Discussion posts are some of my favourite posts to read. New ideas get shared that way, or old ideas are revisited and given a new spin. And of course, I get to be my opinionated self as I hoist my views upon others, while pretending to be objective. Or maybe not. I do welcome alternate views and I’d love to hear from you in the comments!
For the most part, I try to keep my TBR (to be read) list manageable. Every other week I weed out books I no longer have any desire to read. I also think twice before adding new books to my TBR list. Despite the temptation to let my TBR list grow infinitely with all the lovely books listed on Goodreads, I resist.
Since I keep my TBR list as short as possible, I have a fairly good recollection on which books I intend to read, so the excitement level for each book is fairly substantial. Now can you imagine looking forward to that handful of books, only to find out they’re out of print or aren’t distributed in your region? It makes me sad whenever that happens.
Geographical restrictions can be extremely frustrating. I especially run into difficulty when it comes to obtaining Australian books. Take The Wrong Girl by Zoe Foster. It was published 26. February 2014 but neither Amazon nor The Book Depository carry that title. Amazon doesn’t list it. The Book Depository does list it but states the book is unavailable. Same at my largest local bookstore; book’s listed but unavailable. Once in a while I can circumvent those problems when my library shelves copies of Australian books that are difficult for me to obtain. But that doesn’t always happen. I’ve looked at international shipping from Australian retailers but I’m not willing to pay shipping that equals the cost of a book. If only I had an Australian address, then I could buy eBooks via Amazon Australia.
Out of print books are even more difficult to get hold off. Unless they’re released in eBook format, my chances of accessing those books are very slim. At least I can ask friends to buy books for me abroad, if I’m really desperate to read a particular book. But when a book is out of print, I can’t exactly ask someone to buy the book for me in whichever country. Neither can I wait for my library to pick up those books. Most of the time the books I look for aren’t available at secondhand bookstores either. I know there’s AbeBooks but I’ve not tried ordering there, so I’ve no idea if shipping costs are justified.
The sad reality is that books that were published in the 1980s and 1990s are more difficult to obtain than books that were published prior to the 1920s. I hope books published in the 2010s will not go through such a level of scarcity since many are also published as eBooks. Rebecca J. Rosen wrote an interesting article for the The Atlantic about the scarcity of books published in recent decades as compared to older works. While that explains the root source of my predicament, it doesn’t solve it. Maybe I need to be more persistent in sourcing for these books but sometimes I just don’t know where to start.
How to you deal with unavailable books? Do you try to hunt them down or do you just move on?
Hi ya , I live in a developing nation (Suriname, South America) so getting I want is not that easy . There is a possibly to order newer and older , still in print, releases but the bookstores will over price any particular book. This is done because the Surinamese public does not read for fun , in a land of under half a million only a few thousand read. I’m part of the middle middle class and books are a luxury , so money is spend 3/5 times not on books . I have gotten almost all of my books from giveaways I’ve won or books I’ve received as gifts
Now on the reason for this comment : I’d love to acquire out of print books but because it is almost impossible to get ahold of them. I try to forget them and move on books that are still in print , still older then new releases. Let’s say 2008 or 2007 ( just mentioning a year or two ) . I try to get these books before they too are out of print . It’s a race against time and not fun at all . If I can’t get some of the books I just have to life with that . #SadButThrue lol :/
I want to own certain HCs of the Chaos Walking series so bad but I can find them for a reasonable price. They are out of print and only available in used book stores/amazon market place and the like. I won’t give up until I have them but it drives me crazy. I feel like I already looked in every place I can.
When you want to buy Australian books/editions you should check out fishpond.com. They ship for free!
And you don’t want the current hardcovers? Usually I feel the pain when I can’t get my hands on a book regardless of format but yes, once in a while I’m aching for a particular cover and no alternative will do. Hopefully you manage to find a complete set!
Ooh. Fishpond. I’ve heard of the site before but never thought to actually check it out. Thanks for the suggestion! :)
Nope, I want to the old ones :D (Not that it is urgent, I have another set of the books, but the very first HCs are amazing because the cover is on the book itself and only part of it is on a transparent dust jacket.)
I’m the read what you get type so I almost never get caught up in this. But when I do, I usually visit our secondhand bookstore (that is actually just a warehouse full of books) and they bring in books from the US which are mostly ones that are rarely available. And people here read more Jeffrey Archer than any YA so I don’t have to worry about it not being there haha.
You can fake an Australian address can’t you? :p
Well, I’ve been on a quest to read more Australian books. That’s why I’ve come across a surge of unavailable books lately which sucks. Other than that, I’ve been able to get hold of most books. My library is extremely well stocked with recent books. But older books age and fall apart, so once they’re off the shelves, that’s it if they’re no longer on sale.
It’ not so much about being able to provide an Australian address as being able to pay with a foreign credit card. That is, if I want to buy ebooks via Australian retailers.
I’ve never actually been in the situation where I wasn’t able to purchase my book of choice on some kind of book selling site, however I know I would find it extremely frustrating – especially if it was one of those books sitting at the top of my wishlist. If I ever found myself in that situation, I think I would just let the book go – as sad as that sounds, not being able to discover those words and said author’s writing etc. There are so many books I hope to read someday and I know festering over a given one would just deter my reading and book buying… Am I alone in this?
Great discussion topic!
:-)
I doubt you’re alone in this. Like you said, there are so many other books out there that can be read instead. Just that for me, I’ve been on a quest to read more Australian books, so I’ve not been so willing to yield to unavailabilities just yet. I’m determined to get hold of at least a few of those books. I just need to hunt down sellers that carry those books first.
First off, YES AUSTRALIAN BOOKS. I mean, I *live* in Australia and I find it hard to find Aussie books sometimes T.T
Like I just looked up The Wrong Girl, and it’s THIRTY DOLLARS. WHAT. That is so outrageous, and just for a paperback, as well.
But onwards.
There was this book that I DESPERATELY wanted to own, but it was out of print. I searched every secondhand bookstore that I could find. I even visited them in other states (I wasn’t there for the book, but it wasn’t there anyway). Like you, I wasn’t particularly keen for AbeBooks, since I have never tried it. And then one day, it just appeared on eBay. So I bought it. And then a few days later, I was in a secondhand bookstore and there it was. So I bought it again. :D But that was a lucky circumstance.
I have since wanted to buy three out of print books, and I cannot find them anywhere. They’re books in a series, and I’m surprised I’ve found the ones that I DO own. They’ve just been sitting in op-shops. Haha :D
The library has the first in the series, but I’ve already read the entire series, so I just want to OWN them, not read them. But yeah, I haven’t been able to find the books that I don’t own in the series.
I that’s kind of unrelated, since I’ve read them, but still. Unavailable book pain.
There haven’t been many instances where I’ve been dying to read a book, and haven’t been able to buy it or find it. I guess I’m lucky that way because Australia gets UK and US and Aussie books, so we’re pretty sweet. But there are always the little black sheep who give me pain =.=
THIRTY?! I checked Kinokuniya and they listed it for ~AU$22, I think. Can’t check now though because the search function on the website seems stuck. But yeah, Kinokuniya’s in Sydney and I’ve no idea if they do deliveries. BookTopia listed it for AU$24 but with AU$6.50 local shipping, that does amount to thirty :( Some offer the ebook for AU$9.99, so when the time comes that I want to sit down and read it, maybe I’ll buy the ebook. Just need to figure out which booksellers accept foreign credit cards.
Ah, eBay. I’ve never come across a book I wanted on it. So I’ve given up hope. But there was this series that I read when I was younger. Three years ago I decided I wanted to reread it but my library didn’t have any copies left, save for one book that was one of the later books in the series. The the ebooks were released last year and I was so happy!
And I think it’s weird and sad when local books aren’t readily available in their own countries. It makes sense on an international scale that not all books get exported to other countries but locally? Just sad.