Greetings all, I hope that I put this in the correct forum; my apologies if I did not. I was looking for a new Silver Dollar book to add to my collection. I have heard rave reviews about the following book: The Comprehensive U.S. Silver Dollar Encyclopedia Vol. 2: 2017 by John Highfill | Jun 27, 2017 https://highfillpress.com/product/2volumeset2017edition/ I always look for personal reviews from people that have bought the book and no matter how much I searched the internet I could only find 1 review and it was a horrid 1 star out of 5!!!! I find it hard to believe that in 2 years there is only 1 review. Does anyone have this book and can they recommend it or did you run into the same problem? Please forgive me if I can not ask this question in the forums. I did not know where to turn for answers. Thank you and enjoy what remains of your day. MJH
Good books, and I define them as books that contain information found in no other books, often are. Over the years I have paid $300 or more for several different books. Have sold some for that much as well. The Gilboy book on Spanish Colonial Pillar dollars, at one point that book was selling for $1,500. Eventually the price came down, but it still sells for around $300. With this particular book I don't know. What I do know is that with most numismatic books they are printed only once, and in very limited numbers. In most cases 500 copies or less will be printed. I've owned several where only 150 copies were printed. Those tend to be pretty expensive, even at their original issue price. But let a year or two pass from the issue date, and that price often quadruples, quintuples or more. Many collectors, even a great many, think of coins as being good investments. They aren't of course, coins are terrible investments, among the worst even. But books on coins, it's pretty dang rare for anybody to do anything but make money, often a lot, with books on coins
I haven't seen Highfill's second edition of his dollar book, but the first edition (1992), while it had some good stuff in it (mostly in chapters written by other authors) I felt a good portion of the book was self-grandizing. The first edition can be had for under $25 at times. The second edition does appear to still be in print. I don't know if the e-book version is still available. If it is and I wanted a copy of the book I'd probably go that route. I normally prefer printed books but there can be advantage to digital versions as well.
When I bought Anthony Swiatecs book on American commemoratives (2012) I think I paid $150 and I squawked over the price but it was a book I needed for my library collection since I specialize in commemorative coins. That book sells on Amazon for over $600. Glad I bought it when I did.
