I’m a newbie to PBS and was wondering about different ISBNs on the same book.

I understand that them being different for hardback, paperback, audio, special editions but what’s the story with different ISBNs for the same paperback. So this is not a question about special or collector editions but your common and garden paperbacks.

Take for example, Elin Hilderbrand, A Summer Affair – there are 3 different paperback ISBNs listed.

So if I want this book, do I ‘Wish’ for each to increase my opportunities of getting a copy sooner?  And of course, be a fair and responsible member and cancel the other requests once my wish has been granted. 

In my case, I just want the book to read and believe that this is probably the case for most members.   

What do you do?

And what if I see that another member has requested a book I have but it has a different ISBN – is this how ‘Similar to Wish’ works?

Hi Judith!! Welcome to PBS :)

Good questions ---- IBSN's are odd - sometimes there are so many for a particular book!  Here's what I've recommended - go ahead and wishlist all the different ones and wait until you have the book in hand before deleting the others from your wishlist.

Look through the Book Bazaar forum - there are threads for "Wishlisted books with different ISBNs" that you could post in :)

Hi. Welcome to PBS

Yes, to increase your chances of getting any edition of a book, include all the ISBNs for editions you want to accept on your Wish List (WL). Keep in mind you can put a max of 200 ISBNs on your WL. Consider keeping all the other editions on your WL until you actually get the book in hand, because sometimes books get lost, it's a RWAP (received with a problem), or something happens.  

"Similar to" emails are sent to members when a WL book whose title matches (but ISBN doesn't) is posted into the system. Some users opt out of receiving such emails (eg people wishing for audio CDs when a paperback is posted). If you have a book which is WL'ed under another ISBN, you can place a tag on the WL'ed ISBN saying "available as ISBN (insert your ISBN)" Some people are really looking for a specific ISBN though.

More info here