I miss half-priced books.
Mar 18th, 2008 by B.
Of all the things I miss from America (the list shrinks monthly), I think the thing I miss most of all these days is half-priced bookstores. Or dollar stores that sell dollar books. Or garage sales where I could buy entire Crichton collections for pennies on the dollar. Or libraries where they actually loan me stuff for free (although I tend to write in my books - never a good idea with a rental).
Here 99% of the books are in German. Go figure. And since they’re such a novelty, you pay through the nose for English-language novels when you’re fortunate enough to find them. I get all of my books either from Amazon.de or Amazon.co.uk. You’d think with the exchange rate & shipping Amazon.de would always be the clear winner, but not always.
Out of curiosity I added up my amazon to-read/buy list and it came to a whopping £457.57 (for 64 of my 66 books - 2 are currently out of stock). Pounds that is. So for all you American readers - double the cost. Ouch. Someone please tell me there’s a super-cheap online book store that I’m not clued into?? Because the alternative is costly. I’ve also been trying to alternate new books with re-reading old titles that have been on my shelf forever. It’s a good system, but eventually I’m bound to run out since I read all the time.
Anyway, here are the titles to the books on my list. Let me know if you’ve read any of them and what you thought. At £457.57 I can’t afford a dud!
The Orchard Book of Greek Myths — The Devil Within: A Memoir of Depression — The Woman in White -A Note of Madness — The Perks of Being a Wallflower — The Third Policeman — The Quiet American — Siddhartha — Brighton Rock — I Love You, Beth Cooper (P.S.) — Everyman — Middlemarch — In Search of Lost Time: The Way by Swann’s Vol 1 — Anna Karenina — In Stitches: The Highs and Lows of Life as an AandE Doctor — I Have America Surrounded: The Life of Timothy Leary — In Search of Adam — Get Dead - You’ve Got to Laugh — It Was a Dark and Stormy Night — Intimacy — The Time Traveler’s Wife — Planet Germany — Walks Through History: Liverpool (Walks Through History) — The Garden of Eden — Don’t You Forget about Me — The Commoner — Cognitive Behavioural Therapy for Dummies — Make the Most of Your Time on Earth: a Rough Guide to the World: 1000 Ultimate Travel Experiences — The Kite Runner — The Bad Dog’s Diary: A Year in the Life of Blake: Lover… Fighter… Dog — Kurt Cobain Journals — Gods Behaving Badly — Half-Assed: A Weight-Loss Memoir — Only as Good as Your Word: Writing Lessons from My Favorite Literary Gurus — Desire: Women Write About Wanting — For Keeps: Women Tell the Truth about Their Bodies, Growing Older, and Acceptance — Rockabye: From Wild to Child — Fucking Daphne: Mostly True Stories and Fictions — Things the Grandchildren Should Know — The Creative Writing Coursebook: Forty Authors Share Advice and Exercises for Fiction and Poetry — Alternadad: The True Story of One Family’s Struggle to Raise a Cool Kid in America — Snoop: The Secret Language of Stuff — Notes from the Underground — The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time: Adult Edition — Shoot the Damn Dog: A Memoir of Depression — Daddy’s Rules — Dialogue: Techniques and Exercises for Crafting Effective Dialogue — Coming Up for Air — The Razor’s Edge — Homage to Catalonia – Trust Me, I’m a (Junior) Doctor — Not in My Name: A Compendium of Modern Hypocrisy — The Book With No Name — Is There a Book in You? — Print Journalism: A Critical Introduction — Helter Skelter — No One Belongs Here More Than You — Duma Key — Essential English: For Journalists, Editors and Writers — Reading “Lolita” in Tehran: A Memoir in Books — Fat, Forty and Fired — Love Is a Mix Tape: Life and Loss, One Song at a Time — Negotiating with the Dead: A Writer on Writing
On this day..
- Questions, part 2 - 2008
- Good times. - 2007
Proust- pretty boring. Hesse- formative book in my youth.
Wow, a few of the others are on my list, but most not. And you should try what I did- send 59 lbs of books back from the states. That cost $200+, but with the prices being so cheap there, and all the hand-me-downs, used books I got, well worth it.
Ever tried the used book offerings on amazon? I’ve had a lot of success and saved some cash… and sometimes perusing the offerings can lead you to online stores that you can peruse for books you didn’t know you needed. (I’ve had a lot of success with that too)
Hi there,
have a look at weltbild.de, there is a section (Internationale Bücher -> Englische Romane) with professed 5479 English-language novels, e.g. Siddhartha 6.90 € plus 3.90 € shipping overall. Seem to be mostly classics however.
Similar at buecher.de, with also non-fiction-sections; e.g. Planet Germany for 10.07 €. Not really cheap - but it means at least Euros instead of pounds.
weltbild.de and buecher.de (and also bol.de [Planet Germany 8.87 €], libri.de [12.10 €] and buch.de [9.86 €]) are often cheaper on imported books than amazon.de. And besides, every book store in Germany should be able to order almost every foreign book over their distributors — sometimes surprinsingly affordable.
I totally agree. I used to love 2nd hand bookshops when I lived in the US, or even the bargain bins at Borders. Do you know about the stupid book pricing law here?
Hmmm…Curious Incident of the Dog at Nighttime is a fabulous book. Both my husband and I read it. Cleverly written.
Reading Lolita in Tehran…I really liked this book, but I know a lot of people that found it a difficult read.
I had to laugh about your missing the book sales. When I’ve gone back to the US for visits, I always manage grabbing a few books off the discount rack to through into my suitcase.
Caffienated Cowgirl’s last blog post..Baby of Mine
Awesome list. How’s the English section at the Dresden library? Maybe we could set up some sort of book exchange thru fellow transplants? I spend more money on English books than anything else too (well, that and Hellman’s imported mayo) but to me it’s well worth it.
The Munich Readery is pretty radical: http://www.readery.de/
It’s run by a lovely American family, and they’ll ship anywhere for the Deutsche post rate + 1 euro. They also offer store credit for trades. You can contact them directly at bookmanjb@readery.de.
katie’s last blog post..Fire It Up
As mud pointed out: sometimes amazon.de has good offers on used books (amazon marketplace). I got some books from booklooker.de where people seel their used books online (also English books available) and also -although with much less choice- billigbuch.de.
Sometimes I shed a few silent tears for all of the used bookstores I would be singlehandedly supporting if I still lived in the states. I only visit the states with empty suitcases. Otherwise I wouldn’t be able to get all of my half.com 1 dollar book purchases on the plane.
What about a book trade? The only book I have on your list is Planet Germany. Have anything you feel like trading for it? (Favorite authors being PK Dick, Tom Robbins, and Derrick Jensen.) Mmmm, used books filled with other people’s cryptic notes. I love it.
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If you make it to Hamburg, there’s a decent English book store with a selection of used books: http://www.english-books-hamburg.de/
Scott’s last blog post..Stroke of Insight
B, Mark buys and then sells on eBay….getting some of his € back. BUT, of course, eBay.de does NOT have Germans screaming for English language books. But he always has a list going and the box and shelf, over about one year, is getting empty. A thought.
Sadly, would doubt that Dresden has an abundance of English books second hand. Here there ARE a few places. Strange but I stopped READING when I stopped teaching …. read enough for more than a life time. Now it´s news as in International Herald and Time and Newsweek …. then I obsess about the “state of this World”! Perhaps should try knitting.
I’ve read:
Perks of Being a Wallflower (loved it)
The Quiet American (loved it)
The Time Traveler’s Wife (original but ultimately unsatisfying)
Helter Skelter (one of my top ten favorite books of all time)
Reading Lolita in Tehran (such a promising premise but lame execution)
I hope you read “Half Assed” and “Fucking Daphne” just for the titles alone. Also, I really want to read “Nobody Belongs Here More Than You” too.
Blythe’s last blog post..Kiddie Swag
There’s a book pricing law?? Thanks for all the suggestions everyone. I’ve added a bunch of new links to my bookmarks and will definitely be hitting the english bookstore in Hamburg when I’m there this weekend.
Blythe - I remember seeing you had King Dork on your to-read list. I just finished it and thought it was great. In advance of posting a review (hopefully later this week), I’ll say it’s well worth picking up.
A bit on book pricing (new books … no discounting allowed):
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/24/arts/24book.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all&oref=slogin
You might try abebooks.com advanced seach:
http://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchEntry
Enter what you are looking for and select Germany (or something close by) in the bookseller country field.
Best to determine the proper English language ISBN/EAN # and search with it.
hth
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