Pages & Proofs

An obscure novel, rejected by the major Australian publishers, has won Australia’s Miles Franklin award, the country’s top literary prize. AS Patric’s Black Rock White City is published by independent publisher Transit Lounge and not particularly easy to find right now, but that will change in the coming weeks. Black Rock White City tells the […]

Ever wondered what Freddie Mercury and Queen were singing about in Bohemian Rhapsody when you hear ‘Scaramouche, Scaramouche. Will you do the fandango?’ I thought exactly that when I saw AbeBooks had recently sold a 1921 first edition of Scaramouche by Rafael Sabatini for $3,000/£2,250. What does Scaramouche mean? Or rather, who was Scaramouche? Scaramouche […]

The Rio 2016 Olympics appeared to have zero effect on bookselling until a 58-year-old from Warwickshire won a gold medal for Great Britain. The stories behind superstars like Michael Phelps, Usain Bolt, and Mo Farah are well known, but Nick Skelton is not a household name. He is a veteran equestrian, who has competed since […]

AbeBooks recently caught up with Managing Director of World of Rare Books Michael Laundon to talk all things bookish. Sister company to World of Books, WORB was founded in 2012 and focuses on rare and antiquarian books from the pre-ISBN era. Naturally, Michael had some interesting stories for us. From providing a special book to a Nigerian tribe, […]

A 1938 edition of Action Comics No. 1 sold for £730,000 (that’s $956,000) yesterday.  Written by Jerry Siegel and illustrated by Joe Shuster, the 13-page story describes Superman coming to Earth, rescuing an innocent woman from the electric chair, stopping an episode of wife-beating and going out on a date with Lois Lane. The famous […]