The Mansion's Misfits

I collect old books. Mostly turn of the century stuff published between 1870 and 1920. My parents did too. They emassed a collection of books somewhere in the thousands. They got them out of abandoned houses, at auctions, as gifts and at every antique store on the east coast. My dad cleaned out his house after the divorce and I got some of the books. I planned to keep the good ones and hopefully sell some of the ones I didn’t have room for. For the past several days I have been researching the different titles and publishing dates to see how much they’re worth, usually it’s somewhere between $15-$50 so I’m not getting rich off it any time soon. I encountered this book:

Beautiful, right? Screams late Victorian period opulence. Definitely keeping it. I check for an owner’s name or little note on the title page, I love books that were Christmas gifts long ago. Instead I find this:

A gift for a student as an award for her academic success. From either 1875 or 1895. Very fucking cool. I search for the Chatsworth Institute of Baltimore Maryland in hopes that I am holding a significant piece of history in my hands. No such Institute has ever existed in Baltimore, none. Not historically, not currently. There is a Chatsworth school in Maryland but it’s a contemporary public school. I cannot find record of this school anywhere online, there is nothing left behind, it must have been a formal school to afford to give awards. There should be some trace of it. It’s like this book came from an alternate universe.

Let’s go to the title page:

Beautifully illustrated by a W Cunston or W Gunston. Neither name being up anyone. The name of the author of this book is nowhere to be seen. The publisher is London based and mostly published childrens books (including the words of Beatrice Potter) and that is the only concrete fact I can get. Googling “Eilon Manor” and “The Four Sisters” brings up very little. I sift and I find a book called Eilon Manor published in 1863. Like Baptista, it’s an incredibly boring piece of literature for Victorian young women. The author is listed as D. Richard, no first name, no gender, no location. D. Richard does not seem to exist either.

Let’s say you need an outdated queer theory textbook that uses biphobic and cissexist rhetoric for your gender studies thesis, but you don’t particularly want to own that book.

Let’s say you need a primary source to strengthen your argument to your college as to why a certain political figure does not deserve to be a speaker at your graduation because they perpetuate hate speech.

Let’s say you and your friends want to hateread a book by your least favorite author but you don’t want to give him your money.

And I found one in the college library.  An original slave-owner’s apologia from eighteen hundred or so.

Nasty stuff.  But studying the mechanics of evil is a useful pursuit.  One that has relevance in today’s world, certainly.

(My African-American Studies professor thought so too; he gave me an A.)

The point being, no matter how bad a book is, there is value in preserving it—if only to demonstrate, “This, this right here, this is a bad thing.“  Mein Kampf?  Worth picking through to note the psychology of a depraved leader.  (Did you know that Hitler framed every damn thing as a war, including farming, which he characterized as wrestling food from an unwilling land, or some such bullshit?  Might be a characteristic worth paying attention to.  Be cautious about leaders who use “war” rhetoric for things that aren’t actually wars, such as … oh, to pull an example out of a hat, how about “drugs.”)  Slavery apologia?  Leans heavily into Biblical justification, from the one I read, so maybe, just maybe, we should examine Biblical justifications very carefully.  Even the worst stuff teaches us things.

Do you like books!?

OF COURSE YOU DO

Do you like reading books?

DUUUUUH!

Do you collect books and let them sit on your shelf!?

WHAT IS THIS!? AMATEUR hOUR? OF FUCKING COURSE! 

Do you spend WAAAAAAY too much money on books even though they’re totally worth it but holy fucking shit fifteen dollars is the median and why is the world so effortlessly cruel?

Who’s got two thumbs and an empty wallet! Yes yes and yes!

WELL HAVE I GOT A SOLUTION FOR YOU

Thriftbooks is an amazing online site that sells used books! These books are, for the most part, in great condition. I’ve used this website for everything from textbooks to fiction to everything else in between! It has a wide selection with an even wider selection of options per book!

You want softcover? They’ve got it! Hardcover? Of course! Audio? Why not!

Hell! They even sell the books in other languages!

You might say to me, humanity, why are you telling us this? We already have barnes and noble!

Because, my poor, naive friend, thriftbooks sells the majority of it’s books for under four dollars.

That’s right. You heard me. Under. Four. Dollars.

And right now, they’re having a huge deal!

2 books for $7

3 books for $10

4 books for $12

But wait! There’s more!

If you leave a book in your cart for long enough, chances are you’ll be alerted when a seller nearby, for a cheaper price, has the same book! You’ll get it cheaper and faster, with less waste of paper and time!

And prices change! That book that would have cost you $3.79 one day might be $3.45 the next, and man oh man isn’t that the best thing to see when you check up on your cart.

So what are you waiting for, book lovers! Go! Go shop!

Go and rule the world!

AND THAT EVER $50 YOU SPEND THEY GIVE YOU $5 BACK.

guys

five dollars

on this site

is a book

that is the cost of an entire book

So to prove my very real point, I went to Barnes and Noble and picked out some of my favorites books that I already have on my shelves

(also, fyi, y’all should read these they’re bangin)

AND BECAUSE THE SHIPPING IS SO INSANE, IT WAS MEAN TO COME OUT TO $47.85 (and that’s at an online price, which discounts by a few dollars)

But with shipping, handling, and the extreme cost of books, my total came to this:

$72.30

Okay. Then I went onto thriftbooks and chose the same books in the same formats (hardcover, softcover, etc.)

Keep in mind that not all books are under $4 due to size, availability, how new they are to the world yada yadayada

But this was the final shopping cart.

Look.

Look at those lovely books.

My final check out price?

$21.86

AND THAT DOESN’T INCLUDE ANY OF THE AMAZING DISCOUNTS, DEALS, AND/OR PROMO CODES.

If you do the math, I saved $50.44.

And even if Barnes and Noble had given me that free shipping, I still would have saved $25.99. Do you know what that could buy you? That could buy you four more books on thriftbooks!

Thriftbooks fucking saved my broke college ass. And I’d encourage you all to use it if you can. Shipping may take 4-14 days, but I swear to god it’s worth every dollar that I would have burned. 

THIS IS IN NO WAY AN ENCOURAGEMENT TO STOP SHOPPING AT BOOKSTORES. PLEASE DON’T. LOCAL BOOKSTORES ARE IMPORTANT AND VITAL AND SHOULD BE SUPPORTED!

Me: “Whaaaaaaatttttt?!”

*add to cart*

I’VE DONE IT.

Series that I have wanted to continue but just didn’t have the money to buy the books.

I am a believer!

NOW LOOK AT HOW MUCH THAT COSTS ON B&N

DO YOU SEE THAT SHIT.

nine books.

nine. fucking. books.

That’s the same nine books from a different source. She fucking saved over 90 bucks. 

MAY I SHOW YOU THE WONDERS OF THRIFTBOOKS INTERNATIONAL SHIPPING!!!!

The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

The Autobiography of Malcolm X

Beloved

Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee (this was the only free version I could find, and it’s a downloadable thing, so do so with caution)

The Call of the Wild

Catch-22 (it was either this version or one where the entire thing was in comic sans font)

The Catcher in the Rye

Fahrenheit 451

For Whom the Bell Tolls

Gone With the Wind

The Grapes of Wrath

The Great Gatsby

Howl

In Cold Blood

Invisible Man

The Jungle (personally I don’t like this formatting, but the site doesn’t look sketchy so…) - there’s also this which is the proper book format in a pdf, but it’s directly photocopied so it might be hard to read some of the print

Leaves of Grass

Moby Dick

Native Son

Our Bodies, Ourselves (we learned about this one in APUSH!)

The Red Badge of Courage

The Scarlet Letter

COULD NOT FIND Sexual Behavior in the Human Male (the ebook is 47 fucking dollars??? and i can’t even find sketchy websites that’ll let me download a pdf. if anyone manages to find a link, lmk please)

Stranger in a Strange Land

A Streetcar Named Desire

Their Eyes Were Watching God

To Kill a Mockingbird

Uncle Tom’s Cabin

Where the Wild Things Are (this is a slideshow!!!! how fun)

Milton: This isn't a date. I told you I was going to the store

Jai: Then why did you invite me?

Milton: I specifically said "don't come with me" and you said "I can do whatever I want" and followed me here