Welcome
Ken Sanders Rare Books is a full service antiquarian bookshop in downtown Salt Lake City, Utah. We carry an ever-changing inventory of art, ephemera, maps, photography, and postcards in addition to a vast selection of used and rare books along with a few new books. We also purchase and appraise books. New arrivals and acquisitions are posted to the KSRB website first on Saturday mornings. The inventory will then be posted to the other sites we use abebooks.com, alibris.com, biblio.com, and amazon.com later in the following week.
Our inventory is diverse, and our specialties include Edward Abbey, Wallace Stegner, B. Traven, Utah and the Mormons, Modern First Editions, Grand Canyon, Colorado River & Colorado Plateau, Western Americana, Native Americans, The Intermountain West, Southwest, Yellowstone, Yosemite, Wilderness & National Parks, Public Lands, the Environment, Explorations & Surveys, Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, Nevada, Arizona, New Mexico, Colorado and the Literary West.
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The Name of the Thief: A Portrait of John Charles Gilkey - by Ken Sanders
During my four-year tenure as security chair for the ABAA, I have been blessed and cursed with a plethora of book thieves, would-be book thieves, fraudsters, forgers, conmen, grifters, and all manner and kind of other predators within the book trade. My tenure has coincided with the rapid rise of Internet commerce and the swift rise to e-auction dominance of eBay. With this increase in cyber commerce, a Wild West frontier mentality has also come to the fore; the gunslingers and cattle rustlers of the Old West have been supplanted by the forgers and credit card thieves of the New West. Nineteenth-century hookers have become twenty-first-century hackers, and the poker players of old have been transformed into electronic auctioneers. This is a tale of a book thief, one of many I have acquired during several years spent in the underbelly of the rare book world. This parable, a rare tale of an unusual thief, tells of one of the few who were apprehended. Some days I feel like a modern-day Jonah, other days more like Pinocchio, swallowed whole by an unseen beast...
Read the full article by Ken Sanders
The Man Who Loved Books Too Much
Price: $24.95
The Death Of The Book Redeux
By Ken Sanders
In some manner or another, I have been involved in the world of books, in the broadest definition of those words, virtually all my life; a galaxy of books, a universe of words, painted, printed, or otherwise: words within worlds...
Events At Our Store
UCONOCLASTS: Suite One – Literary Utah
From the Obscure to the Arcane:
Famous, Forgotten, and Infamous Utahns
Paintings & Broadsides on display:
At The Rose Wagner 2/19 – 3/14
Reception with Artists:
At The Rose Wagner, February 19th, 5:00-9:00 p.m.
Shadow Show:
At Ken Sanders Rare Books 2/19 – 3/14
Ken Sanders Rare Books is pleased to announce the premier of a new exhibit titled Uconoclasts: Suite One – Literary Utah on Friday, February 19th from 5:00-9:00 PM at The Rose Wagner (138 West 300 South, SLC, UT). Uconoclasts, a collaboration between bookman Ken Sanders and artist Trent Call, is a portrayal in words and pictures of a dozen literary mavericks from Utah's past. Those featured include Wallace Thurman, Wallace Stegner, Neal Cassady, Edward Abbey, May Swenson, Bernard DeVoto and half a dozen more iconoclastic authors; all in one way or another connected to Utah. This project is in conjunction with Plan-B Theatre Company's premier of Wallace, a play about Wallace Stegner and Wallace Thurman running March 4-14th at The Rose Wagner. The Rose Wagner will feature the original paintings and the broadsides of the Uconoclasts project from February 19th thru March 14th in addition to hosting a reception with the artists on Friday, February 19th from 5:00-9:00 p.m. The show at Ken Sanders Rare Books is a shadow show consisting of prints of Trent Call's portraits of each author. These events are part of the February Salt Lake Gallery Stroll and are free and open to the public.
Featured Books
Deluxe Edition
Price: $2,500.00
Limited Edition
Price: $1,500.00
New From Scrub Oak Bindery
& Ken Sanders Rare Books:
1833 Book of Commandments
Deluxe Edition
Price: $2,500.00
Limited Edition
Price: $1,500.00
Ken Sanders Rare Books, in cooperation with Ethan Ensign and Scrub Oak Bindery, is pleased to announce the November 1st release of a letterpress replica of the 1833 Book of Commandments, the most sought after LDS text, of which less than thirty copies are known to exist.
This title is available exclusively through Ken Sanders Rare Books. We are now taking pre-orders on both editions. Books will be available November 1st. The Limited Edition is $1500.00 and the Deluxe Edition is $2500.00. Mail orders please add $10.00 shipping and handling for the limited edition and $15.00 for the deluxe edition. Utah orders please add $102.75 Utah Sales Tax for the limited edition and $171.25 for the deluxe edition. These editions are sure to sell out so reserve your copy today.
The Monkey Wrench Gang
By Edward Abbey
Hardbound illustration edition in dustjacket. A dozen full page illustrations and 30 chapter head illustrations by legendary sixties underground comix illustrator and American icon, R. Crumb. Colorful R. Crumb dust jacket as well. Plus full page photograph of Edward Abbey and R. Crumb in Arches National Park. As new condition.
Price: $25.00
Gift Certificates
Give someone the experience of browsing our unique store, and picking out exactly what he or she wants - give a Ken Sanders Rare Books Gift Certificate!
