Used Books
Beijing-based NGO Roundabout is a fantastic organization that fund-raises for various charities (like Little Flowers). People (mostly expats) donate their out-of-use household items and out-grown clothes and toys. Roundabout sorts these, sending some directly to participating charities and selling the rest at their retail store for needed cash for the charities.
Roundabout also conducts gigantic used book fairs they stage at some of the International Schools. The cash they generate (which is quite substantial) pays for medical supplies and surgeries for children in desperate need. It's an opportunity to load up on English-language books that are otherwise difficult for us to buy given where we live. We are often surprised, but grateful, at what books people have cast off. Our most recent haul included Tobias Wolff's This Boy's Life, some Boxcar Children mysteries, and Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator. The continuation of the adventures of Charlie Bucket Myles was hoping specifically to find.
Since the books are donated by people from all over the world, the books likewise come from all kinds of places. This was really brought home by this Rumer Godden novel I picked up.
It is nearly in never-read condition. It also bears no marks or inscriptions that could fill in the years between printing (and likely sale) in the UK in 1959 and a used book sale in Beijing in 2013. It's times like this I wish people would write a little bit in their books. How did someone manage to hold on to it for so long only to donate it to Roundabout now?
Since this book has been out-of-print in the US, I was really happy to be able to find it at the book fair. I often wonder why publishers don't start publishing their back catalogs of out-of-print titles in Kindle, but that would then deprive some of us of the joy of discovery at a used book sale.
This on Rod Dreher's blog was about something similar (though the book find was more magical). However, my conclusion is not to disdain the Kindle or other E-Reader. There are places for both formats in our current landscape. Sure, an old book is a treasure, but what good is a good book if it is kept out of circulation?
Roundabout also conducts gigantic used book fairs they stage at some of the International Schools. The cash they generate (which is quite substantial) pays for medical supplies and surgeries for children in desperate need. It's an opportunity to load up on English-language books that are otherwise difficult for us to buy given where we live. We are often surprised, but grateful, at what books people have cast off. Our most recent haul included Tobias Wolff's This Boy's Life, some Boxcar Children mysteries, and Roald Dahl's Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator. The continuation of the adventures of Charlie Bucket Myles was hoping specifically to find.
Since the books are donated by people from all over the world, the books likewise come from all kinds of places. This was really brought home by this Rumer Godden novel I picked up.
It is nearly in never-read condition. It also bears no marks or inscriptions that could fill in the years between printing (and likely sale) in the UK in 1959 and a used book sale in Beijing in 2013. It's times like this I wish people would write a little bit in their books. How did someone manage to hold on to it for so long only to donate it to Roundabout now?
Since this book has been out-of-print in the US, I was really happy to be able to find it at the book fair. I often wonder why publishers don't start publishing their back catalogs of out-of-print titles in Kindle, but that would then deprive some of us of the joy of discovery at a used book sale.
This on Rod Dreher's blog was about something similar (though the book find was more magical). However, my conclusion is not to disdain the Kindle or other E-Reader. There are places for both formats in our current landscape. Sure, an old book is a treasure, but what good is a good book if it is kept out of circulation?
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