Linda's Scenic Tour through the United States

I have owned a copy of Linda by Mildred Wirt Benson for many years.  I used to own one without a jacket and later upgraded to this one with a faded and chipped dust jacket.  The jacket has a name written near the top of the front panel.

I have owned the above book and dust jacket since 2008.

In late May, I saw an online listing for Linda with a dust jacket that appeared to be better than mine.  The price was not cheap but it was also within what I considered to be a fair price without being too high.  This meant that should the book and dust jacket have failed to meet my quality expectations for any reason, I knew that I could probably at least get my money back by selling it.  I prefer just to resell disappointments when possible rather than have to mess with returning them to the seller.

Let me assure you that I do return books to sellers when the books are significantly not as described, like the time that I received books that had undisclosed severe water damage and that were actually wet when I removed them from that package.  Those situations are the ones where I hold the seller responsible.

It's a different situation when I think a book is an upgrade but don't know for sure how I will regard the book once it is in my hands.  If I am not quite satisfied, then I consider it to be my problem.  That's when I resell the book.  What often happens is that I make a slight profit, so it works out for me.

I did purchase the offered copy of Linda on May 26.  The tracking indicated that the seller printed the label on May 26 and dropped the package off on May 28.  Linda should have arrived here by June 4, but she decided to go on a scenic tour.

The book went from Illinois to Iowa and then to Dallas, Texas.  Most of my packages come through Dallas.  The book came here to Oklahoma City, a couple of days later than expected, but no problem.

Linda then detoured to Utah.  I was mildly concerned, but not overly so.  The seller is a professional bookseller whose listings state that books are mailed in boxes.  So long as the book was in a box, it was probably okay.  It was just a bit concerning for such an extremely scarce book to go on a scenic tour.

After Utah, Linda went to Colorado and then arrived in Oklahoma City for the second time.  Finally, Linda arrived today, a week later than expected but safely nonetheless.

The image below shows the tracking information for the package.  Always click or tap on an image to see a larger version.

Linda did indeed arrive in a box.

Thankfully, the box was not damaged.

And as for Linda, both the book and dust jacket made it through the journey just fine.

The dust jacket does have chipping as well as fading to the spine, but I do consider it better than the one I already had.  As almost always seems to happen these days, the upgrade cost a bit less than my old one did.

Some collectors hold out for perfect copies.  With scarce books like this one, I just get what I can and feel happy to have it.  I was satisfied with my previous copy.

To some of you, the new copy probably doesn't look much better.  The new copy is seen on the left in the below photo.

In person, the difference in condition between the two copies is more obvious.  The jacket on my new acquisition still has a shiny surface.  The color is more striking because it is less soiled.  In person, the new one looks a lot better even though the actual condition is just marginally better.

I will sell my old copy at some point.  It will probably be priced somewhere between what I paid for the old copy and the new copy, so for less than what I paid for the old copy and for more than what I paid for the new copy.  Sometimes I will just average the prices and go with that amount.

The below screen capture shows current online listings for Linda as seen on Bookfinder.com.

These books have not sold, which means that most of them are likely priced too high.  There are actually only three different books available, since two of the sellers have their books listed on multiple sites.  The first listing at $216 has an original jacket and is within the price range of what I paid for my two books.  I feel that the $216 book is probably priced fairly.

The other two books have reproduction dust jackets, so I feel that both books are grossly overpriced.  Since the jackets are not original, those books are worth no more than a bare book without a dust jacket.  For Linda, even a bare book is quite scarce, but most people probably would not pay more than $100 for a bare book, if even that.