Avoid shoveling the snow, stay inside and curl up with a good book. Since March is National Reading Month, I want to
highlight the Friends of the Library (FOL) Used Book Sale at the Olney library.
Other volunteers and I sift through, organize and shelve donations from local
residents. We receive and sell bestselling novels, nonfiction, popular
children’s (preschool through teenage) books, even DVDs of recent movies – all
for 50 cents to one dollar a piece!
A few years ago, I shared my unscientific observations of the Olney community based on donations to the MGH Women's annual used book sale. While
working on FOL Used Book Sale, I've noticed trends in donations, including:
*
Romance novels (Nora Roberts, Danielle Steele,
etc.)
*
Erotic romance (series like Fifty Shades of Grey, Bared to You, One Night Promised/Denied, Beneath This Man)
*
Crime (James Patterson, Patricia Cornwall, etc.)
*
Travel (guidebooks, foreign language phrase
books, travelogues)
*
Self-help/inspirational nonfiction (Chicken Soup
for the Soul series, Eat, Pray, Love, etc. )
*
Humor (Chelsea Handler, Mindy Kaling, Woody
Allen, Dave Barry, etc.)
If this selection truly reflects readers’ tastes, Olney seems to
be an escapist community, traveling through guidebooks, frothy romances, erotic tales, whodunnit mysteries, Zen/”finding oneself” memoirs
or just good old-fashioned humor.
Visit the FOL Used Book Sale at the Olney library to find a bargain “staycation”
… or at least to spy on what other people read.
