Is "Moonshine Pours Down on Thomasville" a book?

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Is "Moonshine Pours Down on Thomasville" a book?

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1TallyDi Primo messaggio
Feb 8, 2007, 2:42 pm

Moonshine Pours Down on Thomasville: Dark Secrets Behind Sweet Flowers in a Small Georgia Town is by Katherine Hicks Brackson who was a native of Thomasville, Georgia.

William Faulkner would have loved this thing. It's definitely rare and offbeat, about ten years old, but is it a book? I found my copy in a used book store, and in it the author states that she sold 500 copies (at $25 each) by placing an ad in the New Yorker Magazine. The title page says, "Copyright certificate of registration, May 1996." It does not have an ISBN. It is photocopied and spiral bound with a paper cover.

So do I shelve it with the strange pamphlets I tend to pick up, or do I catalog it with my books?

2artisan
Feb 8, 2007, 3:03 pm

Interesting question. In cases like this, the first place to look is at the Library of Congress. They issue the "Copyright certificate of registration". They don't list either the title or the author. If she deposited the required copies to register her copyright, it should be listed.

So, it's not indexed as a book, but she may not have deposited copies. Is it a pamphlet? Spiral bound, perhaps not. How about "booklet". Nice compromise. Now, if you didn't have a collection of booklets, you do now.

Next question: Do you catalog your collection of booklets on LT? :-)

3lilithcat
Feb 8, 2007, 3:24 pm

Suonds like a book to me. Lack of an ISBN doesn't mean it's not a book. Neither does lack of registration. You don't have to register a copyright (it's wise, but not necessary). Spiral-bound? I have plenty of spiral-bound books.

Including my favorite: Boundless.

Oh, it is registered. See here

4MaggieO
Feb 8, 2007, 3:30 pm

TallyDi - How many pages does it have? How big is it? And, perhaps most important, do YOU think it's a book?

I have a similar problem with small press poetry (I have a couple that are actually sewn bindings, not stapled), and self-published books on weaving. For the purposes of my own LT library, if it has some sort of binding (even if just stapled), and if I think it's a book, it's a book.

Can anyone offer some clear definitions of what constitutes a book, booklet, chapbook, pamphlet, etc.?

5TallyDi
Feb 8, 2007, 3:41 pm

Wow! I've been using this LT about three days now and already experts are solving my mysteries! Lilithcat, I used your link and found the the registration. So I get to move my copy from the weird pamphlets shelf to the weird books shelf and enter it into my LT catalog.

Now if I can locate a copy of her other book The Legend of Loomis Langdon.

6TallyDi
Modificato: Feb 9, 2007, 1:11 pm

>#2

Heaven preserve me! I have to do the real books before I tackle that question. If a boat is a hole in the water into which you pour money, then LT is a cyberspace into which you pour whatever time you have left from reading.

7TallyDi
Modificato: Feb 9, 2007, 1:13 pm

>4 MaggieO:

It has 109 pages, according to the registration at the U.S. Copyright Office (thanks, lilithcat). And since it is registered, I'm placing it with my books and will enter it into my LT collection. And since I, too, tend to collect strange printed material, I'd like some suggstions as to what constitutes a book, booklet, chapbook, pamphlet, etc.

8lilithcat
Feb 8, 2007, 4:29 pm

> 5

I learned a long time ago to try a search like this a couple of different ways. I tried by the author's name, but, as you see, it's spelled differently on the LOC's site. So I tried the title. Bingo!

>7 TallyDi:

As to what constitutes a book, well, that's a much-debated question. Is a scroll with text a book? What if it just has images? How about a Jacob's Ladder like In Adam's Fall or a torn-up text in a box like Election Results? Is it a matter of intent? A pamphlet may be a couple of sheets intended to be briefly used and then tossed (I'm thinking about, for instance, a political candidate's election brochures), or it may be one signature intended to be put on your shelf and read and consulted. The latter seems to me to be a book; I'm not sure about the former.

9artisan
Feb 8, 2007, 4:32 pm

#1, #3> Spelling counts. The registration shows her name is BLackson, not BRackson.

But simply because it's registered still doesn't help with the question, since the registration is lumped with all sorts of textual matter, volumes, pamphlets, booklets,,,etc. ("books" isn't one of them, "volumes" is!)

I say 109 pages means book, regardless of binding.

10JimThomson
Gen 29, 2011, 10:35 pm

>#1 Hey, if it reads like a book, where the back of a page has more printing in sequence with the front, then it's a book. "If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's probably a duck."