Inspired by the DVDs thread; I’m in a similar boat only with books.

I’ve got hundreds of paperbacks which are never going to be re-read and taking up half the house. I’m close to just tossing them out, but it seems a shame and there must be some monetary value to them. I’m toying with the idea of taking to a local bookstall in the market or to a charity shop. Anyone have any better suggestions?

We couldn’t even give ours away, local bookseller wasn’t interested. Charity or bin I’d say.

http://www.greenmetropolis.com/ maybe if you don’t mind a bit of faff? Anything good? 😉

Ours normally end up at charity jumble sales.

got anything good..?

We get through 100s of books per year in the yunki household so a good cheap source is always welcome..

STW Book swop shop anyone?

Bin. I had the same problem and spent ages selling them on Amazon, ebay etc. Big waste of time and money, with finding envelopes, traipsing to the Post Office etc

make a list and sell some on here.

Second hand books are only £2-2.50 at Oxfam though (and cheaper at most other charity shops), so surely posting hardly makes it worthwhile…

I take some to work and distribute there for a couple of the long distance train commuters, some to charidee shop and some to the local pub for their bookshelves of things that people might be interested in reading.
My name’s aP and I have a small book problem….

I had a look into this once and came across this site http://www.listbooks.co.uk/ In the end I figured for paperbacks that sell for 50p at jumbles/Oxfam etc it wasn’t worth it for me – but I guess it depends on what you have/ how many etc.

Edit – nothing wrong with the STW book club idea though .. goes well with the STW austerity measures … 😉

@flyingmonkeycorps

Thats a great idea . A book club 🙂

STW Book swop shop anyone?

No no no, I want the space back, not more of the things! I think the swap shop is a great idea, but not for me. Xbox games, on the other hand…

GreenMetropolis looks good, my concern there is that stuff could sit there for weeks / months if no-one wants it.

got anything good..?

They’re mostly my other half’s, though I’m going to be going through my more modest collection as well. She made a start on cataloguing them at one point, though how complete the list is or even if it exists still, I’ve no idea.

From memory there’s a wide range of different genres, but there’s a good percentage of best-seller / thriller type stuff, Karin Slaughter and the like.

Another suggestion.

Stick them in boxes by your gate and flog them for 30p or 4 for a quid.

I bought some books like this at the bottom of Holford Combe in Quantocks. Including hardbacks.

If your looking for books back try an in and out box.

What I’d really like is for someone to give me, oh I don’t know, a quid a book for the job lot.

A big part of it for me isn’t the financial side of it, so much as I hate throwing things out when there’s nothing wrong with them. I’ve got a graveyard of technology that is useless for all practical purposes but I can’t throw out because it all still works. I think I have a problem.

List what you’ve got and I’ll offer you xbox games in return. 😉

I for one have less and less books in the house now. I only buy books to make sure I have at least one for the bathroom and in those instances where I can’t get the book I want on the Kindle.

Similar boat here. Have boxes and boxes of books – could barely give some of them away even to sellers. Seems such a waste.

Might not work for you Cougar, but for anyone who’s interested in swapping, check out: ReadItSwapIt.

An STW version might work too.

Maybe find some folk who do car boots on a regular basis and try to flog to them? Doubt you’ll get a quid a book that way though.

Or just bite the bullet and freecycle…

We must have a STW version 🙂

I could do something on my webspace. I’m sure there is some of the shelf script is out there .

The Kindle has pretty much killed the books, for us. Not because we never buy new paper books any more, but because there’s close to zero point in keeping boxes and boxes of old ones “in case we want to re-read them” when we can just snag it on the Kindle if that ever happens.

I want some Pratchets but have loads of Chris Ryans and the like.

I’m going list all my books I don’t want.

Doubt you’ll get a quid a book that way though.

50p, even. </shrug>

Or just bite the bullet and freecycle…

That’s not a bad idea, god knows the users of my local freecycle list could do with practising their basic literacy.

I want some Pratchets

I’ve a handful of Pratchett which I’d let go for a nominal fee plus postage. I don’t want any more books.

I want some Pratchets

I’ve a handful of Pratchett which I’d let go for a nominal fee plus postage. I don’t want any more books.

I saw Pratchett at Paignton Zoo yesterday.. 🙂

I shall be buying a Kindle on Thursday when I’m at the airport – I don’t know if it’ll make me want to get rid of the books I have though as I like just having them on shelves. With DVD’s and CD’s on the other hand I have no attachment at all to the physical object. I’ll probably still keep buying physical books which I usually pick up in charity shops, the Kindle is really just for travelling which I do a lot of for work.
I’ve also got some old partwork books that a neighbour left me many years ago, all from the the early 1900’s to the 1930’s. They don’t really appear to be worth much but I can’t get rid of them.

We’ve started clearing out for a retirement move abroad in the next year or so

I’ve had 4 or 5 book burnings now – I just keep taking a load to the bottom of the garden and torching them

FREECYCLE! They will be gone tomorrow, and probably be being read shortly afterwards.

Otherwise, I thought maybe places like hospitals etc would take them?

If anyone has cycling books to sell, please let me know cos I put a ‘Wanted’ ad in the Classifieds yesterday. Thanks!

Doesn’t amazon facilitate this?

I’ve got every Discworld novel from Interesting Times onwards in hardback first edition. I thought about selling them recently, but it seems they’re only worth a quid or so each as well.

Cougar, tweet me with games you have for swapsies. I have loads gathering dust.

I’ve just done this….. Sent about 2 boxes of paperbacks to zapper.co.uk and got about 40 quid.

I basically did all my books in a couple of hours. I found the quickest way to do it is:

1.Download a free app for your smartphone that scans barcodes (there are loads of these about.
2.Scan all the barcodes of your books -this is MUCH quicker than typing sh*t in, and you can leave them on the shelf.
3.From the app, send an e-mail containing all the barcode numbers to yourself
4.Drag the numbers one-at-a-time into zapper.
5.Zapper generates a list of what it has accepted, go down your shelf and pull-out the books that it wants and box-up.

I must of scanned in excess of 200 books (in batches) and after I put them in zapper I dumped the barcode numbers into Fatbrain.com too, to see what it came up with (you can drag 15 numbers at a time into fatbrain, rather than 1 by 1). It only wanted about 4 of the 200 books that I put in – so I wouldn’t bother. On their website it says that they are more interested in textbooks. I think zapper probably accepted about 60 of them – and has quoted me about £40.

My learnings were:
•“Airport fiction” paperbacks are worth nothing
•Newer fiction, or more unusual fiction are usually worth something
•“good” books/classics are usually accepted – but not penguin classics
•Non-fiction is almost always accepted.

Hope that helps!

I got rid of loads on Amazon Marketplace – as long as they’re the usual light paperbacks then you can sell at 1p and still make a small amount on the P&P. I’d just put them on at slightly less than the next cheapest seller, normally they’d be gone in a few days.

This was a few years ago though, might be harder to get the same sort of sales now.

Charity shop is the quick and easy way, although for anything popular they’re probably oversupplied and anything niche they may not give shelf space to so they’ll end up recycled.

Amazon works for us most of the time – and you can list on there for free if the book’s already there. Even if you sell a book for a penny you might still make money on the postage…

Doesn’t always work out but it might be worth a try?

STW Book Club might be worth a go – we could list all our sale items and do payment by PayPal. Postage at cost and full second hand price (as per price on Amazon) for the book work for anyone?

avdave2 – Member

I shall be buying a Kindle on Thursday when I’m at the airport

No need for a Kindle if you have a smartphone or a tablet of any kind…

No need for a Kindle if you have a smartphone or a tablet of any kind…

There is no comparison in the experience of reading on a kindle and reading on a phone or tablet.