alexander calder at home book cover

After reading two recent post referring to out-of-print books like Calder at Home and  How to Construct Reitveld Furniture, a long-time reader emailed us a great strategy for finding affordable books online using “favorite searches” on ABE books. Check out her message below to hear how it works. We are going to try setting up searches for some hard-to-find books:

…when you are looking for a used book that seems too expensive, you should try ABE books. You can save searches (including advanced searches, e.g., by price, year, ISBN numbers if you want a particular edition, hardback or paperback, etc) and they send you an email you when any book fitting those parameters come for sale on to the used book market—sort of like a favorite search on ebay, keeping you from having to constantly check if a new, cheaper copy has become available. Many of the used book vendors on amazon are simultaneously selling on ABE (stands for Advanced Book Exchange).

I find it great for books that I would like to get to one day, and so am in no rush to buy (and most of my books I get from the library anyway), or that are out of print, etc.

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3 replies on “how-to find affordable and/or rare books online

  1. I prefer bookfinder.com.
    It includes Abe Books, old and new books, paperbacks and hardcovers, pre-sales…. I find it very helpful.
    🙂

  2. Hey thanks. We’ll check it out.

  3. Try betterworld books as a source for used books , they give money for literacy fund projects (a very worthwhile cause) and they have free snail shipping option!

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