Children’s books are cheap individually and expensive in aggregate, because a child who reads gets through them faster than anyone budgets for.
Sets are the lever
A single children’s hardback runs $12 to $18. A ten-book series set runs $40 to $60. That is roughly $5 a book against $15, for the same publisher and the same paper.
The reason is straightforward: the publisher sells ten at once and prices accordingly. It is the single biggest saving available and it requires no hunting.
| Buying | Books | Price | Per book |
|---|---|---|---|
| Wings of Fire complete | 18 | $99.99 | ~$5.55 |
| Haunted Library | 10 | $48.62 | ~$4.86 |
| Legend of Korra | 7 | $58.84 | ~$8.41 |
| Single titles | 1 | $12–$18 | ~$15 |
A sensible order to buy in
- One series they will finish. Not the longest — the one closest to what they already like. Finishing matters more than length.
- A second series in a different register. If the first was fantasy, make the second funny, or scary, or real. This is how you find out what they actually want.
- Then length. Once you know what holds them, an eighteen-book set is a good investment rather than a gamble.
What not to spend on
- Collector editions for a child under ten. The book will be damaged. That is fine and normal, and it should be a book you do not mind being damaged.
- Classics they are not ready for. A beautiful edition of a book that sits unread for four years is not a bargain.
- Everything at once. A shelf of forty unread books is discouraging. Five they want to read is not.
The one thing worth paying for
Binding, on anything they will reread. A favourite book gets read twenty times, and a glued spine will not survive it. For a first-choice series, the sewn edition is the cheaper purchase over three years.
The shelf is on the Kids & Young Adult page.
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