11th Annual BookFinder.com Report

Out-of-print and in demand

In this the 11th annual BookFinder.com Report we publish a list of the top 100 most searched for out of print book titles from the previous 12 months. The books featured in this 2013 edition of the report run the gamut of publishing from true to life memoirs to science fiction, cookery to crochet, and firearms to photography.

Most of the books published over the course of history are out of print today. For hundreds of years the lifecycle for the vast majority of books has been the same: a book is written, it is published, many people buy and enjoy it, the book begins to fall out of favor and then publishers stop printing copies and the book falls out of print. This happens to exceptional books, average books and books that perhaps should never have seen the light of day in the first place. This lifecycle remained the same from the days Gutenberg walked the earth until the very recent past; a book being out of print meant it was a dead book. Once a book was dead the only way you were going to read a copy was to find someone to lend, give or sell it to you, or convince a publisher that issuing a new pressing was going to be financially viable.

In recent years, however, two technologies changed the landscape for out of print books, and created major debate among readers in the process. Print on Demand Books (POD) and Electronic Books (ebooks) have forced us to ask two questions
 1) Are these technologies helping book lovers?
 2) Does out of print exist in 2014 anyway?

Print on Demand (POD) technology allows anyone to create a bound book from any manuscript they hold the copyright for (or any work in the public domain) in a matter of minutes. Gone are the days of a required demand threshold to warrant a traditional print run. If a publisher wants every book they hold a copyright for to be available for purchase online they can now do it with an added marginal cost of essentially zero; no up-front print costs and no warehousing expense. Ebooks, of course, take this a step further and require no printing whatsoever and zero shipping costs, making even the most marginal title potentially worth something to someone.

Whether you think these technologies sound like a science fiction utopia or dystopia will depend on what camp you fall into. For many scholars, academics, and voracious readers (who merely want access to more books) this is a dream come true; the vaults of human literary and scientific achievement have been unlocked and no matter how esoteric your interest reasonably affordable access is easier than ever before. However, for collectors and traditionalists (who also love the book as an object unto itself) these technologies are essentially producing counterfeit goods. Based on the fact that each side has a very different use case for why they value the books in question, one could easily see the validity of either side's argument. This is why I don't see traditionally printed books and fine presses going anywhere anytime soon.

The second question is the one we struggle with when creating the BookFinder.com report. For our report we do not consider a title currently published as an eBook or POD to be in print. We felt that In Print meant printed on a page, with ink; so while a book only available electronically may be handy, it did not fit our criteria. We also decided some years ago that we would not consider POD published titles to be In Print. This was less to do with the quality of printing and binding (some PODs are indistinguishable from basic trade printings) but more that The BookFinder.com Report is meant to highlight books which traversed the entire traditional book lifecycle from life to death, and yet are once again sought after for one reason or another.

1. Sex by Madonna (i.e. Louise Veronica Ciccione) (*1958) Warner Books; New York, NY, 1992 Full-Metal, Spiral Bound; First Edition 132 pages. 32 cm Madonna Sex (first published in 1992) was the highly controversial erotic photography book which features the queen of pop along with other early 1990s notables including rappers Vanilla Ice & Big Daddy Kane as well as model Naomi Campbell. The book itself is spiral bound and actually quite fragile making fine copies relatively rare; copies still found in their Mylar wrapping sheet command an extra premium. The book went beyond basic erotica of the day, with several shoots pushing various social taboos, and earned Madonna the moniker “Queen of the Obscene.” After the books initial, albeit large, print run Sex has never since been reproduced as Madonna has very typically moved on from this phase of her career. As such one can assume that Sex will probably remain out of print indefinitely.
2. Rage by Stephen King (as Richard Bachman) (*1947) Signet; New York, NY, 1977 Paperback, First Edition 211 pages. 18 cm Rage (originally titled Getting It On) is the first novel by Stephen King published under the pseudonym Richard Bachman in 1977. It was collected in 1985 in the hardcover omnibus The Bachman Books. When King decided to let Rage fall out of print in the United States, it was available only as part of The Bachman Books. The other novels that appeared in that compilation (The Long Walk, Roadwork, and The Running Man) are now published as separate books in the USA.
3. My Pretty Pony by Stephen King (*1947) Knopf; New York, NY, 1989 Stainless Steel, First Edition 100 pages. 35 X 24 cm "My Pretty Pony" is a short story written by Stephen King and illustrated by the artist Barbara Kruger. It was the sixth publication in the Whitney Museum of American Art artist and writer series. An original limited artist edition of 250 was published in 1989 and was an oversized fine press slip-cased book with stainless steel faced boards and digital clock inset into the front cover. A trade edition of 15,000 was later published by Alfred A. Knopf and was later included in King's collection Nightmares & Dreamscapes.
4. The Harvard Classics edited by Charles W. Eliot (1869-1909) Easton Press; Norwalk, CT, 1993 Full Leather, Reprinted 50 v. ; 23 cm The Harvard Classics, originally known as Dr. Eliot's Five Foot Shelf, is a 51-volume anthology of classic works from world literature, compiled and edited by Harvard University president Charles W. Eliot and first published in 1909. It has been republished a number of times over the past century, including the latest publication which was by the Easton Press in 1993, which is currently out of print.
5. On the Nature and Existence of God by Richard M. Gale (*1932) Cambridge University Press; Norwalk, CT, 1999 Paperback, Reprinted 422 p. ; 23 cm. First published in 1991 this is Richard Gale's critical response to the plethora of defences of theism published in the 1980s. While this book out of print, currently it is also available as a print on demand edition.
6. Promise me tomorrow by Nora Roberts (*1950) Pocket Books; New York, NY 1984 Paperback, First Edition 296 p. ; 18 cm. Described by some as the worst thing Nora Roberts ever wrote, Promise me Tomorrow has been out of print since this first publication, and will probably stay that way for the rest of eternity. Roberts has gone on record to say that this novel is so bad that she will never allow it to be republished, and that her fans should probably avoid it. That however has not stopped this novel from being a mainstay on the BookFinder.com Report, or from completest collectors regularly paying over $100 to aquire a copy.
7. The Jerusalem Bible by Salvador Dali (1904-1989) Doubleday; Garden City, NY, 1970 Full-Leather, First Edition 353 pages. 32 x 24 cm, thirty-two full-page color plates by Dali. The Jerusalem Bible (first published in 1966) was the first truly modern Bible for Catholics. The translation itself uses a literal approach that has been admired for its literary qualities, perhaps in part due to its most famous contributor, J.R.R. Tolkien (his primary contribution was the translation of Jonah) The Jerusalem Bible was the first widely accepted Roman Catholic English translation of the Bible since the Douay-Rheims Version of the 17th century.
8. A Treasury of Great Recipes by Mary and Vincent Price (1911-1993) G.P. Putnam's Sons; New York, NY, 1983 Hardcover, Reprinted 488 pages; 29 cm. First published in 1965 A Treasury of Great Recipes highlights one of Vincent Price's greatest loves in life, food. More than a celebrity cookbook A Treasury of Great Recipes captures an entire lifestyle -- the Postwar, globe-trotting, Pan Am, waiters in bow ties, gourmet lifestyle. What makes this book great is that Vincent was not only a food lover but actually a gourmet cook who had his own cooking show which aired in Britain called "Cooking Pricewise." This book features all of the Vincent and hiw wife's favourite recipes, collected from their many trips around the globe.
9. Mandingo by Kyle Onstott (1887-1966) Ballentine; New York, NY, 1983 Paperback, Reprinted 639 pages; 18 cm. First published in 1957 the novel is set in the 1830s on a fictional plantation in Alabama. The story centers around the plantation's owner, his son, and a Mandinka (aka Mandingo) slave named Ganymede and is a tale of the cruelty suffered by African Americans in this time. The book was the basis for a 1975 film by the same name.
10. The Centurions by Jean Lartéguy (1920-2011) Dutton; New York, NY, 1961 Paperback, First Edition 487 pages; 21 cm First published in France in 1960, translated into English in 1961 by Xan Fielding, the novel is the first known work to use the "ticking time bomb" scenario in which the argument is brought up that a person or nation could justify the torture of a terrorist if they possess critical knowledge of a bomb or weapon which will soon explode and cause a great loss of life. There has been renewed interst in the novel in recent years as the use of torture in counter-terrorism has become a more regular topic of debate.

 

Top 100 most sought after out-of-print books in 2013

11	Norman F. Dixon	On the Psychology of Military Incompetence
12	A.C.H. Smith	Labyrinth: A Novel
13	Nan Gilbert	365 Bedtime Stories
14	Stuart Chase	The Road We are Travelling, 1914-1942: Guide lines to America's Future
15	Cristina de Middel	The Afronauts
16	Stephen King	The Body
17	Joseph Zbukvic	Mastering Atmosphere & Mood in Watercolor
18	Anne Golon	The Angelique Series
19	Carl Sagan	Murmurs of Earth
20	Janet Woods	Beyond the Plough

21	James Virgil Howe	The Modern Gunsmith : a guide for the amateur and professional gunsmith in the design and construction of firearms, with practical suggestions for all who like guns
22	Virginia Williams	A Different Kind of Life
23	Sid Watkins	Life at the Limit: Triumph and Tragedy in Formula One
24	Bill Walsh	Finding the Winning Edge
25	Ricky Jay	Cards As Weapons
26	John Blockley	Country Landscapes in Watercolor
27	Allen Drury	Advise and Consent
28	Ray Bradbury	Dark Carnival
29	Anne Alexander	The Pink Dress
30	Mary Konior	A Pattern Book of Tatting

31	Tony Kosten	The French Advance
32	John Ross	Unintended Consequences
33	J.R. Hartley	Fly Fishing: Memories of Angling Days
34	Martin Caidin	Cyborg
35	Linda Dawson & Terry Furchgott	Phoebe and the Hot Water Bottles
36	Ray Garton	In a Dark Place: The Story of a True Haunting
37	Arthur Hailey	Airport
38	Ivy Wallace	Mediumship Made Simple
39	Donald Gaskins & Wilton Earle	Final Truth: The Autobiography of Mass Murderer/Serial Killer Donald 'Pee Wee' Gaskins
40	John Birchard	Make Your Own Handcrafted Doors and Windows

41	Madeleine L'Engle	Ilsa
42	Charles W. Clawson	Collector's Guide to Colt. 45 Service Pistols
43	Lynne Cheney	Sisters
44	Peter Dombrovskis	On the Mountain
45	Betty MacDonald	Anybody Can Do Anything
46	David Pelham	Sam's Sandwich
47	Bill Watson	Floatmaker's Manual: Expert Methods for the Practical Angler
48	Harley Brown	Confessions of a Starving Artist: The Art and Life of Harley Brown
49	Jack Hamm	First Lessons in Painting and Drawing
50	R.P. Hunnicutt	Stuart: A History of the American Light Tank

51	John Harris	Covenant with death
52	Cameron Crowe	Fast Times at Ridgemont High
53	Paul Hoffman	To Drop a Dime
54	Julia Overend	Hello Baby
55	Walt Kelly	I Go Pogo
56	Les Dane	Big League Sales Closing Techniques
57	Kyle Onstott	DRUM
58	Charles W. Clawson	Colt .45 Government Models
59	Donald Hamilton	The Big Country
60	Clancy Holling	Book of Indians

61	Ruth Orbach	Apple Pigs
62	M.G. Say	Alternating Current Machines
63	Gregoiro F. Zaide	Jose Rizal: Life, Works, and Writings of Genius, Writer, Scientist, and National Hero
64	Maisie Mosco	Almonds and Raisins
65	Mary Konior	Crochet Lace: An Illustrated Guide to Making Crochet Lace Fabrics
66	Barbara Brackman	Encyclopedia of Pieced Quilt Patterns
67	John D. Green	Birds of Britain
68	Jack S. Levy	War in the Modern Great Power System, 1495-1975
69	Norman Rockwell	102 favorite paintings
70	Arthur Koestler	The Act of Creation

71	David Wilkerson	The Vision and Beyond, prophecies fulfilled and still to come
72	Elmer Keith	Hell, I Was There
73	Jack Handford	Professional Pattern Grading for Women's, Men's, and Children's Apparel
74	Jay Cronley	Good Vibes
75	Betty Feezor	Betty Feezor's Carolina Recipes
76	H.W. Janson	History of Art
77	Don Graf	Basic Building Data: 10,000 Timeless Construction Facts
78	Truda Williams McCoy; Leonard Roberts	McCoys: their story as told to the author by eye witnesses and descendants
79	Arthur Upfield	The Barrakee Mystery
80	Oliver Strange	The Law o' the Lariat

81	Garry Winogrand	Women Are Beautiful
82	Charles Flato	The Golden Book of the Civil War
83	Ronald Welch	Bowman of Crecy
84	Kate Seredy	The Chestry Oak
85	Kyle Onstott & Lance Homer	The Black Sun
86	Stephen King	The Colorado Kid
87	Jan Wolkers	Turkish Delight
88	Sarah Bradford	Reluctant King: The Life and Reign of George VI, 1895-1952
89	Norman Thelwell	Angels on Horseback
90	Joseph McElroy	Women and Men

91	Kenneth Nathaniel Taylor	The Bible in Pictures for Little Eyes
92	Tom Lea	The King Ranch
93	Ivy Wallace	Pookie
94	Alan Brunacini	Fire Command: The Essentials of Local Ims
95	Arthur Bryant	Macauley
96	Watt Piper	The Bumper Book; a Harvest of Stories and Verses
97	Richard Rutt	A History of Hand Knitting
98	Richard Schmid	Alla Prima: Everything I Know about Painting
99	Rien Poortvliet	The Ark/Noah's Ark
100	Peter Popesko	Atlas of Topographical Anatomy of the Domestic Animals