Saved the world with Used Books?

December 12, 2006 9:00 AM

Save the world with used books?A bookstore I sometimes go to in Boston is doing a Used Book of the Month Club...and apparently trying to save the world. Has anyone else every sold anything used-of-the-month? I think this is new retail territory. I could save a few bucks with a Used-XBox-Game-Of-The-Month. Or does this mean the economy is getting worse, if people can't even buy new books?
posted by UMDirector (33 comments total)

I haven't bought myself a new book since graduating college five years ago. It's not a matter of not being able to afford it, it's a matter of not being able to justify it. What happens to the book when I'm done with it? There are all these once-read books sitting in garages and basements and (shudder) landfills. Why add to that when I can spend a third of the money and still read a totally functional book? Or better yet, spend nothing and borrow it from the library.

These days I have such a hard time wrapping my mind around the concept of buying new books, that I have to remind myself that almost everyone still does it.
posted by Plutor at 9:06 AM on December 12, 2006

Interesting idea - what's your impression of the stock at the shop and the of how interesting/ knowledgeable/well-read the staff is?
posted by ryanshepard at 9:10 AM on December 12, 2006

Yeah I also rarely buy new books...especially fiction. Hardback fiction gets cheap quickly online. Non-fiction sometimes is a bit harder - it seems to retain its value.

As far as the store the staff seems very knowledgable to me. They have turned me onto some books I would never have thought of. Talked to one girl who works there who is getting her PhD in English. They are definately the artsy type though...its not Barnes and Noble by a long shot. Of course I am biased cause they gave me a real good deal on a old book on theatrical make-up I sold them! :)
posted by UMDirector at 9:21 AM on December 12, 2006

The ABC Gum Company now has Viagra® flavored product in stock.
posted by Smart Dalek at 9:25 AM on December 12, 2006

Used bookstores used to be one of my favorite hangouts. Great place to find out of print stuff, just like used CD stores. There's also some bonuses, I picked up a copy of "Dianetics" from the local used bookstore because someone filled the margins with counter-arguments to everything in the book. It was entertaining.
posted by The Power Nap at 9:25 AM on December 12, 2006

I buy most of my books new, as much of the stuff I enjoy won't be available at the library for a while if ever (plus I still have that fine to pay off).

I do love a good used book store though, but do to my job, I just don't have the same desire to go in them as I once did.
posted by drezdn at 9:28 AM on December 12, 2006

BookMooch
posted by eustatic at 9:51 AM on December 12, 2006

Drezdn: What job could cause to not want to go to the bookstore?
posted by UMDirector at 9:57 AM on December 12, 2006

Working for a bookstore.
posted by drezdn at 10:01 AM on December 12, 2006

Though I love it, it's just that I have so many new books coming in (not the worst problem I admit), that the last time I went to a used bookstore, the books that I was interested in buying were purely because they were books I wouldn't mind owning, rather than ones I'd like to read shortly, because I constantly have to perform triage on my book piles to determine what gets read and what gets shelved.
posted by drezdn at 10:06 AM on December 12, 2006

I picked up a copy of "Dianetics" from the local used bookstore because someone filled the margins with counter-arguments to everything in the book.

WINDMILLS DO NOT WORK THAT WAY!
posted by sonofsamiam at 10:09 AM on December 12, 2006

much of the stuff I enjoy won't be available at the library for a while if ever

You can get just about anything under the sun through interlibrary loan.
posted by Miko at 10:31 AM on December 12, 2006

I haven't bought myself a new book since graduating college five years ago. It's not a matter of not being able to afford it, it's a matter of not being able to justify it.

It's a matter of pitching in for the common good. If nobody buys new books, no new books get published. So, once in a while- throw the writer (and the publisher) a dime. Like tossing the busker a coin.

Or better yet, spend nothing and borrow it from the library.

Or donate that once read new book you've just bought to the library.
posted by IndigoJones at 10:56 AM on December 12, 2006

I hate new books...

No cool underlines or notes from the previous reader
Extremely bright pages
Hard to turn the page no whithered corners
Very dry pages... I think time makes old books softer to the touch
posted by matimer at 11:02 AM on December 12, 2006 [1 favorite]

I love the concept, but my tastes tend too far towards the mass market to make it worth the price. I'm a simple man; keep me plied with anthologies of horror short stories and I'll be very happy. Since they're already plentiful at any used book store, there's no sense in paying $12.50 apiece to have them delivered to me.
posted by Faint of Butt at 11:07 AM on December 12, 2006

No cool underlines or notes from the previous reader

Yesssss, I love objects with some history to them. Excepting one time where a book on Buddhism had every other sentence refuted in the margins by some Objectivist who addressed the author directly: "You're fooling yourself! Meditation is a waste of your life, which should be spent thinking as furiously and as hard as possible!"
posted by sonofsamiam at 11:13 AM on December 12, 2006

There are used bookstores? Who knew?
posted by fixedgear at 12:00 PM on December 12, 2006

First of all, the store is in Cambridge, not Boston.

Second, with the $12.50 it costs you per month to have these jackasses unload their stock on you, you could go get a book from each of of the many wonderful used book stores in the Boston area. Wander the stacks, ask the staff for recommendations, make a day of it. (An itinerary off the top of my head: start downtown at Brattle Bookshop and Commonwealth Books; catch the Red Line to Cenral Square and go to Rodney's; walk up Mass Ave. to the Harvard Bookstore; get back on the Red Line to get to McIntyre and Moore in Davis Square.) But of course this isn't about supporting used book stores in general, but supporting this one in particular.

This place seems to have a knack for lame gimmicks. Buy a t-shirt with one of the sixty-nine words of Lorem Ipsum emblazoned on it for only $2175! Don't have that kind of scratch? Well, starting at $5 you can buy an indulgence which absolves you of all the guilt you feel for having shopped at Barnes and Noble that one time! What a bunch of bullshit.
posted by otio at 12:01 PM on December 12, 2006

There's another second-hand Book Club at Loganberry Books - and they'll deliver to the UK, which this one doesn't seem to. Otio, I take your point, but the serendipity that could result from second-hand books you haven't chosen yourself arriving when you aren't expecting them sounds good to me.
posted by paduasoy at 12:08 PM on December 12, 2006

paduasoy, I have no problem with the concept itself which could definitely be cool. I just wouldn't trust the book recommendations of people who think this transaction has anything remotely to do with "saving the world."
posted by otio at 12:16 PM on December 12, 2006

paperbackswap.com
posted by mikoroshi at 12:20 PM on December 12, 2006

While I worry about the loss of used bookstores in cities and communities, the fact that you can find just about any rare or out of print book, or simple one that a local bookseller wouldn't stock, and have it delivered (usually) within a week is pretty remarkable. A great boon to literature, I think. When I was selling used books online with a large distributor I would take note of what books I was sending to what locations, and it was really heartening to see really serious literature and non-fiction get shipped to bumfuck, Montana or Texas or Alabama. I personally don't buy new books just as I don't buy new clothes or new much of anything, thanks to Craigslist and thrift shops. There's a ga-billion of just about everything already, no sense in making more.
posted by bukharin at 1:15 PM on December 12, 2006

otio: wow why so angry? Seriously...people trying to sell some books and they are jackasses? Bit harsh don't you think? My experience buying and selling books from them is that they are not jackasses. A little unique from time to time but thats about it..

As far as Cambridge v. Boston...yes it is in Cambridge but I guess I always considered the whole area Boston. Perhaps not legally but close enough.

And yeah it is about used bookstores in general...at least if you take the time to read the rest of their webpage rather than attacking people. There is a lot of stuff about buying local and all that jazz...sure this specific product is that bookstore but my point was that we may be changing to a more used economy and this could be a sign of it. Maybe if we supported more local indie merchants more people would have decent jobs and we would buy used by choice not by necessity.

I don't want to have flames flying back and forth but I think you missed the entire point.
posted by UMDirector at 1:17 PM on December 12, 2006

UMDirector: "otio: wow why so angry? Seriously...people trying to sell some books and they are jackasses? Bit harsh don't you think?"

I think maybe he tried this and at the end of the year ended up with three copies of Clavell's Shogun and four of The Tommyknockers.
posted by Plutor at 2:17 PM on December 12, 2006

$12.50 per month?! For that price I think I'll start the Brand New Paperback Of Your Choice From Amazon.com Of The Month Club. Send money if interested!

Like mikoroshi said, Paperback Swap is the answer.
posted by vorfeed at 2:30 PM on December 12, 2006

this is wonderful--thanks!

I try to only buy new when it's an author i already know and love--or when something else i've read (online or off) has relied on it or raves about it.
posted by amberglow at 2:40 PM on December 12, 2006

it would be better if you could specify the amount each month tho--5 per month or 10 or 20, etc.
posted by amberglow at 2:41 PM on December 12, 2006

is anyone else doing this? Powell's would be great for something like this, i think.
posted by amberglow at 2:42 PM on December 12, 2006

AbeBooks sells used books from a network of independent stores at often excellent prices. It's a nice alternative to Amazon and the Big B's.
posted by Iridic at 2:45 PM on December 12, 2006

I very rarely buy books new. For one thing, they're just too goddamned expensive in anything but mass-market paperback (which only a relative few books are ever published in). $25-$30 for a 300-page hardcover? $15-$20 for a trade paperback? No thanks.

Another reason is simply that a lot of the books I want aren't available new. I'm really big into SF from the 40s, 50s and 60s. The overwhelming majority of those books aren't in print, and most of the ones that are I already own.

On the other hand, for some reason it's almost impossible to find any of Philip K. Dick's novels used (which is why it's fortunate most of them are still in print).
posted by Target Practice at 5:40 PM on December 12, 2006

hummh, books will always bore!?
posted by gamerfreak at 6:24 PM on December 12, 2006

Why buy when you can rent? What's the draw of owning used books over picking them up at the library?
posted by Sprout the Vulgarian at 11:23 AM on December 13, 2006

Why buy when you can rent? What's the draw of owning used books over picking them up at the library?

Because they're pretty (who needs posters when you've got bookshelves?).

Because they serve as physical markers of your personal history, entwined with countless strangers' histories and the history of literature in general.

And if you're employed (or otherwise engaged) in something involving research, you're less likely to have to go down to the library and put a hold on something when you just need a specific passage.

Also, they're pretty.
posted by poweredbybeard at 11:53 AM on December 14, 2006