| A Guide to Buying Wiccan/Pagan Books |
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How many people out there want to buy Pagan/Wiccan books, but don’t like shelling out twelve to seventeen dollars on average for one book? How many people want to read and buy the ‘classic’ Wiccan texts but don’t know where to find them? If your one of these people, then read on. Since I started my journey into Paganism four and a half years ago, it has been a pleasant challenge to obtain many of the popular and classic books on the subject. I had an insatiable need for these books because I wanted to learn all I possible could. Most of the books I bought were brand new and cost me a lot of money. But I still persisted, and hundreds of dollars later, I started searching for a better means of getting a hold of these books. I guess my search began when I started to get interested in the ‘classic’ Wiccan books. A lot of the titles I wanted were out of print, and hard to find. I thought it was hopeless to keep searching. Then I discovered several sources to get these classics, and along with buying the classics I found I could buy the more new and popular books at cheap prices as well. Below is a list of some places where you can find cheap Pagan/Wiccan texts, both new and used, out of print, and hard to find. Ebay - Definitely the best place to find books. Its free to sign up and use but you have to be at least 18 to set up an account. Ebay has tons of Pagan/Wiccan books up for auction. It’s a great place to get inexpensive books too. Usually there will be several of the same titles up for sale at the same time, so they tend to be cheap. Someone who is a beginner in Wicca and wants to get some beginner books can go here and buy many of them for half the price. A lot of times a seller will put up a set of beginner books and start the bid at a cheap price. I have bought a lot for the popular beginner books on ebay for a fraction of the price at the bookstores. The seller will tell you the condition of the book - new or used, and if there are any marks or damages. Books with tears, creases or discoloration sometimes will go for cheaper. Don’t be afraid to buy a book with a crease or tear. They are still readable and definitely worth buying especially if you can get them for $5.00!! A lot of the books I have bought looked brand new, but others were posted as having little tears or something like that, but I still buy them anyway. They still look good. I love to buy used books for two reasons - I can get them cheaper, and I know they were read and enjoyed by someone else. Plus, I just like buying the older editions of books. You can also find a lot of out of print books on ebay. Authors such as Doreen Valiente, Gerald Gardner, Sybil Leek, the Farrars, and many other have out of print books that you may want to find. Ebay is, in my opinion, the best place to find them. Keep in mind though that the hard to find books may cost you more than the newer ones and most of the time, books that were recently published will be more expensive because they are brand new. One thing to watch out for is the costs of shipping. Most sellers will post how much the shipping costs will be so you know exactly how much you will have to pay. Some sneaky sellers will start the auction of a books at a very low price, but have the shipping price way high! You may pay little for the book, but get caught paying crazy fees for the shipping. Whenever you want to buy a book, first look to see if the shipping price is reasonable. I would never pay any more than $4.00 for shipping. Another thing you should do is wait until the last few minutes of the auction to bid on an item. If someone has already bid on an item, and you want to as well, don’t do it till the last few minutes because if the other person (people) see you bidding against them, they will quickly bid again. They wont have time to bid again if you do it right before the auction ends. I’ve won many auctions doing this. I have bought many, many items on ebay and I have had only one bad experience. I won a book from someone, but they sent me the wrong one. I tried contacting them but they never replied. Before buying an item, you can check out the comments left for that seller by people who have bought from them in the past. If they have positive feedback then its pretty likely that you wont have any problems. If there are negative feedback, then be careful before you buy from them. I use something called PayPal to pay for all my books. When I pay for something, money is taken from my bank account and transferred to the sellers account. Its quick and easy and probably the best way to go about buying on ebay. However, if you cant do this most sellers will accept money orders, credit cards and personal checks. You just have to read the sellers directions to find out what they accept. Half.com - This site is a partner site to ebay, the only difference is that its not an auction. People list what they have and you buy it from them right then and there. Another thing that’s different is that you can only use credit cards to pay for your purchases here. If you do have a credit card, it’s a really good place to get cheap and out of print books. Another thing I like about this site is that if your looking for a book and there are none listed, they will email you as soon as one is listed, that way you will know exactly when there is one available. Amazon.com - You can buy books at Amazon at lower prices than bookstores. They have a feature where people can sell their used books, and you can find some cheap ones there as well. The only thing about buying the used books for sale is that they don’t accept PayPal, so you have to use a credit card. If however, you buy from amazon.com directly and not someone selling a used book, you can pay with a money order. Also, amazon.com will ship your order for free if it is over $25.00, which may be a good idea if you want to buy a lot of books at once. Abebooks - I would recommend searching Abebooks to find out-of-print and hard to find books. You can also find the more popular books for sale here, but in my experience they have been cheaper at ebay. Like ebay, different sellers will accept different forms of payment. You just have to read the descriptions, Also, don’t forget to see how much they will charge for shipping too. Walmart.com - Believe it or not, Walmart.com does sell Wiccan/Pagan books! Not only do they sell Wiccan books, but they sell them at discount prices. The best way to go about buying off walmart.com is to go into one of the stores, buy a gift certificate then go home and use the gift certificate online to purchase your books. They accept credit cards and gift certificates, but not money orders or personal checks. Used Book stores - If you search hard enough, you may find Wiccan/Pagan books at some used book stores. You may also get lucky and find some out-of-print ones as well. Many times, people will have old Pagan/Occult books and not know that they are actually in demand and worth something, so they give them to a used book store who turns around and sells them at cheap prices. Trading - If your looking for a certain book, let people know. If you are a member of message boards and groups ask around for that book. Someone may have it and will be willing to trade or sell it to you. Of course, you should totally trust this person. You don’t want to send them money and not have them send you the book. Other Tips - Annuals - Llewellyn publications puts out a number of various annuals each year, such as ‘The Witches Calendar,’ ‘The Magickal Almanac’ and many others. If you wait about a month or two after Christmas, you can buy them directly from a Llewellyn catalog (can get these sent to you for free by visiting their site, www.llewellyn.com) for half the original price. Some stores that carry them will also mark them half off as well. - Buy in Bulk - If your buying at ebay, some sellers will put up auctions for 2 books or more in one lot, meaning you can get more than one book for really cheap. There is one seller on ebay that I buy from a lot that will sell two books that relate to each other and set the starting price really cheap. I have bought pairs of books for under $15.00, including shipping. Once I bought two brand new books by Raven Grimassi for $15.00 and another time I bought two other books for $12.00. If someone is selling more than one book together and you would like those books, then go ahead and bid. You can get some really cheap books by buying more than one at a time. - Look Around - If you see a book at ebay, but know you can probably get it cheaper another time, just wait a bit. Books by Silver Ravenwolf, Scott Cunningham, Ray Buckland, and other popular authors are frequently up for auction and you can get them really cheap. Some people try to sell books for their original price, but you can get them way cheaper than that. If a book is going for its original price, then don’t buy it. Wait till someone else posts it for cheaper. Your aim to is get the cheapest price possible. I’ve paid as little as $2.00 on some really good books in the past. Also, if you find a book you want at one site, look around at others to see if they have it cheaper. - Hard Cover - If your buying books because you want to collect them, then buying first editions and hard covers are a good idea. Lots of people may have the soft back, newer editions of books, but few have hard covers and first editions. These are a bit harder to find, but well worth searching for. Also, some books have had many editions with a few different covers, or sometimes different titles. If you have a favorite book and you like collecting, try obtaining each edition, especially if the covers are different. Older books by authors like Doreen Valiente have a few different editions with different covers. If you like collecting, then try to find all of the different ones. - Buy from Authors - If you want a signed copy of a book, then you can buy directly from the authors websites. Many will happily sign the book is you ask. You can view a list of pagan author sites at the links page. So there you have it. These are some of the successful ways I have bought cheap and hard to find Wiccan/Pagan books. Watch out though, once you start collecting these books, its very hard to stop! Happy Hunting :) |