Books Received from Ziesing and Others
Jeff VanderMeer • March 24th, 2009 @ 3:56 pm • Book Reviews
Why do I buy from Ziesing? Because they’re awesome people and they always pack their books with special care.
I never get a damaged book.
I never get a book that even remotely looks like it ever even touched the sides of the box it was in. Always nicely wrapped.
Even inside the wrapping, they understand that, for example, not having the books all facing the same way helps protect them.
They also always find what I need. (Under the Raymond’s are two books I bought at Davis-Kidd in Memphis and then two Pyr titles that came in the mail and looked interesting.)
March 24, 2009 at 6:11 pm
The Moers was marvelous, and made me immediately seek out all his other books.
March 24, 2009 at 6:23 pm
Those all look good! I’m going to have to check out Derek Raymond and Mark Chadbourn.
March 24, 2009 at 7:52 pm
I’ll give them a try. My last three Amazon orders had slightly bent covers.
March 25, 2009 at 12:05 pm
I second Edd Vick on Moers. I’ve read “City of Dreaming Books” and “Rumo…”, both excellent and profusely illustrated by the author.
March 25, 2009 at 8:02 pm
I wish Mark would start publishing books again….
I’ve found that almost everything I’ve ordered from Abebooks has been amazingly well packaged — clearly the people selling through them really care about books.
I’ve had various issues with Amazon, but it seems like lately they’ve started using more reasonably sized boxes (at least in the States), and things are arriving in better condition than sometimes in the past. (For example, I received a huge box (like 2′ x 1′ x 6″) containing much, much smaller items, and some completely ineffectual air-filled plastic (some of which was prepopped). The book was hurt. I sent it back. They sent me another copy in the same-sized box, and, surprise! trashed again. I sent it back again, and they cancelled my order. I bought it elsewhere.)
Subterranean currently has the most amazing packaging I see on a regular basis. Every book is placed in a closely-fitting plastic bag (like a comic bag), which is taped shut. Then the book is surrounded with bubble wrap. Multiple books or larger books come in boxes with peanuts; novellas usually in padded envelopes.
Ah, packaging fetishism….