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OK I am cleaning house and I have WAY to many books.
I am talking about 6 to 7 thousand books. 1,000 in science fiction and fantasy the rest were my mothers so are mostly mystery and romance novels. I am talking 35 Xerox paper boxes FULL.
They have to go. I only mildly care how. I do not burn books, (with one exception) and throwing them out borders on sacrilege.
I have thought of a few options.
Pummel a used bookstore with a u-haul full of books
a) pros: Books are gone and I would then have credit there for a long long time.
b) con: I will never be able to use all that credit.
Goodwill or Salvation Army.
a) pros: books are gone. I get a tax deductable, and they can pick them up.
b) cons: have not thought of any yet.
Hi Opal!
a) pros: saying hello is a positive pleasant thing.
b) cons: She is most likely sick of this running joke.
Sell as grab boxes on e-bay
a) pros: would make a bit of money off them this way
b) cons: Books linger to long in my home. I have to make many trips to UPS.Very time consuming.
Note: I am keeping some of my books I am not a complete fool.
The 17th and 18th century Dutch theology books stay. As do my collection of Soviet era Poetry and my complete set of George Orwell books, Most of my first editions and those books I enjoyed and will most likely read again.
Everything esle ihas GOT to go.
I will now solicit comments and suggestions from you, my fellow dopers. Help me solve this paltry problem.
Preferably one of you bringing a truck and taking them all to a better home
I vote for the used book store idea. I did this with my Star Trek novels when I grew up and developed taste, and it was fun having all that credit. I spent it all eventually, but if you don’t think you can, you could always give some of it to others.
Or you could register your books at www.bookcrossing.com and leave them behind you like rosepetals wherever you go, brightening thousands of lives. It’d take time, but think of the fun!
Go through the books and decide which ones you’d like to keep for yourself. Remember that you may decide in a few years that you’re interested in some of these books, so be generous in keeping some of these books.
Pick out a few truly valuable ones that (assuming that you don’t want to keep them) you can sell to a rare book dealer or on E-Bay.
Pick out a modest number of reasonably good ones that you can use for trade at a used bookstore. If you deluge a used bookstore owner with thousands of books, he’ll give you almost nothing for them in trade, since it would take him too long to get rid of them. If there are a number of used bookstores in your area, you might bring just a couple boxes of them to each store.
Bring all the rest of them to charities that do regular book sales. Good Will, Salvation Army, churches, schools, libraries, whatever. You may have so many books that it might be best to split them up and give them to half a dozen different charities.
Don’t waste your time selling grab bags of books on E-Bay. It’s not worth the effort.
One other possibility: Presents. Are there people who you regularly give Christmas or birthday presents to that would appreciate certain of these books? Give a few of the books to them for presents on the appropriate occasion.
I gave all my books to the local library when I moved out of the country for a few years.
But they didn’t put any on the shelves, not even the new best sellers!
They held them all for their next “friends of the library” sale, where they were picked over and sold for 10 cents each, and then at the end of the day for so much a bagful, which I was told was almost always bought by realtors looking to fill shelves in model homes.
kniz - Read my note just above yours.
Put the books to better use and give the library a cash donation. They are not equipped to make good use of books. Strange bu true. Their attitude is pure governmentese: We would rather sell a $20 book for 10c than let somebody else place something on our shelves.
One more thing: I presume that you’ve inherited all your mother’s estate. Aren’t there relatives who didn’t get anything from the will who would like something from your mother’s estate? Ask them to come over to the house and take any books they would like from her collection.
I think it depends on the library. I’ve found newish books (non-library copies) on the sale shelf at my library, for $1. Most of their “sale” books are extra library copies, but they also have donated books for sale all year-round.
Since you have so many, I vote for splitting them up.
Give some to your library, some to Goodwill, and some to a used book store. Spread the wealth.
Why are you judging all Libraries by the actions of one? I have worked in Libraries since I was 14 and have been at my current one for 21 years. We do not put all donations out for book sale. If books are in good condition and we don’t need them we send boxes of books to other Libraries with very small budgets. We also send them to two different prisons, and the local jail.
I’m sorry if you had a bad experience with your Library but don’t paint us all with the same brush.
Libraries are the wrong choice if you actulayy want your recipients to read your books. Most likely they will sell them.
I suggest a hospital, retirement home, women’s ehelter, something like that. A place that has residents or in-patients with a lot of time on their hands.
Osip. Sweetie. Darrrllling. You know I love you, right? I’m salivating here, Osip.
Now, while romance novels aren’t my thing, I bet I could find a very, very good home for the majority of your books. One, say, not too far from you. One, perhaps, that you’ll be visiting in the near future.
My point being, I want my books to go directly to people who will appreciate them, not simply sell them off. I don’t object to the practice, it’s perfectly ok, but I’m pretty proprietary about my books and want them to go to good homes.
I did this, by the way, just a month ago when moving into my new place. I gave away several hundred books, and had a hell of a time finding good homes for them.
I’m with yojimboguy here. People in hospitals and prisons could really use good books to read. I have started giving all my used magazines to a local hospital after an elderly friend spent some time there. She does not watch tv and they had absolutely nothing for her to read. I ended up there earlier this month with appendicitis. I spent several days reading. I was lucky to have friends and family to bring books…If not, I would have been really, really bored.
sigh well I guess I can save a box or two and bring them your way come august. The rest HAVE TO GO! I am up to 40 F**king boxes right now and still have more to go groan
Bobkitty if you want I can dig thru and pull out some of the mysterys and bring them and save you from the romance books.
Thanks for the advice everyone, I do know some people who work at the Crisis center and I am sure those ladies breaking away from their abusive husbands might appreciate stuff to read.
But send me some of the good stuff first. I need some good non-fiction, because I have no idea how to pick any out.
if you ever get really bored, make a list of what you’ve got (or at least about 1% of your finer books) and see if anyone here will take them off your hands. Aside from that, used book store is a good bet.
Just out of curiosity, are there no used book stores that give cash for books where you are? There’s a chain of Half Priced Books here that does. Perhaps if you get so much?
Osip, I’m not mocking you, and I’m not trying to get in your business about retraining orders or nothing like that. I’m a nerd, and I genuinely love books. I honestly think I have a problem when it comes to books. I can’t get enough of them. When I posted what I did, I was just trying to imagine what it’d be like to have 6-7 thousand books in my house. Does that mean that at one time before you packed all those books in boxes you had bookshelves lining every wall and they were bursting with books. ::drool:: As far as getting rid of your treasure, I’d say give the books to local charities, used bookstores, and needy Dopers.
you had bookshelves lining every wall and they were bursting with books. ::drool:: As far as getting rid of your treasure, I’d say give the books to local charities, used bookstores, and needy Dopers.