Dog-eared, rubbed and slightly foxed

Forget about those dreary best-seller book lists. Wouldn't it be more fun to have a worst-seller list? Yes, of course it would!

Forget about those dreary best-seller book lists. Wouldn't it be more fun to have a worst-seller list? Yes, of course it would!

So today I am bringing you some worst-seller Top 10s, based on years of observation in second-hand bookshops. This is not a scientifically based survey. However, I think you will find it is highly accurate.

All books listed are 5p each, or tend to be.

Every No 1 is a worst-seller, of course, and sells fewer copies than any other book on the list.

THE SECOND-HAND BOOK WORST-SELLER LIST

Non-Fiction
1. The Billericay Nobody Knows, by the Rev Edward S Grant (Essex History Pocket Books 1949)
2. Quilt-Making For Fun and Profit, by Mrs Threlfall (1953)
3. The Observer Book of Wood Lice (7th edition)
4. It's Easy To Make Your Own Lawn Mower! (1966)
5. Fifty Ideas For Sermons by Bishop Hewitt
6. The Good Pub Guide 1977 (soiled; some pages missing)
7. A Basic Greek-Spanish Dictionary (Athens & Madrid, 1955)
8. All You Need To Know About Your Spleen, by A Doctor (1978)
9. So You Want to be a Butler? by an ex-butler (1956)
10. Behind the Scenes in a Mortuary

Sport
1. The Olympic Games, And How To Apply To Stage Them In Your Country (as new)
2. The Salvation Army Book of Card Tricks (1st edition)
3. Make Your Own Clay Pigeons by Lt-Col Pritt
4. The Scottish Curling Yearbook 1949
5. Why Not Try Putting Left-Handed? by the Golf Doctor
6. Twenty All-Time Top Scrum Injuries, by A Physio
7. I Ran Fifty Marathons - And Never Finished!, by A Trier
8. And Now Back To The Studio: Do's and Don't's for would-be sports commentators
9. I Changed Sex For East Germany by Peta Tarbruck
10. So Your Village Has Got A French Twin?- a guide to international petanque etiquette

Travel
1. I Ate An Elephant, and other African Adventures, by Col George Chambers.
2. In The Footsteps of Col. George Chambers, by Martin Bull
3. Martin Bull: Forgotten African Explorer, by Dorothy Deodar
4. Female Botanist in the Jungle: a portrait of Dorothy Deodar by Professor Stanley Walcot
5. Walcot of Burma: a memoir, by Donald Peverill
6. Peverill Peaks: Portrait of a Mountain Range by Sebastian Plaistow
7. The Man who Conquered P2: a tribute to Seb Plaistow, by his widow
8. Death in High Places, by Josh Blake: a compendium of mountaineering fatalities
9. Knotting Hill: a guide to ropemanship for climbers, by the late Sir Edward Larrabee
10. The Bupa Guide to Hospitals in Nepal (1970)

Food and drink
1. Choosing a Name For Your Restaurant
2. 100 Things to do with Malt Vinegar
3. Casual Kitchen Staff: The Employment Law Jungle
4. The Left Over Potato Cook Book
5. Celebrity Cook Book: Websley Village Hall Appeal Fund 1977 (contains Roy Castle's spaghetti bolognese, Barbara Cartland's sherry trifle etc)
6. 100 Ideas for Sandwich Fillings
7. 100 More Ideas For Sandwich Fillings
8. A Social History of Bottle Recycling
9. The Do's and Don'ts of Food Stain Removal
10. The Clement Freud Joke Book

(For many other worst-seller lists - Humour, Art, Fiction, etc - send SAE and a signed blank cheque...)