Best Seller Classic Series; Published by Award Books, Inc., NY NY

At my brothers passing i received a set of four books that have no other information on them accept the above. They are bound in a red leatherette finish and are of the following titles:

Call of the Wild, Jack London
Arabian Nights
Treasure Island, Robert L. Stevenson
Tales of Mystery, Edgar Allan Poe

Does anyone know anything about these books?

T

I took a look at Worldcat (Link: http://www.worldcat.org/search?q=Best+Seller+Classic+Series&qt=owc_search ) and see 6 titles plus a peridocial. Besides two of your titles, this page lists The Invisible man of H G Wells, The Scarlet Letter of Nathaniel Hawthorne, Tom Sawyer of Mark Twain, Captains Courageous of Rudyard Kipling, but not the Arabian Nights or Tales of Mystery by Edgar Allan Poe.

This is a publishers series of very popular novels in many editions. They are hard to find out about, because most libraries have a bunch of other editions, and did not try to get the editions that yours are part of. Worldcat has question marks by each of the dates for these titles, which means that their compilers has little to go on. These books were probably all beyond copyright, so neither the Library of Congress nor the Catalog of Copyright Entries will have info.

LT doesn't really have good edition information, so maybe someone else can tell you something more.

I, too, have obtained a red leatherette finished copy of The Scarlet Letter by Award Books, Inc., NY NY. This message board is the closest I've come to discovering the date of publishing or print. Though I hold little hope that any of you are still active, please respond with any information! Thank you!

See these ABE searches.

https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/SearchResults?bi=0&bsi=50&bx=on&ds=...

https://www.abebooks.com/servlet/BookDetailsPL?bi=19997332376&searchurl=pn%3...

It appears that in the years before and after 1950 Award had a series called "Bestseller Classics" (sometimes maybe "Family Classics" too) usually bound in red or blue leatherette, although it looks like they might have been issued in paperback as well at one point. Looks like there were 15 or so titles.

As compiled from the ABE searches there were:
1 Treasure Island
2 Black Beauty
3 Tom Sawyer
4 Call of the Wild
5 Alice in Wonderland
6 ?
7 Arabian Nights
8 ?
9 Poe -Tales of Mystery
10 ?
11 Scarlet Letter
12 ?
13 ?
14 ?
15 ?

According to dealer listing, also in the series were O.Henry-Great Short Stories; Kipling-Captains Courageous; Wizard of Oz; Adventures of Sherlock Holmes; The Invisible Man; Heidi; and A Christmas Carol. This would fill 'er up to 15.

The second ABE search there is from a dealer who says he has 11 of 12 titles and appears to give them numbers, but none of his numbers match the list I've constructed from multiple witnesses on the first search., Also, he says the missing one is #10, and then assigns a title to #10. I think he just listed 11 books with randomly assigned numbers.

Is your copy of The Scarlet Letter printed as Vol 6? If so, are you interested in selling it? I stumbled upon a set of 1-12 in a thirft shop, but am missing #6!

The Scarlet Letter
Family Classics
Best Seller Classic Series
Award Books, Inc

So people are aware, I have another book from I believe the same published collection as it is bound in red leatherette. Heidi by Johanna Spyri. I cannot find any print number on it however, and the binding is very loose.