11 ms·

"The hardback is a mark of quality" I disagree. A major mark of quality (other than the writing) is the paper it's printed on, and the publishers often pick th

"The hardback is a mark of quality" I disagree. A major mark of quality (other than the writing) is the paper it's printed on, and the publishers often pick the poor, yellowing, easy-tearing newsprint paper, almost newsprint quality. Then they stick a hardback cover on it and sell it for £££. Come on publishers, if I pay decent dosh for a book, hardback or soft, don't skimp on this.

lb1lf 7y ago
-Assuming you're in the UK, I'd like to draw your attention to the Folio Society - granted, their selection is very limited, but their titles are a joy to behold - proper, heavy paper, sewn spines, commissioned illustrations...
- Nerada 7y ago
  They do international shipping too (or used to). I was a member for a number of years and resided outside of the UK.
  - briansteffens 7y ago
    They still ship to the US at least, I've ordered from them recently.
  - lb1lf 7y ago
    -Oh, they most definitely do, it was poorly worded on my part - my thought was that their selection of titles is rather UK-centric, though I do believe it has broadened in later years. (I live in Norway, but have been a Folio Society regular for a decade and change, now - books published in Norwegian are rather expensive, so the premium (in the international market) price of Folio Society books is still quite comparable to that of a Norwegian hardcover release - but the comparison ends there.)
- tempguy9999 7y ago
  Consider my attention drawn - thanks! (also @Nerada too)
- shantly 7y ago
  Other good stuff: - Many university presses, especially if you've heard of the university. - Library of America for works by American authors in English. They're dense (bible-type paper, usually 2+ novels per volume) but more readable than a lot of editions that go for density (think all those unreadable, useless single-volume Shakespeares out there for comparison). Very well made. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade is the French equivalent of this, in purpose and in form, if you read French. - Limited Editions Club and Heritage Press, which reprinted LEC books in somewhat lower quality (and usually somewhat smaller, too). HP can be hit-or-miss—watch out for any with (faux) leather on the binding. All the cloth-bound stuff is great. Often have great illustrations and such included. Big, heavy, Serious Business editions for your Serious Business books. Their epics feel epic. - Modern Library and Everyman are pretty OK. I especially like Everyman's little poets series, for nice single smallish volumes dedicated to individual poets that are a little easier to actually pick up and read through than some of the huge, more comprehensive collections out there. You've gotta watch translations from both ML and Everyman, though, as often they use older (public domain) translations for non-English works that are probably not what you'd choose, given your choice of any translation. Other times they're good, more recent ones. Just have to watch out. - Norton Critical Editions are paperback but usually have excellent annotations and commentary. If you want something like the experience of reading a book in a course at a university and don't want extra books of commentary, lean toward these. - Penguin Classics are paperback, but are often the only way to get a half-decent copy of all kinds of religious and mythological works—Eastern and Western—outside a handful of the most famous ones, without resorting to very expensive, very limited run academic press editions. - Dover's like Penguin Classics but for older math and science books. I've bought a shitload of books over the years and my advice to anyone starting out is to buy whatever you'll read. Something you don't mind abusing or writing in. Trade paperbacks are the sweet spot on this, for me, usually. Save the nice copies for books you love and for which you really want the ambiance of a nice edition. Worry more about annotations, introductions, appendices, and which translation you're dealing with than how the book looks, in most cases. For your easier genre fic or light business-related reading you're unlikely to re-read, just use an e-reader, or buy disposably-cheap used mass market paperbacks. If you love something you read there enough you want it on your shelf for re-reads and reference, you can always grab a paper copy later. That goes for other books, too—buy the LEC or LOA or some weird niche press ultra-nice goatskin-bound edition only after you already know you love a book. If you're gonna buy paper genre fic before reading it, try to reserve most of that shelf space for short story collections (great to be able to grab off the shelf and just start reading, much nicer than in ebook format). [EDIT] Loeb, if you read Latin or Greek or sometimes they're just the best edition of more obscure ancient works even if you don't read the original (they're all facing-page translations). Green Lion Press for very nicely-bound math books. [EDI2] Don't, don't "collect" hardbacks of very popular books unless you re-read them all the time. You can go grab a bunch of Terry Goodkind or Stephen King hardbacks at thrift shops any day you want, for next to nothing. Don't waste space with them unless you read them all. The. Time. That's true to a lesser degree for most books—few are rare enough you can't just go find it some time later, at a reasonable price, if you pass on it today. Most aren't quite as ubiquitous and cheap as Stephen King novels, though :-)
- _pmf_ 7y ago
  This link will cost me dearly ...
IAmEveryone 7y ago
I just checked a few examples, and the hardcover and paperback editions have consistently different weights and thickness that cannot be explained by just the cover. To use a friend's book as an example: Normal People (https://www.amazon.com/Normal-People-Novel-Sally-Rooney/dp/1984822187/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr= https://www.amazon.com/Normal-People-Novel-Sally-Rooney/dp/1...) Paperback: 304 pages, 0.6 inches, 8.3 ounces Hardcover: 288 pages, 1.0 inches, 14.7 ounces The hardcover has fewer pages but is 70% thicker and 80% heavier. The other dimensions differ only slighty (5.7 x 8.6 vs 5.2 x 8) I checked two other recent releases and this seemed somewhat consistent. And even if the weight difference is mostly the cover, I would tend to think the cost of material to correlate linearly with weight (as your accusation also implies). So you are getting about twice the weight for about twice the price[0]? Printing costs are obviously only a fraction of the price. I wouldn't even be surprised if books were one of those goods where gross margins actually increase even when the price difference is lower than the increase in weight (the canonical examples are perfume and software). Personally, I don't care too much about paper thickness. The far more relevant quality issue used to be acid, with paper degrading within a decade. Today's paper is good for a few hundred years, so it wins any competition with those hand-sewn, thick, artisanal "quality products" of previous eras. [0] Incidentally, the hardcover I looked up above sells for $9.95 while the paperback is $17.00 (both new). Go figure!
- acqq 7y ago
  I have different experience: it seems a trend that the books I'm interested in (note: not fiction) are first made for hardback, then just scaled down for paperback, resulting in pages that are too annoying to read. After a few paperbacks that I've hated, now if I see that the paperback has smaller dimensions but the same number of pages I am going to order hardback.
- lordgrenville 7y ago
  You're friends with Sally Rooney? Pretty cool. (Unless you just meant that this is a book your friend owns.)
Turing_Machine 7y ago
> Then they stick a hardback cover on it and sell it for £££. Traditional hardbacks (and collector-quality ones, even now) are made from pages sewn together in signatures, and will last for many, many readings. When the binding does get worn out, a new one can easily be put on. However, the typical "hardback" you see in a bookstore today is basically just a paperback with thicker cardboard for the covers. The pages are held together (and the "binding" is held on) with a thin layer of glue, just like a paperback, rather than being properly sewn. You're lucky if you get one reading out of one of those pieces of crap before it starts to fall apart in your hands. They are simply not worth the money. Go with ebooks, or, if you absolutely must have paper, paperbacks. Otherwise you're getting ripped off.
- allovernow 7y ago
  It's painful to see so many examples of hallmarks of quality or even just signals of niche culture hollowed out and used as a facade on inferior products. Sometimes it really does feel like late stage capitalism (especially MBAs) is gradually ruining much of the fruit it made plentiful. This pursuit of pennies sucks the soul out of anything it touches. There's value in lasting quality, and as I've gotten older I've learned to appreciate goods that reflect a respect for the art of the trades that produced them, like solid tools, or over-engineered appliances from decades past, where a little extra material is the difference between just out of warranty failure and indefinite use. But I suppose the real problem that the average person doesn't notice and/or care.
yongjik 7y ago
Well, you might want to be careful what you wish for. "High-quality paper" is heavy. In Korea, somehow every publisher decided books should use maximum quality paper, which is brightly white, looks supreme, and also so heavy that you could use them for upper body exercise. E.g., this is how ASOIAF boxed set looks like in Korea: http://www.yes24.com/Product/Goods/11816241 http://www.yes24.com/Product/Goods/11816241 (It doesn't help that they print each page with an inch margin, 150% line spacing, and fonts large enough for 70-year-olds without glasses. Sometimes I wonder if they're selling books by weight.)
- kick 7y ago
  That looks fine? Similar to a lot of paperbacks I see in the States.
  - wishinghand 7y ago
    I take exception to needing 11 books to contain a 5 book series, unless the Korean language is not very dense.
    - larnmar 7y ago
      My English edition is five paperbacks, but these paperbacks run at about a thousand pages each. A 1000-page paperback is a major hassle to read (how do you comfortably hold it?) or carry around, and they seem to get damaged pretty quickly (the spine is a mess by the time you’ve finished reading). I’d prefer a larger number of thinner volumes.
      - yongjik 7y ago
        That's the problem: somehow nobody sells a larger number of thinner volumes. You just get a larger number of books, each somehow being heavier than the original English volume.
    - kick 7y ago
      Hangul was intentionally created to be the simplest script in the world to learn.
jeffwass 7y ago
This. I would gladly play a bit more for acid-free paperbacks that don’t turn yellow and brittle. I am concerned what my current book collection will look like in 10-20 years, and for this reason have been considering hardbacks over paperbacks (which isn’t always better quality but there is some positive correlation there).
Eric_WVGG 7y ago
I collect a fair number of both American and UK edition of various books. The paper and glue quality of virtually all UK books, even limited/special editions, is just appalling. Even the worst American airport paperbacks are superior to nearly anything I've acquired from the UK. I have been told this is "just the way things are done over there."
- Symbiote 7y ago
  I hardly ever buy hardback books, but I think the paperback books are cheaper in the UK. I had a long trip changing planes in Los Angeles followed by Heathrow, and I bought the second part of a trilogy in LAX, and the third part in LHR. The American edition is better quality, but was 50% more expensive than the UK/European edition. A quick look on amazon.com vs amazon.co.uk gives the same impression, at least comparing the actual price (not the RRP).
patrickserrano 7y ago
Having worked at a publisher specializing in hardbacks, acid free paper (so it doesn’t yellow), and sewn bindings. I can tell you that maintaining quality is hard in an ever shrinking industry. In the US there’s been a huge consolidation of printers and binderies that have driven not only the costs up, but the run sizes needed to even do business with them unless you’re a major publisher. It’s sad, because there are a lot of people out there interested in providing high quality books, but what little money was there has been nearly erased in the last 20 years. The place I worked was a family run shop for over 30 years and was only 5 people total. We watched our costs and expenses, but doing business with Amazon or their shrinking and consolidating competitors was painful at best. Combined with the consolidation on the on the production side, we had to slow our output dramatically. The company still around, putting out great books, but not at the same scale they could be doing it and that’s everyone’s loss.
Iv 7y ago
In France the standard became de "livre de poche" edition, the "pocket-book". Fits well on shelves, kind of uniform format, softcover, so it is easier to read/transport, good paper quality. I have grown with this being the standard and to me when I see US hardcover books at $50+ I don't understand it: it is bulky, hard to read in a cramped place like a subway (or toilets!) No two books are the same size or color and it is printed with so much spacing that it looks like kids books or the kind of dissertation formatting I used to do when the teacher asked for 20 pages and I only had 5 pages of material.
- pojntfx 7y ago
  +1 for small book formats. As some who reads in the metro each morning, not having to carry around a hardback is nice.
  - vinay427 7y ago
    I've never seen a non-textbook that was only available in hardcover. Has the lack of a lighter alternative ever been a problem for you?
- Consultant32452 7y ago
  I think it's that books, particularly hard backs, are in a pseudo-artwork/collectible category. There are times I've liked a paperback so much I bought the hard back and never opened it, just to have the "pretty" version on the shelf.
  - Iv 7y ago
    Yes, that's a weird thing. Some books seem to be vanity items. But even in that respect, I find the US format weird: all books are dissimilar and are harder to fit in typical furniture. I do prefer the look of this: http://a52.idata.over-blog.com/2/25/73/36/Photos/Bibliotheque/100_1143.JPG http://a52.idata.over-blog.com/2/25/73/36/Photos/Bibliothequ... to the look of this: https://www.archimag.com/sites/archimag.com/files/styles/article/public/web_articles/image/Biblioth%C3%A8queLivres.png https://www.archimag.com/sites/archimag.com/files/styles/art...

lb1lf 7y ago

-Assuming you're in the UK, I'd like to draw your attention to the Folio Society - granted, their selection is very limited, but their titles are a joy to behold - proper, heavy paper, sewn spines, commissioned illustrations...

Nerada 7y ago
They do international shipping too (or used to). I was a member for a number of years and resided outside of the UK.
- briansteffens 7y ago
  They still ship to the US at least, I've ordered from them recently.
- lb1lf 7y ago
  -Oh, they most definitely do, it was poorly worded on my part - my thought was that their selection of titles is rather UK-centric, though I do believe it has broadened in later years. (I live in Norway, but have been a Folio Society regular for a decade and change, now - books published in Norwegian are rather expensive, so the premium (in the international market) price of Folio Society books is still quite comparable to that of a Norwegian hardcover release - but the comparison ends there.)
tempguy9999 7y ago
Consider my attention drawn - thanks! (also @Nerada too)
shantly 7y ago
Other good stuff: - Many university presses, especially if you've heard of the university. - Library of America for works by American authors in English. They're dense (bible-type paper, usually 2+ novels per volume) but more readable than a lot of editions that go for density (think all those unreadable, useless single-volume Shakespeares out there for comparison). Very well made. Bibliothèque de la Pléiade is the French equivalent of this, in purpose and in form, if you read French. - Limited Editions Club and Heritage Press, which reprinted LEC books in somewhat lower quality (and usually somewhat smaller, too). HP can be hit-or-miss—watch out for any with (faux) leather on the binding. All the cloth-bound stuff is great. Often have great illustrations and such included. Big, heavy, Serious Business editions for your Serious Business books. Their epics feel epic. - Modern Library and Everyman are pretty OK. I especially like Everyman's little poets series, for nice single smallish volumes dedicated to individual poets that are a little easier to actually pick up and read through than some of the huge, more comprehensive collections out there. You've gotta watch translations from both ML and Everyman, though, as often they use older (public domain) translations for non-English works that are probably not what you'd choose, given your choice of any translation. Other times they're good, more recent ones. Just have to watch out. - Norton Critical Editions are paperback but usually have excellent annotations and commentary. If you want something like the experience of reading a book in a course at a university and don't want extra books of commentary, lean toward these. - Penguin Classics are paperback, but are often the only way to get a half-decent copy of all kinds of religious and mythological works—Eastern and Western—outside a handful of the most famous ones, without resorting to very expensive, very limited run academic press editions. - Dover's like Penguin Classics but for older math and science books. I've bought a shitload of books over the years and my advice to anyone starting out is to buy whatever you'll read. Something you don't mind abusing or writing in. Trade paperbacks are the sweet spot on this, for me, usually. Save the nice copies for books you love and for which you really want the ambiance of a nice edition. Worry more about annotations, introductions, appendices, and which translation you're dealing with than how the book looks, in most cases. For your easier genre fic or light business-related reading you're unlikely to re-read, just use an e-reader, or buy disposably-cheap used mass market paperbacks. If you love something you read there enough you want it on your shelf for re-reads and reference, you can always grab a paper copy later. That goes for other books, too—buy the LEC or LOA or some weird niche press ultra-nice goatskin-bound edition only after you already know you love a book. If you're gonna buy paper genre fic before reading it, try to reserve most of that shelf space for short story collections (great to be able to grab off the shelf and just start reading, much nicer than in ebook format). [EDIT] Loeb, if you read Latin or Greek or sometimes they're just the best edition of more obscure ancient works even if you don't read the original (they're all facing-page translations). Green Lion Press for very nicely-bound math books. [EDI2] Don't, don't "collect" hardbacks of very popular books unless you re-read them all the time. You can go grab a bunch of Terry Goodkind or Stephen King hardbacks at thrift shops any day you want, for next to nothing. Don't waste space with them unless you read them all. The. Time. That's true to a lesser degree for most books—few are rare enough you can't just go find it some time later, at a reasonable price, if you pass on it today. Most aren't quite as ubiquitous and cheap as Stephen King novels, though :-)
_pmf_ 7y ago
This link will cost me dearly ...

IAmEveryone 7y ago

I just checked a few examples, and the hardcover and paperback editions have consistently different weights and thickness that cannot be explained by just the cover. To use a friend's book as an example: Normal People (https://www.amazon.com/Normal-People-Novel-Sally-Rooney/dp/1984822187/ref=tmm_pap_swatch_0?_encoding=UTF8&qid=&sr= https://www.amazon.com/Normal-People-Novel-Sally-Rooney/dp/1...) Paperback: 304 pages, 0.6 inches, 8.3 ounces Hardcover: 288 pages, 1.0 inches, 14.7 ounces The hardcover has fewer pages but is 70% thicker and 80% heavier. The other dimensions differ only slighty (5.7 x 8.6 vs 5.2 x 8) I checked two other recent releases and this seemed somewhat consistent. And even if the weight difference is mostly the cover, I would tend to think the cost of material to correlate linearly with weight (as your accusation also implies). So you are getting about twice the weight for about twice the price[0]? Printing costs are obviously only a fraction of the price. I wouldn't even be surprised if books were one of those goods where gross margins actually increase even when the price difference is lower than the increase in weight (the canonical examples are perfume and software). Personally, I don't care too much about paper thickness. The far more relevant quality issue used to be acid, with paper degrading within a decade. Today's paper is good for a few hundred years, so it wins any competition with those hand-sewn, thick, artisanal "quality products" of previous eras. [0] Incidentally, the hardcover I looked up above sells for $9.95 while the paperback is $17.00 (both new). Go figure!

acqq 7y ago
I have different experience: it seems a trend that the books I'm interested in (note: not fiction) are first made for hardback, then just scaled down for paperback, resulting in pages that are too annoying to read. After a few paperbacks that I've hated, now if I see that the paperback has smaller dimensions but the same number of pages I am going to order hardback.
lordgrenville 7y ago
You're friends with Sally Rooney? Pretty cool. (Unless you just meant that this is a book your friend owns.)

Turing_Machine 7y ago

> Then they stick a hardback cover on it and sell it for £££. Traditional hardbacks (and collector-quality ones, even now) are made from pages sewn together in signatures, and will last for many, many readings. When the binding does get worn out, a new one can easily be put on. However, the typical "hardback" you see in a bookstore today is basically just a paperback with thicker cardboard for the covers. The pages are held together (and the "binding" is held on) with a thin layer of glue, just like a paperback, rather than being properly sewn. You're lucky if you get one reading out of one of those pieces of crap before it starts to fall apart in your hands. They are simply not worth the money. Go with ebooks, or, if you absolutely must have paper, paperbacks. Otherwise you're getting ripped off.

allovernow 7y ago
It's painful to see so many examples of hallmarks of quality or even just signals of niche culture hollowed out and used as a facade on inferior products. Sometimes it really does feel like late stage capitalism (especially MBAs) is gradually ruining much of the fruit it made plentiful. This pursuit of pennies sucks the soul out of anything it touches. There's value in lasting quality, and as I've gotten older I've learned to appreciate goods that reflect a respect for the art of the trades that produced them, like solid tools, or over-engineered appliances from decades past, where a little extra material is the difference between just out of warranty failure and indefinite use. But I suppose the real problem that the average person doesn't notice and/or care.

yongjik 7y ago

Well, you might want to be careful what you wish for. "High-quality paper" is heavy. In Korea, somehow every publisher decided books should use maximum quality paper, which is brightly white, looks supreme, and also so heavy that you could use them for upper body exercise. E.g., this is how ASOIAF boxed set looks like in Korea: http://www.yes24.com/Product/Goods/11816241 http://www.yes24.com/Product/Goods/11816241 (It doesn't help that they print each page with an inch margin, 150% line spacing, and fonts large enough for 70-year-olds without glasses. Sometimes I wonder if they're selling books by weight.)

kick 7y ago
That looks fine? Similar to a lot of paperbacks I see in the States.
- wishinghand 7y ago
  I take exception to needing 11 books to contain a 5 book series, unless the Korean language is not very dense.
  - larnmar 7y ago
    My English edition is five paperbacks, but these paperbacks run at about a thousand pages each. A 1000-page paperback is a major hassle to read (how do you comfortably hold it?) or carry around, and they seem to get damaged pretty quickly (the spine is a mess by the time you’ve finished reading). I’d prefer a larger number of thinner volumes.
    - yongjik 7y ago
      That's the problem: somehow nobody sells a larger number of thinner volumes. You just get a larger number of books, each somehow being heavier than the original English volume.
  - kick 7y ago
    Hangul was intentionally created to be the simplest script in the world to learn.

jeffwass 7y ago

This. I would gladly play a bit more for acid-free paperbacks that don’t turn yellow and brittle. I am concerned what my current book collection will look like in 10-20 years, and for this reason have been considering hardbacks over paperbacks (which isn’t always better quality but there is some positive correlation there).

Eric_WVGG 7y ago

I collect a fair number of both American and UK edition of various books. The paper and glue quality of virtually all UK books, even limited/special editions, is just appalling. Even the worst American airport paperbacks are superior to nearly anything I've acquired from the UK. I have been told this is "just the way things are done over there."

Symbiote 7y ago
I hardly ever buy hardback books, but I think the paperback books are cheaper in the UK. I had a long trip changing planes in Los Angeles followed by Heathrow, and I bought the second part of a trilogy in LAX, and the third part in LHR. The American edition is better quality, but was 50% more expensive than the UK/European edition. A quick look on amazon.com vs amazon.co.uk gives the same impression, at least comparing the actual price (not the RRP).

patrickserrano 7y ago

Having worked at a publisher specializing in hardbacks, acid free paper (so it doesn’t yellow), and sewn bindings. I can tell you that maintaining quality is hard in an ever shrinking industry. In the US there’s been a huge consolidation of printers and binderies that have driven not only the costs up, but the run sizes needed to even do business with them unless you’re a major publisher. It’s sad, because there are a lot of people out there interested in providing high quality books, but what little money was there has been nearly erased in the last 20 years. The place I worked was a family run shop for over 30 years and was only 5 people total. We watched our costs and expenses, but doing business with Amazon or their shrinking and consolidating competitors was painful at best. Combined with the consolidation on the on the production side, we had to slow our output dramatically. The company still around, putting out great books, but not at the same scale they could be doing it and that’s everyone’s loss.

Iv 7y ago

In France the standard became de "livre de poche" edition, the "pocket-book". Fits well on shelves, kind of uniform format, softcover, so it is easier to read/transport, good paper quality. I have grown with this being the standard and to me when I see US hardcover books at $50+ I don't understand it: it is bulky, hard to read in a cramped place like a subway (or toilets!) No two books are the same size or color and it is printed with so much spacing that it looks like kids books or the kind of dissertation formatting I used to do when the teacher asked for 20 pages and I only had 5 pages of material.

pojntfx 7y ago
+1 for small book formats. As some who reads in the metro each morning, not having to carry around a hardback is nice.
- vinay427 7y ago
  I've never seen a non-textbook that was only available in hardcover. Has the lack of a lighter alternative ever been a problem for you?
Consultant32452 7y ago
I think it's that books, particularly hard backs, are in a pseudo-artwork/collectible category. There are times I've liked a paperback so much I bought the hard back and never opened it, just to have the "pretty" version on the shelf.
- Iv 7y ago
  Yes, that's a weird thing. Some books seem to be vanity items. But even in that respect, I find the US format weird: all books are dissimilar and are harder to fit in typical furniture. I do prefer the look of this: http://a52.idata.over-blog.com/2/25/73/36/Photos/Bibliotheque/100_1143.JPG http://a52.idata.over-blog.com/2/25/73/36/Photos/Bibliothequ... to the look of this: https://www.archimag.com/sites/archimag.com/files/styles/article/public/web_articles/image/Biblioth%C3%A8queLivres.png https://www.archimag.com/sites/archimag.com/files/styles/art...