Easy Peasy Tip: Share Reading Material!
By tinychoices | March 1, 2008
Once you’ve finished reading a magazine or book, it’s ready to be passed on to another lucky soul. Bring it with you when you leave your house and find a spot to leave it for someone else to become the next happy reader!
We’re certainly not encouraging littering– but, perhaps, leave the tome on the bus seat when you get off, in the waiting room of a doctors office, or at an ATM terminal or on a shelf in the supermarket. If you leave a note tucked into the pages which says something like, “Please read me, then pass me on again!” the finder will understand that the literature wasn’t left behind accidentally but is now theirs to enjoy.
There are official ways to become a part of this “book crossing” culture– but in the end, all you have to do is set yours free in the wild, so that it can keep moving on.
[Image by placelightonaproject via Creative Commons]
Topics: Books, EasyPeasyTips |
There are also several on-line book swapping services. I’ve been using . You can list the books you have available, and mail them to others to obtain “points”. In return, you can spend the points mooching books off others.
Oops the URL is:
bookmooch.com
I don’t really agree with the idea of leaving a book or magazine on a bus. Being a daily bus rider I hate when there are things left on the seats. Many people seem to leave the newspaper and it most often ends up on the floor gathering mud.
I do however leave my magazines in the lunch room at my work. In fact so many people follow this practice that a box is there specifically for books or magazine sharing.
Its not hard to implement in your own workplace.
definitely agree that you shouldn’t be leaving things on public transportation (bus/train/whatever)… people driving that bus have to clean it later, and there’s a pretty good chance they won’t be recycling things, especially after they’ve fallen on the floor to be trampled by muddy shoes.
Someone in our neighborhood collects all our magazines once a month and drops them off at a women’s shelter. Makes it easy for all of us to share….
I started using SwapTree to trade my books, movies, cds and video games. Granted it’s not so very eco friendly considering the things are being mailed off to different parts of the country, but it helps by not having to buy something new.
And in our apartment building’s laundry room people leave magazines and books and sometime other things for people to take.
There are several locations around my town where I can drop off already read books for folks in prison. Also our library takes them as well and either adds them to the collection or sells them as part of their fundraiser a few times a year.
A few friends and I subscribe to our differing favorite magazines and share with each other - that way we only have to purchase one subscription and share with each other.
A great book swap website I’ve used for over year now is www.paperbackswap.com.
i started leaving my magazines in the front of my apartment building by the mailboxes. if there’s an address label, i remove it, so people will know i didn’t drop it or something. the magazines are always picked up within a few hours and that makes me happy!
Here here! What a great post, guys.
I second Judy by encouraging sending your used paperback books to prisoners through Books Through Bars (www.booksthroughbars.org), a great organization with which I volunteer. It helps prisoners help themselves to get the education they need to better themselves. It’s a great way to pass your books on.