Windows shopping

I surveyed eight websites of booksellers on the internet (see table 1) and searched each website for 11 books and one CD Rom, all with medical connections. Naturally, vanity and a desire for publicity prompted me to search first for four of my own publications. I then looked for patients’ accounts of their own illnesses—Teresa McLean’s descriptions of her diabetes and epilepsy (has anyone else suffered two different serious diseases in print?) and Joseph Heller’s description of Guillain-Barré syndrome (prompted by the fact that an old colleague and friend of mine recently suffered from it). I also looked for a standard medical dictionary available in both printed form and CD Rom and for two recent books—Narrative-Based Medicine, edited by Trisha Greenhalgh and Brian Hurwitz, which has received a fair amount of exposure, and The Smallest of all Persons Mentioned in the Records of Littleness by Gaby Wood, a delightful little book, which has not. Finally, I looked for a book that I know is out of print, J B S Haldane’s On Being the Right Size and Other Essays.

Table 1 Websites searched
 

Bookseller	URL
Amazon (US)	www.amazon.com
Amazon (UK)	www.amazon.co.uk
Barnes and Noble	www.barnesandnoble.com
British Medical Journal	www.bmjbookshop.com
Dillons	www.dillons.co.uk
IBS (the Internet Bookshop)*	www.bookshop.co.uk
MedScape	www.medbookstore.com
Waterstones	www.waterstones.co.uk

Results

The websites

The different websites offer different levels of information. MedScape and the BMJ Bookshop offer the least, being chiefly catalogues. The others offer information about certain current books, including pictures of the front covers, and other items of news (such as winners of recent awards like the Booker prize and the Whitbread award). The Waterstones website gives the best entertainment (if that’s what you’re looking for); for example, it includes extensive reviews of recent books and has the courage to publish adverse reviews of books that it sells. Barnes and Noble offers links to journals such as the New York Review of Books and the New York Times. IBS (the Internet Bookshop, now known as WHSmith Online), Amazon, and Barnes and Noble invite readers to submit their own reviews, which are as variable in quality as you would expect.

Availability of titles

Table 2 shows the results of my searches: IBS listed most of the titles, and Amazon (UK), Barnes and Noble, and the BMJ Bookshop were not far behind. The advantage of the Amazon (US) catalogue is that it includes a large number of out of print books, which it identifies as such, and offers to try to obtain them. This is an excellent service in my experience; sometimes the prices are rather high, but an order does not commit you to a purchase. Barnes and Noble also offers out of print books in the catalogues of second-hand dealers who subscribe to their service. Alternatively, you can try searching via Bookfinders (www.bookfinders.co.uk).

Table 2 Results of searching seven websites for 12 different publications
 

Publication	Amazon (US)	Amazon (UK)	Barnes and Noble	BMJ Bookshop	Dillons	IBS	MedScape*	Waterstones
ABC of Monitoring Drug Therapy, Aronson et al, BMJ Books, 1993	ü	ü	ü	ü	ü	ü	ü	ü
An Account of the Foxglove and its Medical Uses, 1785-1985, Aronson, OUP, 1985	ü	ü	ü	ü	ü	ü	_	ü
The Oxford Textbook of Clinical Pharmacology and Drug Therapy, 2nd ed, Grahame-Smith and Aronson, OUP, 1992	ü	ü	ü	ü	_	ü	ü	_
Side Effects of Drugs, annuals 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, ed Aronson, Elsevier, 1993-7	ü (17-19)	ü (18)	ü (17–21)	ü (17-21)	_	ü (18, 19)	ü (20, 21)	ü (17, 19, 20)
Metal Jam, McLean, Hodder and Stoughton, 1985; Coronet, 1987	"Out of print"	_	"Out of print"	_	_	_	_	_
Seized, McLean, Richard Cohen Books, 1996	_	_	ü	ü	ü	ü	_	_
No Laughing Matter, Heller and Vogel, Primus, 1995	ü	ü	ü	_	_	ü	_	_
Dorland's Illustrated Medical Dictionary, 28th ed, WB Saunders, 1994	ü	ü	ü	ü	_	ü	ü	_
Dorland's Electronic Medical Dictionary, CD Rom, WB Saunders, 1998	ü	ü	ü	ü	_	ü	ü	_
Narrative-Based Medicine, ed Greenhalgh and Hurwitz, BMJ Books, 1998	_	ü	ü	ü	ü	ü	ü	ü
The Smallest of all Persons Mentioned in the Records of Littleness, Wood, Profile Books/LRB, 1998	_	ü	_	_	ü	ü	_	ü
On Being the Right Size and Other Essays, Haldane, ed Maynard Smith, OUP, 1985	"Out of print"	"May be available," later informed "Out of print"	_	_	_	_	_	_
No of hits out of 12	7 (9†)	9 (10†)	9 (10†)	8	5	10	6	5

*MedScape lists many titles of which it has no copies available.

†Including titles listed but marked "Out of print." In the case of Barnes and Noble, the out of print title was available through a second-hand dealer

However, for second-hand books I always first try Bibliofind (www.bibliofind.com). This is both a book finding service and a union catalogue of second-hand books that are currently held by many different (mostly US) booksellers. You search for a title or author, and the catalogue tells you about any copies that are currently available. For example, when I searched for Heller’s No Laughing Matter I found 26 copies, ranging from a "very good paperback" at $4, through a "fine first edition" at $15, to a "very good first edition" at $29.95. Delivery charges vary but in my experience are usually reasonable. If Bibliofind doesn’t list a copy available at the time you can enter the title into a "Personal want list," and when a copy becomes available you will get an email message about it. My limited experience of the Barnes and Noble catalogue of out of print titles is that it does not coincide exactly with that of Bibliofind, so search it if Bibliofind fails.

Discounts

IBS, Amazon, and Barnes and Noble give the best discounts (table 3) and give them on many books (IBS boasts discounts on "1.4 million UK and US titles"). Discounts are variable, and it is worth shopping around. However, it is my impression that IBS has a slight edge over the rest, and this is illustrated by the fact that it was the only site quoting prices in pounds that offered a discount on ABC of Monitoring Drug Therapy. MedScape (prices in dollars) also offered a discount, but its delivery charges are high.

Table 3 Other information about the websites
 

Type of information	Amazon (US)	Amazon (UK)	Barnes and Noble	BMJ	Dillons	IBS	MedScape	Waterstones
Discounts	Up to 40% off many titles	Up to 40% off many titles	Up to 40% off many titles; up to 90% on selected "bargains"	To BMA members	Occasional offers	Up to 40% off many titles	10% off all titles plus occasional special offers	Occasional offers; some discounts on selected titles
Ease of searching	Good	Good	Slow	Slow; variable results*	Variable†	Good	Slow; not user friendly	Not user friendly
Out of print service	Yes	No	Yes	No	No	No	No	Yes
Delivery charges (in or to UK)	$3.95 per shipment + $0.95 per item	£1.95 per shipment + 50p per item	$4 per order + $1.95 per item	£1.50 per item	First book £2; subsequent books £1.75	15% of full book price (minimum £1.95, maximum £6)	Variable; expensive	One paperback £1.50; other orders £3
Security	SSL	SSL	SSL	SSL	SSL	"The latest security software from Microsoft"	SSL	SSL
Example of cost + delivery charges and quoted delivery date‡	$18 + $4.90 "Usually ships within 4-6 weeks (but may not be available at all)"	£9.95 + £2.45 "Available in 2-3 days"	$18 + $5.96 "24 hours"	£9.95 (£8.95 to BMA members) + £1.50§	£9.95 + £2 "3 days"	£8.96 + £1.95§	$16.16 + $9.50 "Back ordered" (No copies currently available)	£9.95 + £1.50 "5-7 days"

SSL=Secure Sockets Layer.

*Best to used "advanced search" facility.

†Sometimes sends message: "Sorry. We are currently unable to deal with your request. One of our staff has been notified." Later, the information becomes available.

‡For ABC of Monitoring Drug Therapy.

§No information on delivery date; in my experience books from IBS often arrive within a day or two.
 

Ease of searching

All the sites have a "quick search" facility, allowing you to enter just the surname of the author or the name of the book (table 3). The performance of this type of search varies from site to site: for example, the BMJ Bookshop’s search engine is particularly slow and does not always give a result, even when the book is listed in the catalogue. Each site also offers a more detailed search procedure, allowing you to enter a variety of details such as the title, author, publisher, and ISBN. These generally perform well. Other interactive features, such as the ordering schemes, vary in ease of use.

Delivery charges

Delivery charges vary widely (table 3). If there is a large discount the total cost may still be below the publisher’s price, but often you will have to pay more for the book than if you went down to the shop yourself. Obviously, if you order more than one book the delivery charge will be proportionately less per book, and some sites waive the delivery charges altogether if you make a large order (over £40 with IBS, £45 with Waterstones, £50 with the BMJ Bookshop). Books that I have ordered (from Amazon, IBS, and Waterstones) have arrived well packaged and in mint condition.

Security

You can usually order books by telephone or fax, giving your credit card details in the usual way. However, it is much simpler to order by email; you need enter your details only once, and they will be used on all subsequent occasions. However, if you order by email you will have to trust the security system that the website uses. The system that most of them quote is called SSL (Secure Sockets Layer), which uses public key encryption and which you can read about at www.consensus.com/security/ssl-talk-faq.html and home.netscape.com/eng/ssl3/ssl-toc.html. Although any code is in principle susceptible to being cracked, in practice it would take considerable expertise and a lot of time on a very powerful computer to crack a public key code, and I am inclined to think that this system is satisfactorily secure (see www.rsa.com/rsalabs/faq/html/questions.html for more information about public key cryptography in general).

Prices and shopping around

The prices of books can vary substantially between booksellers, and it is always worth searching around for the best deal. Sometimes the same bookseller stocks different editions of the same book at widely different prices. The only book on my list that was stocked by all seven suppliers was ABC of Monitoring Drug Therapy, and table 3 gives the current prices and delivery charges for each website. IBS came out best, unless you are a member of the BMA, in which case you would pay a few pence less by ordering from the BMJ Bookshop.

There is now what should be a very efficient way of shopping around: a "Comparison Shopping Service" provided by Acses (www.acses.com). This service is not a bookseller. Instead, it searches the catalogues of many booksellers and gives information about which is the cheapest. I asked Acses to find the ABC of Monitoring Drug Therapy, and it quoted the costs from 18 different suppliers, with overall prices ranging from £9.45 to £32.75. Table 4 shows the six sites offering the lowest overall prices for the book. I have not used Acses yet for purchasing, and I am not sure how much to rely on the information it gives. For example, the total cost it quoted me from IBS was £9.93, about £1 less than the price that IBS quoted direct (table 3). When I asked Acses to quote me the lowest costs for a package of four recently published books worth over £60 it quoted delivery charges of £6 from IBS, which advertises free delivery for orders over £40.

Table 4 Six cheapest suppliers of ABC of Monitoring Drug Therapy according to Acses
 

Supplier	Item price	Discount	Shipping			Delivery time	Total cost
			Service	Time	Cost
countrybookstore.co.uk	£9.45	14%	Unknown	1-2 days	0	NA	£9.45
IBS	£7.96	27%	Unknown	2-3 days	£1.97	4-5 days	£9.93
Alphabetstreet	£8.46	23%	Standard	1-3 days	£1.95	NA	£10.41
			Fast	1 day	£4.95	NA	£13.41
Amazon (UK)	£7.96	27%	1st class post	1-3 days	£2.45	4-6 days	£10.41
Blackwell's	£9.95	9%	Standard	1-3 days	£1.75	NA	£11.70

Conclusions

The internet offers a great way to shop for new and second-hand books. Of course, I still like to browse around the bookshops, handle the volumes, and discover books that I wouldn’t have come across otherwise. And nothing replaces the thrill in a second-hand bookshop of finding a clean edition of an unexpected treasure. But I sometimes begrudge time spent browsing that could have been spent reading, so when I want a particular book I order it, usually from IBS or Amazon (whichever offers the better overall price), and expect to receive it within a day or two. Incidentally, I got a copy of On Being the Right Size through Bibliofind.

Jeff Aronson, clinical reader in clinical pharmacology, Radcliffe Infirmary, Oxford

Rapid Responses:

Read all Rapid Responses

Quality of packaging

Paul Bishop
bmj.com, 15 May 1999 [Full text]

Free delivery from ommitted bookshop

Peter English
bmj.com, 17 May 1999 [Full text]

Pitfalls of buying books through the net.

Gururaj Aithala
bmj.com, 24 May 1999 [Full text]