» Book Exchange Proposal
- filed under Books
- 11 comments
I’ve been thinking about trying to organize a book exchange! I was inspired by Raven’s Flip-Flop Swap and Scarf Swap, and I love the idea of buying something inexpensive but GREAT for someone I may or may not know.
But when I pitched this idea on Twitter, not only did I not have a lot of interest, but I think I gave the impression that we would be sharing books we already own. That wasn’t really my intention, but would be, obviously, okay. Here’s what I was thinking:
-You would sign up to participate.
-I would make up a survey of some basic questions about you, your reading tastes, your reading preferences (physical or eBook), to where you would be okay sending a package, anyone participating you DON’T want to swap with, etc.
-You would answer the questions (probably via e-mail).
-I would pair you with someone, most likely with as different as possible of tastes in books as you, to provide some diversity.
-You would email that person for their address, and with a few book ideas to make sure they don’t already have the one(s) you’re thinking about sending.
-You buy them a book (or give them one from your library) and send it to them. You also get one from them.
-If you prefer eBooks, it is SUPER simple to gift someone a book via Amazon or B&N.
-If you have a physical book with which you’re willing to part, you can send it, but you probably won’t get it back.
-Media mail is really inexpensive, so I was thinking this would be a fairly cheap exchange.
I wasn’t thinking about a sharing service for books we all already own because there are already those out there, and it’s not something I’d like to take on. If, after my notes, you’re still wanting to participate, comment below, and make sure the e-mail address you use to comment is one where I can contact you about the exchange! Signup will close on Friday, August 31, and if at least 10 people are signed up I will go ahead and send out the survey. If not, well, I tried. 
WOO, BOOKS!
Reading (and chickens)
August 13, 2012 7:55 pm
Oooh, this is a great idea. I am totally up for it except, uh, could we maybe be paired with someone with similar tastes, or not VERY different tastes? I don’t have a lot of luck with people who want to give me, say, murder mysteries or historical fiction (just examples), and I can imagine a lot of people would not want YA or romance or humorous essays that I love. Um, this is not clear, but what I meant to say is I would LOVE to participate but would love it MORE if I knew the person I was paired up with was someone who would introduce me to favorite new authors instead of something interesting I’d read once and go, “hmm,” and then not really love.
Donna
August 13, 2012 8:16 pm
I’ll do it!
Becky
August 13, 2012 10:18 pm
I would be up for this!
Jesabes
August 13, 2012 10:56 pm
I’ve been thinking about this since you first tweeted about it and I’m not sure. It sounds fun, but my library list is a million miles long and the quickest way to make sure I never read a book is to buy it. The ones I own always get pushed to the end of the list. Plus, the biggest thing for me is that I hate spending money on books. It just seems like such expensive entertainment, since after two or three hours your money is gone. Especially since it’s so easy to get books for free.
ALTHOUGH, I just thought of a certain genre of books (ahem) that might be fun to exchange. I think Erin should participate.
Hillary
August 14, 2012 10:40 am
I’m in.
Ginger
August 14, 2012 12:32 pm
I’m in
PinkieBling
August 14, 2012 12:34 pm
Ohhh, ok. When I saw it on Twitter, I did think it was for books we already own, and I’ve purged my shelves since I got my Kindle. This is almost more like a CDP exchange, but with books.
I’m IN!
Anne
August 14, 2012 2:54 pm
Sure, sign me up! I am in a reading funk lately, so maybe this would help me out!
Natalie
August 15, 2012 3:01 am
Sounds fun!
Emily
August 16, 2012 10:00 am
I’m in!
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