2018: The Year of the Japanese Series Book

I will remember 2018 primarily as the year of the Japanese series book.

Some of you have been aware of the Japanese editions of series books that have been showing up on eBay since the summer of 2018.  A couple of people who purchased just a few of the books have mentioned them on Facebook.  I avoided those discussions, since I didn't want to reveal that I had purchased many of the books.  One person even posted a laughing emoji about the prices.  Seeing someone make fun of the prices of books that I was buying was rather annoying.

I kept quiet about the books so that as many of the books as possible would expire from eBay's search results before I admitted to buying any of them.  I am admitting to it now, but most of the listings have expired, so you can't see a list of exactly what I paid for each book.  I prefer it that way.

Finally, I kept quiet so as not to draw more attention to the books.  I was fortunate to be able to purchase all of the oldest and scarcest Nancy Drew books that showed up.  While I would have preferred for the books to be less expensive, I was also thankful that the prices were higher than most would pay.  This kept most people from even thinking about buying the books.  Only around five or so people might possibly have purchased the books if they had seen them first.  The prices kept my competition down.

In fact, I missed out on some Judy Bolton books since I neglected to check eBay one morning and someone else got them first.  A few of you also purchased some of the Nancy Drew books that were duplicates of ones that I had purchased on eBay just weeks before.  So, some of us understood the scarcity and desirability of the books while few others did.

If you were aware of the listings, you didn't know that I was an important link in the chain of events that led to the books getting listed in eBay.  In fact, I am directly responsible for causing the Japanese series books to be listed on eBay.  Here is what happened.

I have wanted the older Japanese editions of Nancy Drew books for many years.  The books are so neat but so hard to find.  I cannot read or write Japanese, so that is a huge barrier.  I have found a few books over the years, mainly recent paperback titles that are much less interesting than the older editions.

Almost 11 years ago, I found a Japanese site that showed pictures of some Japanese series books.  I saved the images to this blog so that I would at least have that.  I didn't know if the Japanese site would stay up, and I wanted to be able to see the pictures even if I was never able to own the books.

Japanese Editions of Series Books

Japanese Editions of Series Books Part II

I was able to purchase some of the recent Japanese softcover books in the last few years, but those aren't the very neat older editions with slipcases and dust jackets that I so covet.  I did end up with two Nancy Drew books with slipcases and dust jackets in a couple of random purchases in the last few years.  Aside from that, I had no luck.

In the spring of 2018, a Japanese seller listed a small bulk lot of one of the modern Japanese paperback formats, one that I didn't have.  After I received the books, I started thinking about how to find the older editions.  I used Lea Fox's site to paste some of the titles into the Amazon Japan site and located some of the Yomiuri Shimban books from the 1980s that have dust jackets.  I used Google Translate to translate the pages.  The prices weren't bad, but the sellers didn't have international shipping set up.  I might have been able to figure something out, but the situation would have been difficult and far out of my comfort zone.

Here is one of the product pages on Amazon Japan.

I kept thinking about the situation and finally decided to send a message to the seller of the books that I had most recently purchased on eBay.  I was shocked when that seller then listed some of the Yomiuri Shimban books from the late 1970s and early 1980s with dust jackets.  Eureka!  The books were a bit expensive, but I wanted them.  I purchased the books, and that was money well spent.  Guess why?

Immediately after I purchased those books, at least two other Japanese sellers then listed additional copies of the same books for sale.  The sellers must have software that tracks what has sold on eBay so that they know what to list.

Suddenly, Japanese Nancy Drew books were readily available on eBay!  Best of all, one of those Japanese sellers began to list the very hard to find old Japanese editions with slipcases and dust jackets.  Wow.

When the books were mentioned on Facebook, some people questioned why the prices were so high.  Some thought that it would be better to go to Japan and find the books.  Assuming that the books could be found, one still has to pay airfare, lodging, and transportation.  The books would not be cheap once the other costs were factored in.  Of course, if one were to be going to Japan anyway, then the cost of the trip would be irrelevant.

However, this is assuming that the books can actually be found in Japan.  I have heard about collectors who have traveled to other countries and tried to find series books as they vacation.  They usually cannot find any, or they find very few.  The international editions are not just laying around waiting for one of us to show up.

I consider it far easier just to buy the books than to try to travel to Japan to purchase them.  If some of the books are priced a bit high, then that cost is a convenience fee.

So very many Japanese series books were listed on eBay in 2018 that I had to make a decision as to whether to purchase all of them.  It was given that I would purchase most of the Nancy Drew books.  I had to make a decision about the other series books that showed up.

In the last couple of years, I have begun to narrow down my collection of international editions to only the series that are the most important to me.  I have sold my Norwegian Cherry Ames and Vicki Barr books.  I am in the process of selling some of my French Dana Girls books.  I find that I do not like most international editions of the Dana Girls series because the covers are too bizarre for my taste.

I do tend to really like the international Judy Bolton books.  I decided to purchase the Japanese Judy Bolton books that came up for sale while passing on the Dana Girls and Vicki Barr books.

I ended up purchasing a rather large number of Japanese Nancy Drew and Judy Bolton books.  Pictures will follow.