The Numismatist Companion books by Bowers

Longacre

I just finished the 8 books in this series. Each book is around 200 pages, and is a compilation of articles from the old Bowers and Merena/Ruddy Rare Coin Review issues (and other old Bowers' house organs). Not all of the articles are written by Bowers and the variety of articles is incredible. They range from colonials to moderns, to historical pieces, to background info on minting processes to general articles on collecting. The articles are great, and I found approximately 98% of them to be very to extremely interesting. Some of the articles are pretty generic and high level, but others are incredibly detailed (such as articles on particular varieties in a series). I highly reccomend the books to everyone, no matter what your collecting interest. I bought them used from Amazon for about $6 each, and the ones that I couldn't find used I bought from DLRC or Brett Kruger (spelling?) for about $11 each. They are great reads.

I also just finished Taxay's Counterfeit and Misstruck Coins and I will post a more substantial review in a bit.

Louis

Thanks for posting your review, I have been intending to buy those.

ldhair

These started in 1987.
A really great author.
I wish he would join us here.

RYK

I have read four of the eight...it did not occur to me to check Amazon to pick up the rest. I agree with Longacre. I did skip a few articles in each book that were OT for me, but overall, the quality of writing and breadth and depth of material covered is excellent.

Veep

I've got 'em all and have read them each at least three times.

Gemini

These books are inexpensive and great fun reading plus easy to transport because of their size.
I always take one along when I head for some waiting room. I grew fond of the artwork on the covers of volume one and two and I am now sorry that I did not take a crack at either of the original paintings for the book covers when they were offered for sale. If anyone knows where they are or knows if there are copies available I'd be interested in their purchase.