Rare Book Monthly

print Send Email to Friend Change Font Size Share Link

Articles - September - 2008 Issue

BookFinder Announces the Most Sought After Books of the Year

- by Michael Stillman


There is another repeat atop the Top 10 for Crafts, Hobbies and How-To. This is Steve Belichick's Football Scouting Methods. Three hundred pound men attempting to crush each others' skulls is an odd craft or hobby, but enormously popular in America, especially when viewed on TV from the safety of your living room. Runners-up include two titles about knitting, and the ever popular Woodwork Joints by Charles Hayward. Further down the list we find more works on knitting, backpacking, magic, and returning to the Top 10 after a year's absence, horror actor Vincent Price and his wife Mary's A Treasury of Great Recipes. Where better to add a touch of arsenic?

There are no changes atop the list for Fiction and Literature this year. Once again, John L. Parker's tome on running, Once A Runner, is number 1, again followed by Nora Roberts' Promise Me Tomorrow. New at number 10 is the Autobiography of Howard Hughes, one of those rare autobiographies not written by its subject. The whole thing was a fraud perpetrated by Clifford Irving.

In History, last year's number 1 was the story of a short-lived Manhattan Restaurant - Flash in the Pan, by David Blum (now number 4). This year it is the story of a New Orleans hotel famed for fine cuisine: French Quarter Royalty: The Tumultuous Life and Times of the Omni Royal Orleans Hotel, by food writer John DeMers. Runner-up is Tom Lea's 50-year-old book about South Texas' enormous King Ranch, larger than the state of Rhode Island.

Four other categories of books are listed, with the top sought books ranging from Carl Sagan's musings on space to Lindsey Williams' conspiracy theories of The Energy Non-Crisis, that claims there is 200 years worth of oil and gas readily available in Alaska. For a complete look at these interesting lists, go to http://report.bookfinder.com/2008.

Rare Book Monthly

  • ALDE, Apr. 8: GUEVARA (ANTONIO DE). Histoire de Marc-Aurèle, Empereur Romain, vray miroir et horloge des Princes. Paris, Pierre et Galliot du Pré, frères, 1565. €3,000 to €4,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: HEURES DE LA VIERGE. Horæ in laudem beatissimæ virginis Mariæ ad usum Romanum. Paris, Charles L'Angelier, 1556. €4,000 to €5,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: MONTAIGNE (MICHEL DE). Les Essais. Édition nouvelle, trouvée après le deceds de l'autheur… Paris, Abel L'Angelier, 1595. €6,000 to €8,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: [ROJAS (FERNANDO DE)]. Celestina, tragicomedia di Calisto et Melibea, tradotta de lingua castigliana in italiano idioma… Venise, 1531. €2,000 to €3,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: CAMÕES (LUÍS DE). Os Lusiadas. Lisbonne, Pedro Crasbeeck, 1613. €2,000 to €3,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: CERVANTES (MIGUEL DE). El Ingenioso hidalgo Don Quixote de la Mancha. Bruxelles, Roger Velpius & Huberto Antonio, 1611. €6,000 to €8,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: LA FONTAINE (JEAN DE). Fables choisies, mises en vers. Paris, Denys Thierry et Claude Barbin, 1678-1694. €6,000 to €8,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: CERVANTES (MIGUEL DE). El Ingenioso hidalgo Don Quixote de la Mancha. Madrid, Joaquin Ibarra, 1780. €3,000 to €4,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: DIDEROT (DENIS) ET JEAN LE ROND D'ALEMBERT. Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers. Paris, 1751-1765. €15,000 to €20,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: [LIVRE TISSÉ]. LAMARTINE (Alphonse de). Les Laboureurs. Poème tiré de Jocelyn… Lyon, J. A. Henry, 1883. €8,000 to €10,000.
    ALDE, Apr. 8: [LIVRE TISSÉ]. Livre de prières tissé d'après les enluminures des manuscrits du XIVe au XVIe siècle. Lyon, [A. Roux], 1886. €5,000 to €6,000.
  • Sotheby’s
    Books, Manuscripts & Objects from Three Important Collections
    Open for Bidding 2-17 April
    Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: [Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun]. Le Roman de la Rose, [Geneva or Lyons, c.1481], first printed edition of the most important medieval French vernacular poem. £200,000 to £300,000.
    Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: Castiglione. Il libro del cortegiano. [Venice], April 1528, first edition, in a magnificent binding by Jean Picard for Jean Grolier. £100,000 to £150,000.
    Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: Jacobus de Cessolis. Schachzabelbuch, Strasbourg, 1483, von der Lasa copy. £50,000 to £70,000.
    Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: World Championship, 1972. A collection of 84 press photographs of the famed match between Spassky and Fischer. £2,000 to £3,000.
    Sotheby’s, Apr. 2-17: Ben Franklin. Autograph letter signed, to Lord Shelburne, British Prime Minister, during peace negotiations, November 1782. £15,000 to £20,000.

Article Search

Archived Articles