LISNews: Librarian News

Entry Level: In the book market, the first word counts By Holly Hubbard Preston over at The International Herald Tribune takes a look at book collecting. A book - like a map, gem or painting - can be a valuable commodity well beyond its textual appeal, as long as it is truly rare. They say that auction prices for rare books and manuscripts had appreciated, on average, by 20 percent since the mid-1980s.

Among the factors that make a book rare, foremost is the number of the edition.While a child's quaint scribbles can squash the value of an otherwise rare book, an inscription by an author is another matter.