Book Grading

 

Books have an important, internationally recognized, grading system that gives buyers a very good idea of what they are buying.

The custom is to grade the book and jacket separately, i.e. a book may be described as "Very Good/Good" meaning the book is in Very Good condition while the jacket is only in Good condition.

Fine: No faults

Near Fine: This is often used to grade slipcased (i.e. Folio Society books) where the book is in Fine condition but the slipcase has some very limited blemishes.

Very Good: Very minor creases/scratches to covers. The book's boards may have a few very minor bumps. Jacket may have a few very minor edge tears. Overall the book and jacket must have a clean and tidy appearance.

Good: Moderate/heavier creases & scratches and minor marks to covers. Jacket may have some edge tears. Boards may have more pronounced bumps. There may be some limited annotations to the text.

Fair: Heavy wear, creases, marks, scratches, annotations, tears to jacket and pages.

Note: Most of our books are in Very Good condition; Some may have the signature of its previous owner inside. In all cases where we grade books we will also provide a description of any faults, i.e. "very small edge tear to jacket.", "folding map to rear has small edge chip.", "previous owner's inscription inside."

We tend to err on the side of caution too, so will often describe a book as "Good" if its "Very Good" grade is in any doubt.

Above all, we want buyers to feel confident that our standards are high, and know that the used books we stock have been selected by a keen and fussy eye in order to ensure buyers are happy and will return to us.