The Ahearns are authors of several books about book collecting as well as over 160 individual author price guides, and have been antiquarian booksellers for over 30 years. When you read their essay, you will notice references to other books about book collecting. There are a great many books that fall into this category, covering as many subject areas as there are books. They may cover book collecting in general, as the Ahearns' book does, or they may be biographies of booksellers or autobiographies. I'm sure each of our members has their special favorites in the 'Books About Books' category and would be glad to share his or her enthusiasms with you.
Book collectors start as readers.
This may seem obvious but is important to keep in mind, for the majority of book collectors collect authors or subjects that they are currently reading or have read and enjoyed. The author expresses the collector's thoughts and inchoate insights and expresses them in ways the collector would if he or she had the talent, or takes him or her to a time and place the collector is interested in or to a setting that removes the collector from his or her current world and cares. Book readers become book collectors when they find that books have become important as objects that they wish to own, admire, and enjoy at their leisure. This is an important point, for most readers are content with reading a library copy or a paperback reprint and have no desire to go beyond this point. For the Fun of It To us, book collecting seems to be more enjoyable than other collecting hobbies because the scope is broad and the availability of material is large.