Time Life Books

April 18, 2006 4:20 PM

In the early 1970s (?) there was a subscription book series sold by Time Life Books. This was a wonderfully selected collection of reading material that I enjoyed reading every month. My set was destroyed in a fire and I am rebuilding it a book at a time from used book stores. Where can I find a complete list of the paperback titles published by Time-Life Books in this series? I can account for 91 titles. Were there more than 91 titles published?
posted by Raybun to media & arts (5 answers total)

Forgot to mention that this was called the Time Life Reading Program.
posted by Raybun at 4:21 PM on April 18, 2006

If it helps in your 'net searching, it looks like this series went by the name "Time Reading Program".
posted by bachelor#3 at 6:53 PM on April 18, 2006

That last post seemed to help my own 'net searching : ) The list has 99 books, but some of them have years (printing?) in the 80s...according to the wikipedia article (previous link), they tried the program again in the 80s, so this list is probably from the second TRP.
posted by bachelor#3 at 7:03 PM on April 18, 2006

This is not an answer to your question, but maybe useful to you. I had a similiar fascination with a series of books, but was impatient to fill it all in through my used book and thrift store browsing. I sent out an email through my local freecycle group and lo and behold, someone had almost the entire set in their basement ready to give away! Worth a shot. www.freecycle.org
posted by typewriter at 7:33 PM on April 18, 2006

The TIME-Life Books in this series were actually called "TIME Reading Program Special Edition(s)". Check out the Time Reading Program book list—with recent cross-referenced sources—at Leggman's Time-Life Library. Combined with batchelor#3's list, this should keep your mind occupied for a week or two. ;-)

An alphabetically sorted AbeBooks search gives many duplicate results for sale from various book shops.

For a complete list, why not contact the publisher directly? TIME-Life Publishing merged with Warner Publishing in 1990 and became Time Warner Book Group. Their main web site is Time Warner Bookmark, and their FAQ is here (but there aren't any links to their out-of-print books.) For questions not answered in the FAQ, you can email General Questions or Customer Service, or call Customer Service at 1-800-759-0190.
posted by cenoxo at 8:49 PM on April 18, 2006