Search Guidelines

Search Facilities
Quick Search
Advanced Search
Surname
First name
Title

Advanced Search Options

Special Book Room
Keywords
ISBN
Publisher
Date
First Edition
Signed
Dustwrapper
Hardback
Order Results By
Refine Search
New Search
Saving Your Search Criteria

Search Facilities

Two search facilities are provided:
Quick Search available at the top of every page on the site
Advanced Search available from the link to the right of the Quick Search box or from the link on the left of every page

Quick Search allows you to enter author last name and/or book title. Enter your search criteria and press enter or click on GO. The search criteria guidelines are the same as for Advanced Search

Advanced Search allows you to enter more information to narrow your search results. All the advanced search sections are optional but you must enter at least one search criterion to produce any results. The following tips explain how to get the best results from your advanced search.

Search criteria can be entered in upper or lower case, the results will be the same. Enter your search criteria and click either of the search buttons or press the enter key.

To get the best results from a search by author or illustrator, enter both the surname and first name of the author or illustrator.

Surname
Author and illustrator surname (last name) must be entered in full as the search engine looks for an exact match on surname. E.g. Bly will not find Blyton, Smith will not find Smithson etc

First name
First names should be entered in full unless the author is known by first name initials e.g. A.A. Milne or W.E. Johns.

If the first name is initials, enter each initial followed by a full stop but with no spaces.

e.g. Milne A. A. or Johns W. E. or Shepard E. H. will all produce results.

BUT
Milne A . A . or Milne A A or Johns W . E . or Johns W E or Shepard E . H . or Shepard E H will not produce any results

If you enter the first letter or letters of the first name our search engine will return any names that match the letters entered.

e.g. surname Smith first name M will find
Martin Smith
Melvin Smith
Marion Smith
Etc.

If you enter a full stop after the initial
e.g. surname Smith first name M . this will only find
M . Smith

Title
You can enter any words or numbers contained in the title and in any order. If the title contains punctuation marks you do not need to type in the punctuation, the title will still be found
      e.g. if the book title is Well Really, Mr. Twiddle! entering well really mr twiddle without the punctuation will
     find the book

Just below the Title search box you will see a row of three 'radio' buttons. You can click any one of these buttons to choose how the words you enter in the Title search box are handled:-

All words - if checked, this will find ONLY books which have all the entered word(s) in the title of the book.
Any words - if checked, this will find books which have ANY or ALL of the entered word(s) in the title.
Exact phrase - if checked, this will find ONLY books which have a title that includs the entered text EXACTLY AS IT IS TYPED.

Advanced Search Options

Special Book Room
The special book room houses our most colectable, rare and fragile books. Books in this collection are generally priced at £90 and above.

Keyword(s)
If you do not know the title of the book you are searching for you may wish to use the Keyword search. This will search the title and description for the word(s) entered. For example, if you are interested in books about dogs you could enter 'dog' as a keyword. This will find all books that have the word dog in the title and / or those books which have the word dog in the description.

Below the Keyword search box is a row of three 'radio' buttons which allow you to choose how the keywords are handled:-

All words - if checked, this will find ONLY books which have ALL the entered keyword(s) in the title and / or description of the book.
Any words - if checked, this will find books which have ANY or ALL of the entered keyword(s) words in the title and / or description.
Exact phrase - if checked, this will find ONLY books which have the entered keyword(s) EXACTLY AS TYPED in the title and / or description.

ISBN (International Standard Book Number)
If you want to find a book with a specific ISBN number enter the ISBN as a row of figures with no spaces or hyphens
e.g. 0006383173

Publisher
Any word or words from the publisher name may be entered but they must be an exact phrase from the publisher name
e.g. Nelson or Thomas Nelson will find all books published by Thomas Nelson & Sons Ltd.

Date
You can find all books published in a particular year or a specific decade
e.g. 1968 will find all books published in 1968
196 will find all books published between 1960 and 1969

First Edition
Check this box to restrict your search to first editions. This selection will also find editions which are first in a particular format, often described as “First thus”. For example The Wind In The Willows was first published in 1908 with only one black and white illustration by Graham Robertson, this would be described as “1st 1908”. The book was later illustrated by many artists, including E.H. Shepherd and Arthur Rackham, whose works are collectable in their own right. The first editions of these would be described as “First thus”. These will also be selected if the First Edition box is checked.

Signed
Check this box if you only want to find signed books. These would include books signed by the author, illustrator or publisher, or association and presentation copies. It does NOT include inscriptions by previous owners.

Dustwrapper
Check this box if you only want to find books which have dustwrappers. These are usually hardback books although some softcover books do have dustwrappers to protect them.

Hardback
Check this box if you want to restrict your search to hardback books only.

Order Results By
Price Low to High will show the lowest price books first
Price High to Low will show the highest priced books first
Most Recent Stock will show the most recently catalogued books first
Title will sort the results by title
Author will sort the results by author
Illustrator will sort the results by illustrator

The search results will tell you how many books have been found which meet your search criteria and the first 20 will be displayed. You can then select the links for next page, last page or previous page to scroll through the results.

Refine Search
Click this link to return to the advanced search form and retain your search criteria.

New Search
Click this link to return to the advanced search form and start a new search.

Saving Your Search Criteria
If you have registered with us you can save your favourite searches. You will then be able to execute your search by simply clicking on a link in your account.