Gardening books at closeout prices

I love books. Fiction or non-fiction, I devour them all. I have over 50 books on and under my bedside table, all waiting to be read. That’s in addition to the thousands of books scattered all over the house. I’ve joked about the second story of our house collapsing under the weight of the books stored up there.

Whenever I’m in a bookstore, I head straight for the clearance bin to see what treasures I might find at a deeply discounted price. I love to be able to save 50, 60 or 70% off the cover price. 80% is dreamy. 90% is nirvana (and exceedingly rare). But in brick-and-mortar bookstores most clearance books are popular fiction, with just a smattering of non-fiction titles and even fewer gardening books.

Now imagine a place where you can find hundreds of gardening books at up to 90% off the cover price! And you don’t have to leave the comfort of home to shop there. This place is called HamiltonBook.com. 15, 20 years ago, I used to pour over their mail-order catalog—densely printed on flimsy stock and folded like a newspaper. That was before online shopping was commonplace. But then Amazon and Abebooks came along and I forgot about Hamilton Book.

Until a couple of weeks ago when by sheer accident I stumbled across their website. Not expecting much, I clicked through to the gardening section—and found over 600 titles! Some of them are current titles sold at a more modest discount, like Timber Press’ Hellstrip Gardening at 32% off, but most of them are closeouts marked down 70% or more. In no time I’d picked out five titles, which came to a total of $31.25. These are books I wouldn’t have paid full price for—especially considering that some of them have a cover price of $50—but I’m willing to take a chance at $4.95 or even $7.95. Gardening in the Deserts of Arizona, for example, was just $2.95—a fantastic 88% off the published price!

So while shopping for books online doesn’t quite give me the visceral thrill that browsing in a brick-and-mortar bookstore offers, it’s the next best thing—and the selection is infinitely greater.

Disclosure: I have no ties whatsoever to Hamilton Book. I’m simply a customer who’s been very satisfied with their selection and service (my books arrived within 10 days).