Channel News - 17th of June

I have some news and updates regarding my channel, and specifically my uploading schedule, that I want to cover in this post.

In these first five months of 2018 I have had a lot of university work to do, and so naturally the channel's uploading rate has suffered. I initially wanted to upload three videos a week but very quickly realised that it would take too much of my free-time to do so. Instead I decided abandon the Sunday & Wednesday uploading schedule and try to upload whenever I had time (which was not that often).

But I'm done with university now and of course... work follows. On Monday (17th of June) I start a full-time job and will work all summer long. This means that I will most likely only record and edit videos during the weekends.

So this is what I will try to do:

- Upload one review video per week (usually on Sundays).
- Plan/schedule more educational videos (I have two videos in mind that I have wanted to film for the longest of time).
- In case of lack of time during busy times, try to release a 'book talk' video or similar.

I'm really sorry that I can't promise more videos and I know that I have so many books to share (with this rate it will take possibly years before I even catch up to all of the books I own, and since I get new ones every-so-often, I doubt I ever will, hah!).

But now for some fun news!

The Folio Society Summer-Sale is just around the corner, and I will most likely pick up a few titles then, so a haul will follow!
And after the haul I will record my fourth(!) bookshelf tour. I know this one will be exciting because so much has happened with my collection.

I'm sure some of you know that I have been selling a lot of books, and I have pretty much stayed within a specific book budget for all of my purchases during the last six to eight months (selling books and buying new ones for that money), and so my budget has limited any expansion in my library. I have traded books I didn't want with books I did want and so the collection has stayed at a steady +-0 (almost). But there's still many new books to show!

I want to thank every single one of you for all of the support and love throughout these years. I always have big plans in mind and I have a pretty decent idea of how this channel will look like in the upcoming years (but more of that in an upcoming post), and I hope all of you will be aboard when (if) changes start to happen... but no drastic changes - just switching the headlights on something else. ;-)

Have a great day!

On Making a Personal Library

In the recent weeks I have had a revelation when it comes to my own personal library, i.e., all of the books I own and all of the books I'm planning to purchase.
I have many times looked over my books and thought, "why do I collect these books? Why do I continue collecting them?", and not very often do I manage to come up with an answer other than: "Well, these books are nice and I like nice books!" But should there be a limit to what I collect? How do I want my library to grow? Should I just pick up books on impulse? Books that I never have read before? Asking these questions I realised that I have for the last two years bought books that have no personal meaning to me. I have purchased books in the dark, ignoring the content. This would of course be okay if I purchased cheap paperbacks, but when I buy books that are "premium priced" that one could technically get for free (library or Gutenberg), why do I continue buying books that I don't know if I will end up liking?

Sitting on my shelf are books by Franz Kafka, William Faulkner, James Joyce, etc., authors that I barely or never have read. Will I enjoy reading them? I don't know. Why did I buy the books? In hope that I would enjoy reading them. Maybe.
And when it comes to it, I also wonder how much exactly my YouTube channel has dictated over my book buying habits. Would I have bought the new Lovecraft edition from the Folio Society? The Exorcist? I really doubt that, to be completely honest.
I have stated before that I absolutely do not want my book buying habits to be influenced by my channel but it is impossible to say that it is not so.
And I have therefor come to the conclusion that I have built a psuedo-personal library. A library built on expectation, want and ignorance.

What will I do about it? Replan and rebuild. From here on, I will not purchase a single book that I either, (1) Have not read and loved/highly enjoyed, or (2) Have not read other books from that same author before and liked the work. Very simple and effective. I don't need to read a £100 book from an author that I have never read before. I could read the book for free, £5 or maybe £10 instead and see beforehand what I think about it.
This to most people make sense, I assume. This is probably how most people collect and build their libraries. It saves time and money.

But did I not mention "rebuild" earlier? Yes. I will sell a part of my collection. A healthy part that is. And it has already begun. A few days ago I sold my Folio Society edition of American Gods. I'm planning to sell my comics (Saga and Y: The Last Man) and other books, from various publishers, until I feel I have a good base to start on.

How will this effect my channel? Well, in the short term, not at all. I will make videos of all the books I have in my collection like you are used to and for those books I'm planning to sell, I will of course make a video about that edition as well before I ship it away.
In the long term then? It is hard to say but I do imagine that you will not see too many new releases from the Folio Society, or other publishers, unless they publish books I already have read. And I know that I will take a bigger step (not that I have taken one before) towards comic books. There will absolutely be a decrease in size of my collection. At least at first.
So all in all, I think that my channel will become more personalized, since that is what I wanted in the beginning. My channel is called Pontus Presents after all, and I wanted to present the things that I had in my life that I enjoyed so I could help you know the product better before you make any purchases.

Changes are always bound to happen sometime or another. I have broken the spell that my books has had on me and it's time to purge. And let me tell you this: not a single book on my bookshelf is safe from this purge. So in the spirit of Halloween, let's break some spines! Mohahahahahahahahahahahahahahaaaaa...

I joined the TASCHEN affiliate program!

How I make money through my videos:

I have for the past year tried to find solutions on how I can make my YouTube channel more profitable. Recording and editing my videos take hours each week, and if I wanted to be able to afford to take that time of my free time, I had to find good ways to bring in some extra profit.
Placing ads on my videos was my first solution, and I have now had ads on my videos for over a year.

But relative low numbers of viewers results in low ad revenue (who would have thought!), and therefor I created a Patreon page.
I did not expect people to support me on Patreon, but to my delight, the warm hearts of a few book lovers wanted support my channel, and I have at this moment three Patrons raising $27 per month! Quite the blessing in my eyes since that prove me that people care about the content I make, and it drives me to do my absolute finest job in presenting both the books I show, but also sharing my knowledge of books (which is steadily growing). 

A few days ago the Online Sales Director of TASCHEN contacted me. She had watched my video (Hiroshige: One Hundred Famous Views of Edo), and wondered if I wanted to be part of their new affiliate program. I, of course, answered yes!

How the TASCHEN affiliate program works:

It is very simple. You can probably see the TASCHEN banner on the top right on this page (as long as you don't use any adblocker). If you click on that banner, you will get transfered to the TASCHEN website. So if you ever want to buy books from TASCHEN (which I warm heartedly can recommend) and also want to support my channel, simply just click on any of my TASCHEN links and make a purchase afterwards, and in that way I get a small % of the deal, while you don't pay any extra!

I will have links on my blog (through that lovely looking banner) and in my description on YouTube!

Affiliate programs is a great way for both viewers and creators, and I will most likely have deals and discounts in the future!

Thank you all for showing your support in all various ways. Every single like, share and comment is amazing. A big thanks to my Patrons too.

Here is the link to TASCHEN: https://click.linksynergy.com/fs-bin/click?id=vIxud*czJT0&offerid=525115.8&subid=0&type=4

Folio Society Updates: LE The Count of Monte Cristo & Double Philip K. Dick!

After the quite underwhelming Autumn Collection (for some people), the Folio Society has decided to bring out two new titles today. A 500 copies limited edition of Dumas' The Count of Monte Cristo and a two cover, double illustrated, colour frenzied thing of madness! It is of course Philip K. Dick's two dystopian science-fiction works, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep together with A Scanner Darkly. 

The Count of Monte Cristo - Limited Edition

But why not talk a bit about the limited edition of The Count of Monte Cristo first. The book is bound in goatskin leather, it is signed by the artist Roman Pisarev. But honestly, does it not look a bit like a more cleaned up Barnes & Noble Leatherbound Collection Edition?
I have yet to read The Count of Monte Cristo, but this LE does not really intrigue me at all. Don't get me wrong, I like the low limitation number, signature and the illustrations but the resemblance to other, much cheaper, leatherbound books don't really attract me.

Limited Edition of The Count of Monte Cristo

I'm sure both Monte Cristo enthusiasts and Pisarev fans will like the book quite a bit though. The price is also not half bad at £195!

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep & A Scanner Darkly - Philip K. Dick

Another book joins the trio of Folio Society's "collectors edition" at the gripping price of £75. So far we have Dune, The Call of Cthulhu..., and American Gods. I own just that trio myself but I will not plunge for this edition (at least not right now, but probably in the future).
Being quarter-bound in a... interesting, almost neon-green cloth, with paper(!) sides, I just don't feel it right now. The half-gimmicky idea of having two novels, each on the opposite side of the book is refreshing(?) and I do like the idea from the Folio Society.
Having not read any Dick myself either, I guess that also play a role on me not being that interested.

Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep together with A Scanner Darkly. 

The illustrations? Looks top, and I also appreciate Folio Society making a video showing the book together with a little talk with the artists. Pretty awesome!

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All-in-all an exciting day for Folio Society lovers. I do think that the Philip K. Dick edition will be fairly popular among many science-fiction readers.
But for now I don't think we will see more books until the Christmas Collection in November/December (unless they sneak in a Bond or a Austen book, that is). Might also be time to rest your wallets until the New Year Sale. That is my recommendation!

The Exorcist – Folio Society Reviews

About a year ago the Folio Society had a "poll" on Twitter were The Exorcist by William Peter Blatty was one of five horror titles (if I remember correctly) that you could vote on. I don't know if Folio Society followed up on that poll afterwards but here, one year later, we have The Exorcist.

My initial reaction when the book first arrived was not overly positive. While the typography and simple binding design was attractive and fitting to the book, what I found inside did disappoint me a bit.
The book compared to other Folio Society editions felt a bit cheap. This was mainly due to the paper used (Abbey Lynx Rough Paper) and the paper used for the illustrations.
I still stand by my initial reaction and I will go into more details below.

Burnt-red binding with inverted crucifix

Binding:

There is not much to say about the binding other than that I do really like it. The burnt-red cloth, the embossed letters with an interesting and pleasant typeface, the inverted crucifix. It is simple but it works very well.
The headband is also the same red colour as the binding, and the same with the endpapers. All-in-all a positive experience, with a cloth that both feel and smell good (although, the cloth leaves a powdery/sticky feeling on your hands afterwards, something that I have experienced in other cloth bound editions).

Paper:

The decision to use a completely white paper for this edition makes sense. The Abbey Lynx Rough Paper (will shorten it to ALRP) is a good paper and I do not doubt the quality of it compared with other Folio Society editions. However, my initial reaction was that the paper felt and looked cheap. Maybe I'm too used to other Folio editions cream-coloured paper (that is Abbey Wove Paper) and seeing a white paper inside a Folio book just surprised me. Or maybe I associate white paper with books of lesser quality? I don't know. I still feel that a book like The Exorcist should have a warm cream-coloured paper.

But since the book has coloured chapter headings (illustrated by the artist Jeremy Caniglia), having a white paper makes sense to bring out the correct colours. Even the page numbers are in a brown/gold colour. It is then clear that the Folio Society decided to use a white paper since they used coloured chapter headings and page numbers. It is a very logical decision and I therefor respect the use of ALRP.

Something I don't understand though is the paper used for the illustrations. Why in the world would you not use photographic paper for photographic illustrations?!
For me it ruins a lot having an even thinner paper (I believe it is thinner than ALRP) used for the illustrations and deciding not to use photographic paper. Not only does it bring the quality of the print down when you use regular paper, but it also takes away the feeling of the illustrations. Using photographic paper would undoubtedly bring more authenticity to the illustrations, and authenticity is exactly what you want to experience when you are reading a horror novel that is based on a real life events.

Illustrations: 

And then we have the photographic illustrations by Jeremy Caniglia. They are both realistic and creepy, but I would not say that I enjoy all of them. It is quite hard to differentiate what is what in some of the illustrations. They are also very dark and with the added lack of printing quality, I'm not overly impressed with them.

Illustration of Regan McNeil

Conclusion:

I cannot help but to feel that this edition of The Exorcist was a bit rushed. No original illustrations combined with a simple binding design and a lack of good paper for the illustrations do not convince me that this book is worth its asking price of £40 (plus the quite premium shipping costs...).

But if you are a fellow horror fan, then I guess you wont be able to help yourself. I know that I couldn't...

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Here is a link to my video presentation: https://youtu.be/MQZRWJKwBLk

What is this?

Hello fellow book lovers and book collectors!

I have decided to start a little blog! A little blog about what you might ask? Well, books of course! But here is the thing: on my YouTube channel (Pontus Presents) I solely focus on the very physical aspect of books; the design, the binding, the quality of the paper (maybe I should introduce a smell part to my videos too? I know people do enjoy smelling their books, hmm...)*, but you are probably aware of this already. What do I want with this little blog then? The plan is simple:

This is a blog about all things book collecting and all things beautiful books. Yes. ALL things beautiful books.

Attractive photos of books. Book collecting tips & tricks. In-Depth Reviews. Beautiful books speculations. Me ranting about the Folio Society.

I want this to be a platform dedicated to the utter most elegance of books that are produced with that little extra... that little extra I like to call a book soul. You know when you are holding a book that has a soul compared to a book who lacks one. You can feel it in the binding. You can smell it. You can feel the soul linger on your fingertips when you turn the pages. You know what I mean.

I truly hope you will find your place here and enjoy what I have to share!

That is all for this first post.

I wish you all the best.

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Sincerely,

Pontus.


* I will use parentheses whenever I want express stuff that just suddenly pops into my head. Might get a tad bit weird but we will see how it goes.