LibraryThing.com

When I was younger I had a spreadsheet of all the books I had read. It was cataloged by title, author, and when I read it (pretty simple). It was my way of keeping track of all the wonderful (an not so wonderful) books I had read over the years. Nowadays however, I have upgraded (like most people do) to keeping track of my reading online. I found this wonderful web site called LIBRARYTHING.COM that helps me keep track of every book I have ever read. I weed regularly to keep my list up to date, but it is a wonderful tool for networking and sharing your personal libraries with others. Try it out...

Book Sale

One thing that is inevitable in public libraries is the notorious "book sale." This is when the library decides to empty the storage rooms that are plagued with hundreds of Harlequin romance novels and old/tattered hardcover’s in order to raise a little extra cash. The quality of these books is disastrously poor however, the people in this community (which I would assume in others) love the fact that you can buy a irrelevant Why Your Child is Hyperactive (random book I picked up from the sale which is, coincidentally, also listed on http://awfullibrarybooks.wordpress.com/) written in 1975 for only a buck. What a deal!

This is where my first nugget of advice is going to come in. When I become a library director I am going to require some quality rules for the books sold in a book sale. Some of the books are in okay condition, however, others I would not take them for free let alone pay a dollar for them. Call me cheep but a book that has its signatures completely detached from the spine is not worth selling. It adds an image to the book sale in my opinion, and not a good one. People say that the musty smell of old books in the basement of the library keeps them away for the three day sale. I don’t think that each book should be a gleaming gem of perfection. I just think there should be some standards. If it is falling apart, recycle it. If it is covered in mold, recycle it. If it has buggers on every page, for the library’s sake recycle it.

I think one of my favorite parts of this book sale is when patrons approach me and ask if I have a list of all of the books, or if I would be nice enough to point them in the direction of the history books that fall between the eras of 1893-1918. We don’t have a list or sections like this at our book sale, which is unfortunate. I have seen book sales however that are arranged much like a book store. With subjects that are listed alphabetically by author. This may take a little time but if you appoint someone to keeping the books organized as you discard them or as patrons donate them then the process will go a lot smoother.