My Collection Parameters Part 5: Nancy Drew Sets

I have already mentioned how I have limited my sets of international editions and library editions.  This post covers my sets of Nancy Drew books as published by Grosset & Dunlap, Simon & Schuster, and Applewood.

With Nancy Drew, I would love to have everything, but I don't have room for everything along with my other collections.  

I don't care for the Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys Super Mysteries or the Nancy Drew On Campus series.  I tried reading both series and couldn't get past the first few books.  I found both sets to be lacking, so I sold them.

I did have the complete set of Nancy Drew Files #1-124 in softcover.  I then began building a set in the hardcover library editions.  I'm not that fond of the Files series.  I found the second half of the set to be very repetitive and often boring.  As I've worked on my set of hardcover Files, I've sold the corresponding paperback copies.  I still have a complete set of Files, but the set is now mostly hardcover with paperback copies filling in the gaps.  Eventually, I hope to have the complete hardcover set with no paperback copies.

I have all of Nancy Drew #57-175 in both softcover and hardcover books.  I have all of them in hardcover library bindings.  I have all of the softcover books in first printing copies, all cover art variants, and most titles in second printing copies without the first printing blurb on the front cover.

I do not collect the flashlight editions.  I owned a set for around a year quite a few years ago.  I sold them as my library editions sets increased.

I have true first printings per Farah's Guide of all Nancy Drew hardcover Grosset & Dunlap titles from #1-56.  I have all first printing picture cover editions.  I have most of the first printing revised text picture cover editions.  I do have some restrictions on what else I keep for these books.

I do not collect the picture cover editions with the Cookbook ad on the back cover.  That would make nearly another complete set of the books, and I just don't have space for them.

I do collect the picture cover editions with double oval endpapers.  I didn't for many years, but I finally ran across some in excellent condition.  I decided that the books are well worth having if in excellent condition.

These photos show my near-complete set of Nancy Drew books with double oval endpapers.

I do not try to get every Nancy Drew title in every format.  For instance, I don't care whether I have a tweed Old Clock with all endpaper variants (blue silhouette, digger, and blue multi endpapers).  It suffices to have the first wrap dust jacket printing and the first revised text printing.  I don't have to have all three endpapers in the tweed edition.

I have a number of thick books with the glossy frontispiece only, but I don't necessarily have all of #1-17 in that format.  It's not important to me to have all of them.

I do have all of Nancy Drew #1-13 with glossy internals, since I have all of them in first printing books matched with first printing jackets.

I do have a set of Nancy Drew #1-18 with dust jackets that list to #18 and have the blue silhouette spine symbol.  My set is shown in the next photo.

I mentioned in a previous post that I've sold many of my books that have pulp paper.  I decided to sell my Nancy Drew books with Dana Girls endpapers.  I never was concerned about finding all of them and never did have all of them.  It's just not a variant that is extremely important to me. 

I think this is because of my strong aversion to pulp paper.  The particular books that I acquired with Dana Girls endpapers were not in very good shape because of how cheaply they were made.  I didn't care to keep them.

I've gone back and forth on the Applewood editions.  I will always keep my FAO Schwarz boxed set of Applewood #1-8.  Since it would be too hard for me to get at my set, follow this link to see a picture of the set from Jenn Fisher's Pinterest.

That aside, I'm not concerned with having a set of Applewood editions.  Years ago, I sold all of my Applewood copies of #9-21.  I later became motivated to collect them again when the prices went up.  I found copies inexpensively and kept those copies for a number of years.  I sold them again in the last year. 

I like the old books better.  I don't need the Applewood editions and don't care for them because of how tightly bound they are.  The tight binding makes them harder to read than the older books.  I would prefer reading any old Grosset & Dunlap original text book over an Applewood edition.  I even prefer reading my library editions over the Grosset & Dunlap editions.  The last time I read through Nancy Drew #1-56, I read my library editions.

As with my previous posts, I have not mentioned all of my parameters, but this should give you an idea.

In conclusion, I have had to place parameters on my collection because I have too many interests which have caused me to collect far more than I can comfortably display and enjoy.  I also collect vintage teen books, and complete sets of Sweet Valley High, Christopher Pike, Dark Forces, First Love from Silhouette, and all the others take up a lot of space just like my series books do.  I have had to reduce what I have due to how very many books are of interest to me.