Eaton Press, et al

Franklin goes to a writer - Nelson DeMille or Gore Vidal, and offers them
some cash if they allow their next book to be put out in a "limited
edition". Franklin then sells "memberships" so that members can or must
buy the next books to be released.

These are artificial "first editions", nicely bound in leather and tooled in
gold. But, they are not the limited boxed and signed books put out for
favourite writers by publishers (normally 250 or so)and the number of books
published is not released. Like trinkets at the mall, these are
manufactured collectibles and unworthy of any true collector, who always
goes for the first trade edition.

Some Franklins can be had for half the original price. Many at only the
original price at retail. I have yet to see one that has been read and
suspect that those who buy them also buy tooled books by the yard.

Eaton pRESS DOES THE TOOLED BOUND BOOKS, NOT TO THE SAME POSH DEGREE, AND
NORMALLY CLASSICS WHERE NOT RIGHTS ARE INVOLVED. aNOTEHR ONE IS heRON,
FORMERLY PUBLISHED IN THE uk, THAT DID BOUND MATCHED SETS OF aGATHA
cHRISTIE, wILBER sMITH AND CLASSICS AS WELL.

Willow


"michael adams" <mjadams25.DeleteThis@onetel.net.uk> wrote in message
news:429j67F1hur0pU1@individual.net...
>
> "mdobson" <msdobson.DeleteThis@sbcglobal.net> wrote in message
> news:6qdur1lo4h3uh26fs12m3j7dplt0954i9v@4ax.com...
> > Hi,
> >
> > New to the hobby.
> >
> > I see a lot of books on eBay with the preface "Eaton Press" and
> > "Franklin Library."
> >
> > Are these the modern day version of the Reader's Digest books?
> >
> > Cheers,
> >
> > Mike
>
> ...
>
> Nope. Readers Digest Books are usually condensed versions of
> popular books - the editorial content has been changed.
>
> Both Eaton Press and Franklin Library publish standard editions
> of mainly classic works - in other words not just current
> bestsellers - in modern day "deluxe" leather bindings.
>
> Some of the editions may have additional introductions, or other
> editorial matter, by reputable authorities.
>
> Some people buy these books for their content, as the easiest way
> of purchasing a favourite text in a nice binding - especially if
> the book has been out of print for years, and pristine second-hand
> copies are very scarce, or prohibitively expensive. Some buyers
> commit to buying extensive collections of these books.
>
> There is a secondhand and collectors' market in these books, but
> as with all items deliberately pitched at a collectors market -
> as opposed to material people decide to start collecting
> years after it was made simply for use - such as antique furniture -
> there can be a very large mark-up when buying new directly
> from the publisher.
>
> Although the leather binding used isn't done using the traditional
> methods, and so doesn't necessarily have the same quality or durability
> as traditional leather bindings, these books would probably be quite
> acceptable for someone wanting a nice copy of a text. As the basis
> for a collection of a particular authors' works for instance.
> As an investment, even buying pristine second-hand copies at a 75%
> discount on new - provided you could find them - it's doubtful if
> they'd work out very profitable in the long run as many purchasers
> will have kept them in pristine condition themselves, wrongly believing
> them to be an "investment".
>
> Also a lot of these books can be marketed as sets - as with the author
> collection mentioned above, and so this is possibly something to be
> aware of when buying single titles. Whether its part of a set or
> not, and whether this is stated inside of the book itself.
>
>
> michael adams
>
> ...
>
>
>
 >> Stay informed about: Eaton Press, et al 

on Sun, 08 Jan 2006 06:51:17 GMT, Willow Arune stated:

>Some Franklins can be had for half the original price. Many at only the
>original price at retail. I have yet to see one that has been read and
>suspect that those who buy them also buy tooled books by the yard.

Hey! I resemble that remark!

I was very amused several years ago on this topic; I'd been
browsing through old Victorian literature for a time, looking
for those books that would look nice on my shelves but not
quite admitting to myself that I was so shallow as to buy
books for my living room for their looks, rather than their
content. Then I found out that my mother has a complete set
of Shakespeare, nicely bound in red leather with gilt titles,
etc., with my great-grandfather's name also stamped on the
spines in gilt. IIRC, at this point only two of the volumes
have had their pages cut - one that my mother read many years
ago, and one that I read more recently.

Great-grandad bought books by the yard. Whaddya know. We
also have a photo of him with an impressive mustache; my
sister thinks of him as incurably vain - he apparently grew
the mustache for the picture, and then shaved it off. Mind
you, he was actually an impressive person. They still talk
about him in some South American high-mountain town where he
put the only railroad access in, and he also put railroads
throughout much of Western Canada.

But I was pretty amused that he'd been collecting books by
the yard, and haven't hesitated since to do so myself.

Well, I won't exactly spend a lot of money on it, mind, and
I'd like the books to have some sort of content that I might
want to read someday. I've bought, over the years, 11
volumes of Gryphon Edition Classics of Medicine library,
most at the bottom end of the price range so that I might
even be able to sell them again without a loss (including
the postage I paid). I don't think of them as brilliant
investments, but they might be tolerable. Mostly they look
nice on the shelf, and might be useful. Two of them, in
fact, are books I very much want in my collection, and
which I'd never be able to afford as originals (Withering's
_An Account of the Foxglove_ and Cullen's _Materia Medica_,
both of which are classics for those of us studying/teaching/
etc. botanical medicine).


I see various volumes from CoM on eBay a lot, for prices
ranging from ~$10 to ~$50 or more, and I'll buy them at the
bottom end of the range if someone else doesn't outbid me.
I don't know what their price new was; does anyone else?

Mostly, though, I prefer the originals. What is it about
the new leather bindings from these "collector" editions
makes them inferior to a well-bound older leather book?


-Allison
 >> Stay informed about: Eaton Press, et al 

Willow Arune wrote:
> "michael adams" wrote...
>>"mdobson" wrote...
>>>
>>>I see a lot of books on eBay with the preface "Eaton Press"...
>>
>>Both Eaton Press and Franklin Library publish standard editions...
>
> Eaton pRESS DOES THE TOOLED BOUND BOOKS...


Easton


--Jon Meyers
 >> Stay informed about: Eaton Press, et al 

<As an investment, even buying pristine second-hand copies at a 75%discount
on new - provided you could find them - it's doubtful if they'd work out
very profitable in the long run as many purchasers
will have kept them in pristine condition themselves, <wrongly believing
them to be an "investment".

Spoken like a true novice. I laughed all the way to the bank after I paid
$79 apiece for a bunch of Easton Press editions signed by Mandela and Reagan
and then sold them for thousands apiece. The Easton Press put my son
through Harvard.
 >> Stay informed about: Eaton Press, et al 

on Sun, 8 Jan 2006 12:18:54 -0800, bookstore stated:
>
><As an investment, even buying pristine second-hand copies at a 75%discount
>on new - provided you could find them - it's doubtful if they'd work out
>very profitable in the long run as many purchasers
>will have kept them in pristine condition themselves, <wrongly believing
>them to be an "investment".
>
>Spoken like a true novice. I laughed all the way to the bank after I paid
>$79 apiece for a bunch of Easton Press editions signed by Mandela and Reagan
>and then sold them for thousands apiece. The Easton Press put my son
>through Harvard.

Well, perhaps it was the signatures, rather than the
books themselves. Or you found some astoundingly
gullible buyers.

I have a copy of Jane Eyre on my shelf, Easton Press,
that I got several years back at a bookstore in trade
for probably 30 or so books I didn't want (I was moving;
better to move one book than 30). I like the way it
looks, and I've read it (or perhaps I read a cheap
paperback edition), but I don't think it's worth any
thousand bucks.

Looking at ebay, there are currently a handful for sale,
and of ended listings there are four in the last week:
$16 to $41. The high-end one is "mint" according to the
seller; the $16 one is damaged.

Doesn't look like they're anywhere near worth $79 each,
let alone any more than that.

Who are you trying to kid?


-at
 >> Stay informed about: Eaton Press, et al 

There are a small number of the Easton Press science fiction line which
are notable because they are the first hardback editions of works
previously done only in paperback. Examples include Lois McMaster
Bujold's Barrayar and The Vor Game (both Hugo winners, and both quite
valuable), F. Paul Wilson's Dydeetown World, and a few others. Others
can be valuable due to the signature of a reclusive or dead author. But
the vast majority of un-signed Easton Press books will lose value over
time.

Lawrence Person
Lame Excuse Books
Stock available online at www.tomfolio.com (searched by
www.bookfinder.com), or at: http://home.austin.rr.com/lperson/lame.html
 >> Stay informed about: Eaton Press, et al 

Allison Turner- wrote:
> bookstore stated:
>> Willow Arune wrote...
>
>>>As an investment, even buying pristine second-hand copies at a 75%discount
>>>on new - provided you could find them - it's doubtful if they'd work out
>>>very profitable in the long run...
>>
>>Spoken like a true novice. I laughed all the way to the bank after I paid
>>$79 apiece for a bunch of Easton Press editions signed by Mandela and Reagan
>>and then sold them for thousands apiece. The Easton Press put my son
>>through Harvard.
>
>
> Well, perhaps it was the signatures, rather than the
> books themselves.


Exactly: Guaranteed specimens of the signatures of world leaders. I
would guess that the Mandela is genuine & a particularly tough find, but
the Reagan is probably an AutoPen sig.


--Jon Meyers
 >> Stay informed about: Eaton Press, et al 

Jon Meyers wrote:
> Allison Turner- wrote:
>
>> bookstore stated:
>
> >> Willow Arune wrote...

No, "michael adams wrote..."
Sorry, Michael: Wanting to add an attribution to the unattributed
material in the previous post, I misread the thread sequence.


>>
>>>> As an investment, even buying pristine second-hand copies at a
>>>> 75%discount
>>>> on new - provided you could find them - it's doubtful if they'd work
>>>> out
>>>> very profitable in the long run...
[snip]
 >> Stay informed about: Eaton Press, et al 

"Willow Arune" <arune1529.DeleteThis@shaw.ca> wrote in message
news:FD2wf.41013$tl.24142@pd7tw3no...

> Franklin goes to a writer - Nelson DeMille or Gore Vidal,

That's rather a bizarre sample set of authors; it runs the gamut from Gay to
B list.


> and offers them
> some cash if they allow their next book to be put out in a "limited
> edition". Franklin then sells "memberships" so that members can or must
> buy the next books to be released.
>
> These are artificial "first editions", nicely bound in leather and tooled
> in
> gold. But, they are not the limited boxed and signed books put out for
> favourite writers by publishers (normally 250 or so)and the number of
> books
> published is not released. Like trinkets at the mall, these are
> manufactured collectibles and unworthy of any true collector, who always
> goes for the first trade edition.
>
> Some Franklins can be had for half the original price. Many at only the
> original price at retail. I have yet to see one that has been read and
> suspect that those who buy them also buy tooled books by the yard.
>
> Eaton pRESS DOES THE TOOLED BOUND BOOKS, NOT TO THE SAME POSH DEGREE, AND
> NORMALLY CLASSICS WHERE NOT RIGHTS ARE INVOLVED. aNOTEHR ONE IS heRON,
> FORMERLY PUBLISHED IN THE uk, THAT DID BOUND MATCHED SETS OF aGATHA
> cHRISTIE, wILBER sMITH AND CLASSICS AS WELL.
>
> Willow
>
>
> "michael adams" <mjadams25.DeleteThis@onetel.net.uk> wrote in message
> news:429j67F1hur0pU1@individual.net...
>>
>> "mdobson" <msdobson.DeleteThis@sbcglobal.net> wrote in message
>> news:6qdur1lo4h3uh26fs12m3j7dplt0954i9v@4ax.com...
>> > Hi,
>> >
>> > New to the hobby.
>> >
>> > I see a lot of books on eBay with the preface "Eaton Press" and
>> > "Franklin Library."
>> >
>> > Are these the modern day version of the Reader's Digest books?
>> >
>> > Cheers,
>> >
>> > Mike
>>
>> ...
>>
>> Nope. Readers Digest Books are usually condensed versions of
>> popular books - the editorial content has been changed.
>>
>> Both Eaton Press and Franklin Library publish standard editions
>> of mainly classic works - in other words not just current
>> bestsellers - in modern day "deluxe" leather bindings.
>>
>> Some of the editions may have additional introductions, or other
>> editorial matter, by reputable authorities.
>>
>> Some people buy these books for their content, as the easiest way
>> of purchasing a favourite text in a nice binding - especially if
>> the book has been out of print for years, and pristine second-hand
>> copies are very scarce, or prohibitively expensive. Some buyers
>> commit to buying extensive collections of these books.
>>
>> There is a secondhand and collectors' market in these books, but
>> as with all items deliberately pitched at a collectors market -
>> as opposed to material people decide to start collecting
>> years after it was made simply for use - such as antique furniture -
>> there can be a very large mark-up when buying new directly
>> from the publisher.
>>
>> Although the leather binding used isn't done using the traditional
>> methods, and so doesn't necessarily have the same quality or durability
>> as traditional leather bindings, these books would probably be quite
>> acceptable for someone wanting a nice copy of a text. As the basis
>> for a collection of a particular authors' works for instance.
>> As an investment, even buying pristine second-hand copies at a 75%
>> discount on new - provided you could find them - it's doubtful if
>> they'd work out very profitable in the long run as many purchasers
>> will have kept them in pristine condition themselves, wrongly believing
>> them to be an "investment".
>>
>> Also a lot of these books can be marketed as sets - as with the author
>> collection mentioned above, and so this is possibly something to be
>> aware of when buying single titles. Whether its part of a set or
>> not, and whether this is stated inside of the book itself.
>>
>>
>> michael adams
>>
>> ...
>>
>>
>>
>
>
 >> Stay informed about: Eaton Press, et al 

Well, some sell snake oil at a massive profit too. .. Bridges too...

With one born every minute, Easton and others like yourself will profit.
But the poor fool that buys from you will not. In fact, I believe several
well known bookstore types have written of the lack of collectablity of
these books. They are ego books, much as the "by the yard" books mentioned
by another post.

To get to the point, assume you bought one for $79 and sold it for $1000.
What happens then? I would bet the real first edition, the trade edition,
would go up and up. The one you sold to the sucker would have to be sold
for less than half the price you sold it for.

Certainly the signatures have value - if they are signatures and not
"writing machine" prepared. But to me, any "made to be a collectible"
simply is not.

Willow








"bookstore" <nada.DeleteThis@blog.spam.net> wrote in message
news:zomdnSwxP9so11zeRVn-pA@bright.net...
> <As an investment, even buying pristine second-hand copies at a
75%discount
> on new - provided you could find them - it's doubtful if they'd work out
> very profitable in the long run as many purchasers
> will have kept them in pristine condition themselves, <wrongly believing
> them to be an "investment".
>
> Spoken like a true novice. I laughed all the way to the bank after I paid
> $79 apiece for a bunch of Easton Press editions signed by Mandela and
Reagan
> and then sold them for thousands apiece. The Easton Press put my son
> through Harvard.
>
>
 >> Stay informed about: Eaton Press, et al 

No need to hesitate. Do as you like, and do what keeps you happy. But
buying books for how they look is not the way I wish to go...

TTFN,
Willow


"Allison Turner-" <betonica DeleteThis @sover.net> wrote in message
news:dprelk02ifu@drn.newsguy.com...
> on Sun, 08 Jan 2006 06:51:17 GMT, Willow Arune stated:
>
> >Some Franklins can be had for half the original price. Many at only the
> >original price at retail. I have yet to see one that has been read and
> >suspect that those who buy them also buy tooled books by the yard.
>
> Hey! I resemble that remark!
>
> I was very amused several years ago on this topic; I'd been
> browsing through old Victorian literature for a time, looking
> for those books that would look nice on my shelves but not
> quite admitting to myself that I was so shallow as to buy
> books for my living room for their looks, rather than their
> content. Then I found out that my mother has a complete set
> of Shakespeare, nicely bound in red leather with gilt titles,
> etc., with my great-grandfather's name also stamped on the
> spines in gilt. IIRC, at this point only two of the volumes
> have had their pages cut - one that my mother read many years
> ago, and one that I read more recently.
>
> Great-grandad bought books by the yard. Whaddya know. We
> also have a photo of him with an impressive mustache; my
> sister thinks of him as incurably vain - he apparently grew
> the mustache for the picture, and then shaved it off. Mind
> you, he was actually an impressive person. They still talk
> about him in some South American high-mountain town where he
> put the only railroad access in, and he also put railroads
> throughout much of Western Canada.
>
> But I was pretty amused that he'd been collecting books by
> the yard, and haven't hesitated since to do so myself.
>
> Well, I won't exactly spend a lot of money on it, mind, and
> I'd like the books to have some sort of content that I might
> want to read someday. I've bought, over the years, 11
> volumes of Gryphon Edition Classics of Medicine library,
> most at the bottom end of the price range so that I might
> even be able to sell them again without a loss (including
> the postage I paid). I don't think of them as brilliant
> investments, but they might be tolerable. Mostly they look
> nice on the shelf, and might be useful. Two of them, in
> fact, are books I very much want in my collection, and
> which I'd never be able to afford as originals (Withering's
> _An Account of the Foxglove_ and Cullen's _Materia Medica_,
> both of which are classics for those of us studying/teaching/
> etc. botanical medicine).
>
>
> I see various volumes from CoM on eBay a lot, for prices
> ranging from ~$10 to ~$50 or more, and I'll buy them at the
> bottom end of the range if someone else doesn't outbid me.
> I don't know what their price new was; does anyone else?
>
> Mostly, though, I prefer the originals. What is it about
> the new leather bindings from these "collector" editions
> makes them inferior to a well-bound older leather book?
>
>
> -Allison
>
 >> Stay informed about: Eaton Press, et al 

"Jon Meyers" <stlouisTAKEbooks RemoveThis @MEcharter.OUTnet> wrote in message
news:2gewf.1240$n34.324@fe03.lga...
> Jon Meyers wrote:
> > Allison Turner- wrote:
> >
> >> bookstore stated:
> >
> > >> Willow Arune wrote...
>
> No, "michael adams wrote..."
> Sorry, Michael: Wanting to add an attribution to the unattributed
> material in the previous post, I misread the thread sequence.


No problem Jon: given I totally confused Easton Press and
Franklin Library I think I've got of pretty lightly.

michael adams

....

>
>
> >>
> >>>> As an investment, even buying pristine second-hand copies at a
> >>>> 75%discount
> >>>> on new - provided you could find them - it's doubtful if they'd work
> >>>> out
> >>>> very profitable in the long run...
> [snip]
 >> Stay informed about: Eaton Press, et al 

on Sun, 8 Jan 2006 21:09:42 -0000, michael adams stated:
>
>
>"Jon Meyers" <stlouisTAKEbooks.TakeThisOut@MEcharter.OUTnet> wrote in message
>news:2gewf.1240$n34.324@fe03.lga...
>> Jon Meyers wrote:
>> > Allison Turner- wrote:
>> >
>> >> bookstore stated:
>> >
>> > >> Willow Arune wrote...
>>
>> No, "michael adams wrote..."
>> Sorry, Michael: Wanting to add an attribution to the unattributed
>> material in the previous post, I misread the thread sequence.
>
>
>No problem Jon: given I totally confused Easton Press and
>Franklin Library I think I've got of pretty lightly.

Is there a big difference between them, and the rest of
the pretty leather reprint houses? I have a tendency
to shy away from Franklin Library, having seen faaar too
many Franklin Mint 'collectible' coins in my youth.
Cheap buncha garbage. But that doesn't mean the books
are any worse (or better) than Easton, Gryphon, or
whoever. Anyone have anything to say on the relative
quality? Or do y'all mostly just ignore all of them?

-Allison
 >> Stay informed about: Eaton Press, et al