The Counterfeit Dust Jacket Market

It's heating up.

From an intriguing story in the LA Times...

Later, in the 1870s and 1880s, after jackets had become commonplace, publishers would use the design printed on the hardcover for the jacket as well. In time, the most alluring of them were considered "posters in miniature," with artists like Toulouse-Lautrec commissioned to create original illustrations. Then, when publishers started using the backs of jackets to list other books for sale, the simple protector doubled as a marketing tool.

Few anticipated the value these simple book-wraps would someday hold. In 1924, literary critic Ralph Straus was a minority voice in defense of dust jackets, which most collectors trashed so as not to sully their collections. "One day they may be of considerable value," he said. "You smile! But . . . I am convinced that the jacket . . . will be required at future book sales."

What Straus did not anticipate was the extent to which a dust jacket can increase a book's worth and thus how irresistible the urge to print fraudulent copies has become.