Festival Art and Books Tolkien Rare Book Dealer

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I have specialized in selling rare Tolkien books for 25 years.

Mine is one of the oldest and largest Tolkien rare book dealerships in the world. We are experts in JRR Tolkien's rare and collectable books, not in Professor Tolkien the academic. There are a number of newer dealers calling themselves Tolkien rare books experts. Most older dealers ignored the opportunity 25 years agao and only just recently jumped on the trends. They cannot possibly know about every book, from every author and publisher. Many young people have taken over family book dealing business, but they too simply do not have the years of experience with condition. Why does experience matter? I have always felt comparing old books to brand new condtion is pointless. What you want to know is how one compares to the rest that come available. We have sold thousands of Tolkien rare books and seen many thousand more in person over our 25 years in business, 30 plus as a collector. The expertise is not in identifying the features and publishing details of the different editions, you can learn that yourself qyuickly, but in having long experience with the condition elements and the price you should pay based on real scarcity. Anybody can get lucky once, but if you are going to be serious about building a collection of hundreds or thousands of Tolkien rare books, you need a system and acquire the experience in condition. You need help from an expert like us. It is clear condition of available copies coming on the market are declining rapidly. What no one wants is to buy a copy, only to see better one later, but if you wait however, it may not come ever along as people are now learning with Tolkien books. People often tell use of the one special bargain they found, but fail to mention the 3-4 they bought previously they wasted their money on. The cost of that one book was much higher than the state.   To avoid this trial and error approach to collecting, buy and learn from a dedicated Tolkien rare book dealer like us.  You will save time, money and frustration in the long run. We are also proud to be honest in our use of photographs rather than word salads to describe condition as most book terms no longer apply to producing modern books. We do not hide damage, but use clear photos that show where the damage is like to be; on the jacket or book spine. If the damage is not shown, there is not any unless described. This helps educate our customers and we are proud that most of our customers over 25 years now know as much, if not more, about Tolkien rare books features. Visit my eBay or Abebooks shop and you will see that all my books are accurately shown, in stock, available to buy now, and none of the sold-out stock, loss-leaders characteristic of so many other new dealers are offering what they do not have. My time in business also means I know where most rare copies are with former customers: I can source any book. Your time is important and I recommend you buy the best, from the best. As a specialist I must get it right first time, every time or I would not have stayed in business for 25 years with another 25 to come.

I only sell J.R.R. Tolkien collectable books and I have no other day job. I am recognised as the leading expert on collecting rare Tolkien books, Tolkien collecting and investment strategy. Click on our shop links below to see all our current inventory but contact me directly to purchase to avoid platform fees. Tolkien scholars and general book dealers, even older ones, are not Tolkien rare book experts. I have been selling rare and collectable Tolkien books for over 25 years. I have sold some of the rarest and most expensive first editions ever and have always been the first to accurately predict new price levels, long before anyone called themselves a Tolkien rare book expert. I know the market, having helped to create it as one of the pioneering Tolkien rare book dealers when the new films revived collecting in 2000. I even helped set up a Tolkien museum in Switzerland as one of the founders. I always have only the best copies for sale, which are not the cheapest. While you can find me with older news searches and via my Festival in the Shire, I do not use social media or pay for advertisements and so do not come top in search engine lists. Keep looking or ask others. You will find out about me eventually!