By

Mark Jensen

This is Part Six of our Six Part Series on Magic Book Collecting. Once again, when I refer to book, I mean books, lecture notes and periodicals unless I state otherwise.

The Thrill of the Hunt

This can be the most rewarding and frustrating part of being a Magic Book Collector. There is nothing like the feeling you get when you find a book that you’ve been looking for whether it’s at a used book store, a magic dealer or a garage sale. The thrill is even sweeter if you manage to purchase the book for what you consider a very fair price. Of course the opposite is true when meet a friend coming out of a used book store and find out that they just bought a book on your list for $10, when you would have gladly paid $50 for it.

I have found books for my library at many places including:

• Used Book Stores – I found a soft copy of Ricky Jay’s Cards as Weapons in a Half Price Book Store in 1998 for only $2.49. It is very unusual to find what we would consider typical magic books, but they are a good source for many mass market books including the Mark Wilson Course in Magic and the Karl Fulves Self Working Books by Dover. You should have an idea what the books are worth before you go looking. Recently I saw Eugene Burger’s Experience of Magic at Half Price and they wanted more than retail for a book that is still available.
  
• Magic Flea Markets – A few years ago I was in Brussels and went to a local Magic Flea Market with Christian Chelman. As we walked from booth to booth visiting, Christian knelt down to go through a box of books. He stood up holding a book with its back to the seller and asked how much he wanted for it. The look on the guy’s face was priceless for he was staring at a large close-up of Christian’s face on the dust jacket, with Christian’s real face directly above it. Christian ended up buying his book, Capricorn Tales for $10 (which I highly recommend and it is now been reprinted – but don’t delay, last word is it’s almost out of print again. Of course I felt it was my duty to point out that I didn’t have his book and that if I’d been walking in front of him it would have been mine. That evening after dinner at his flat, I happened to mention how long the plane flight was back to the states and that I didn’t have a thing to read. Later Christian asked me if I had $10 he could borrow…vanished it, picked up the book, signed it and handed it to me. I read the book on the flight back home. It is one of my favorite books in my library. Thanks Christian…
  
• Magic Auctions – Sometimes you will find magic books, etc on estate auctions. While I didn’t get a book from the William Spencer Estate auction I did obtain what for me was a Holy Grail for my collection. I obtained a John Rogers Traveling Magician Statue. If interested in it, you can learn more about it on my website at: http://www.thats-impossible.com/collecting.htm
  
  I was also fortunate enough to obtain the Bob Karlebach Lecture Note Collection at the Lone Star Magic Auction in Fort Worth, Texas. Having known and attended many of the lectures that Bob sponsored over the years it is a real pleasure to have his collection as the center piece of my lecture note collection.
  

I could go on, but I think that you get the idea on how much fun collecting can be. Here are a few other tips for your hunt:

• Other Collectors – Meet and get to know other collectors, go to collecting conventions, etc. Often they will have a book you want and you’ll have a book they’ve been looking for. As they become friends, they may also give you a call when they come across a book they think you may be interested.
  
• EBAY, Online Book Searches, etc – You can often find books you’ve been looking for, unfortunately the books can go for more than they are worth and if you don’t know the seller, well as they say…Buyer Be Ware.
  
• Magic Shops – Please support your local dealers for books that are currently in print.

As you can imagine when you start to get a fairly large library it can be a challenge to remember every book you own. To help my aging memory I also purchased a REB 1200 e-book reader so that I can more easily determine if I have a book or not when I’m out shopping used book stores, etc. This helps me to avoid purchasing duplicate books and to determine whether the book I’m considering is an upgrade of what I may already have. I purchased my REB 1200 off EBAY for about $180 and highly recommend it.

Additional Information:

Here is a list of some of the sources I use for items listed in the articles.

Archival Supplies (Dust Jacket Protectors, Clam Shell boxes, etc) – Gaylord Bros http://www.gaylord.com/

REB 1200 Info: http://www.gemstar-ebook.com/ebcontent/supt/1200.asp

Until then…Happy Collecting.

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