I went with my kid to the local library sale. Not at my usual branch, but a smaller one nearby. The sale is smaller, too. This year it was – rather disappointing. For me! We filled a cloth shopping bag for $10, but most of those were books my kid picked out. Personally I brought home seven books, and only two of those actually added to my library. Wow. Pickings were slim enough, we were there on the second day of the sale and either not much got donated, or a lot of people came on friday. I passed over many many great titles that I already own, but chose a hardback copy of Roadless Area to replace my paperback, and a hardbound, very worn first edition of Bambi with the exact same illustrations I fondly recall from my first reading of it out of a public library when I was around ten. Even though I already have a copy of that. It feels like insurance, for such a favorite. The other duplicates were mistakes! I got two books I already own but had forgotten they were on my shelves. Oops.
The ones that are actually new to me: Peter and the Starcatchers (which I thought was on my TBR? but it’s not) and The Church Cat by Mark Bryant- shorts stories that looked like they might be good. Just because it’s cats you know.
I’ve never had such a small library sale haul. Here’s hoping the one in fall, at my regular library branch, will be better. Although really, maybe it’s a good thing that my acquisition rate is slowing down. And my daughter sure was happy to find a lot of crafting and knitting books, fairy stories, some mild horror and romance, and a Harry Potter cookbook!
(Now I’m wondering: are there fewer books donated to the library sale, because people stick them in those little free libraries instead? we have several in town)
