Book Exchange

Today I had a lovely ladies' lunch in Logan Square at Lula Cafe, and took along a book to leave in the Logan Square Community Book Exchange. I read about it last year in the Chicago Reader, and I thought it was like the greatest thing ever. This guy temporarily removed a newspaper-type box from the street, took it home, painted it, and put it back with books inside. It operates on the take a penny/leave a penny principle, and today it was fully stocked!

I left a copy of Chloe Plus Olivia, a steamy anthology of lesbian fiction. Actually, not all the stories are steamy, now that I think about it, but those are the ones that I remember. (Hmm?) I decided to combine the Book Exchange box with another book-sharing venture that I love - Bookcrossing.com, which is another concept I'm really into - Bookcrossing provides ways for you to track the travels of your books. I first found out about it when I lived in San Francisco, and I was up at my favorite spot - the top of Nob Hill, in the little park around the fountain, and under my bench I spotted a book. Inside the cover was pasted a number (that's the bookcrossing ID) and a link to the website. When you find a book, you can make a journal entry on the website, then the idea is to "release" the book again. You can check out my profile. I've released 28 books. OK, so no one's ever logged on and claimed them, but I keep trying!

Even though I have a huge collection of books I want to keep, I'm a big proponent of sharing books, and I give books away all the time. I love both these methods (the Logan Square box and Bookcrossing) of promoting the sharing of books and providing a way for it to be done creatively, frequently, and easily!

Oh, I really want to make a box for my neighborhood, Andersonville, but I haven't quite got up the courage to essentially steal a box off the street (but then you give it back - everyone wins)!

By the way, next to the book box, someone's put up a "video exchange" box. Before lunch it had a bunch of Adam Sandler VHS tapes, and after lunch they were all gone and replaced with tapes on wine tasting.