BOOK REVIEW: COIN COLLECTORS SURVIVAL MANUAL, 7TH ED.

As a coin collector for more than 50 years, I have a very select library. For years, Scott Travers’ The Coin Collector’s Survival Manual was a must-have work that informed and enhanced my numismatic education. Viewers of Coin Update know about my background in coins, including serving as a columnist for Coin World and as a former member of the Citizens Coinage Advisory Committee. Many also know that I am a journalism educator and author of media ethics and technology books, including works by Oxford University Press.

Revising editions of acclaimed books is a distinct skill requiring keen knowledge not only of subject matter–in Travers’ case, numismatics–but also of deletion of outdated material, insertion of at least 50% new material (justifying purchases by owners of the last edition), and expert copy editing to ensure the work reads in a consistent tone of voice.

Unfortunately, these standards are not met in the seventh edition. That said, it is still one of the few must-have books.

What does this mean? If you have the sixth edition, you probably don’t need this one. If you do not own this book, you should buy it.

First, let me tout why this work is essential. It features a cogent history that truly is a survival manual for novice and apprentice collectors. Some of the highlights, also found in other editions, include these chapters:

• The Grading of U.S. Coins, including sections on certification services, manufacturing methods, numerical standards, overgrading and undergrading, and doctored-coin detection.
• Grading Services and the Plastic Revolution, including sections on the impact of such services, grading by consensus and changes in grading standards.
• Don’t Let Uncle Sam Pick Your Pocket, including sections on US Mint products, tax obligations, estate-planning secrets and retirement planning.

Because this was once a numismatic masterpiece, every level of collector and investor can find something to like and inform in each of the 23 chapters with appendices.

However, the savvy reader of Coin Update News, especially a hobbyist with numismatic experience, also may find something outdated or no longer relevant in many of these chapters.

For instance, on page 148 in the section on crossovers at NGC and PCGS, Travers leaves the reader with the impression that NGC will consider grading coins from other holdering companies when, in fact, that policy was changed years ago.

In general, the work assumes coin purchases will be made through dealers or at coin shows. There is an outdated, pessimistic 13-page section about buying coins on the Internet, focusing on eBay rather than on the dozens of reputable venues and portals offering coins via Internet and smartphones, from Proxibid to GreatCollections. This chapter of Travers’ book includes a self-indulged section titled “An Exchange of Correspondence with eBay” that is slanted journalism with leading questions by the author, reprinting of contentious replies and few facts that help any collector “survive” the online coin purchasing business.

I blame Travers’ copy editor, assuming his publisher Random House hasn’t already downsized copy editors.

As viewers of Coin Update News know, increasingly hobbyists not only are buying coins on Internet but also on smartphones. (Proxibid has just rolled out a mobile phone version still in its development stages.) Moreover, there needs to be a new Survival Guide written by someone who actually uses the Internet to purchase coins.

The last Amazon review, posted Nov. 9, 2015 and titled “Please Rewrite This Book,” captures the key points of my own review here of the seventh edition.

I recommend it for numismatic history, grading practices and services, counterfeit detection, fourth-party grading companies such as Certified Acceptance Corporation, and tax and legal advice.

However, if this is the only resource upon which novices depend, they won’t survive if purchasing or bidding on coins online rather than from dealers or at shows. Internet coin buying and selling deserves its own survival manual. That information isn’t in the seventh edition, sloppily edited (if edited at all) by Random House.

To read the complete article, see:
Review of the 7th Edition of Travers’ Coin Collector’s Survival Manual (http://news.coinupdate.com/review-of-7th-edition-of-travers-coin-collectors-survival-manual/)

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