 1st edition doesn't appear for several years after the paperback first, in some cases decades? Again, the immediate response may be to say "why not both?" but often with popular titles, both versions can be very pricey despite the time separation. Would you feel comfortable paying hundreds or even thousands of dollars for a hardcover knowing that it was printed a couple of decades after the true first? jimjum12 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimjum12 Posted Thursday at 10:53 PM Author Share Posted Thursday at 10:53 PM At the end of the day, my preference is moot, but I'm assessing this issue myself, with Carlos Ruiz Zafon. His firsts are published in Spanish. I know a little, but not enough to navigate a novel. I'm going to try for one and see how I feel. At least the graphics are typically the same. As for PBOs, I try to stick with them when I can. Some are too pricey for me as are many HCs. If it exceeds 200 smackers, I have to have a tremendous desire for it, but that's post "fixed income". When I was still working 2 jobs, the sidelines were more accommodating. One thing about books, you can fund some radical items for a grand. GOD BLESS ... -jimbo(a friend of jesus) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darwination Posted Friday at 12:28 AM Share Posted Friday at 12:28 AM A) I like the first English edition. If the book was translated and published in the UK first, I prefer that printing. But complicating matters, I also like the best translation. When it comes to a non-native book, I'd prefer to have a newer, better translation than the first if there's acknowledgement that the first translation is lacking. B) The first edition is always more desirable to me. I've been collecting more paperbacks, so PBOs are awesome, but I acknowledge that a first HC is always the big dog when the paperback was printed later. That said, there are price issues in play here, and I'm often happy to get a paperback first where the HC is super-pricey. If the HC is somewhat affordable and the pb first is pricey, I'll definitely just put the paperback dough towards the HC, as I'm not the sort that needs both. Also, HCs are far more durable. Set the dust jacket to the side, and I don't feel like you are impacting a nice hardcover very much in the act of reading. But if the HC came later? I want the pbo. If I'm worried about the condition of any book getting harmed during reading, it is the digital age after all, and I don't mind reading a scan or even an epub. jimjum12 1 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jimjum12 Posted Friday at 12:24 PM Author Share Posted Friday at 12:24 PM On 9/12/2024 at 8:28 PM, Darwination said: Set the dust jacket to the side, and I don't feel like you are impacting a nice hardcover very much in the act of reading. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
