Books With Benefits

Look familiar? There is definitely an uncanny resemblance between this picture and my dining room! The depicted conversation is all too familiar with my husband recently  asking why he had bought me a Kindle if I’m going to continue to “clutter up” the dinning room with more and more paper books. I won’t tell you my less then elegant retort for fear of upsetting any small people reading!
My problem is that I absolutely adore books, reading them, reviewing and recommending them, smelling them and looking at them on a beautifully alphabetised(one day!) bookcase but even I have to admit to keeping copies of books that I am unlikely to read again.
A recent visit to my local Oxfam (the spoils from which have been discreetly hidden from the husband) has certainly made me re-think my book hoarding. With falling book donations and stock levels, Oxfam are using the month of June to highlight the need to re-home your  previously read, unwanted and neglected books . Hearing that the money raised from the sale of one paperback could buy two new books for schools in Somali land  certainly put my my dust gatherers in to perspective!

Oxfam’s target for June is to Collect an additional 500,000 books. The money from which is enough to fund all of their work in Rwanda for a whole year!
Now don’t get me wrong lovely followers, I’m certainly not going to be obtaining the minimalist look any time soon but I do believe that a book sort is long over due and I shall be donating any “spare” books to my local Oxfam shop.
If you want to get involved you can take your donated books to any Oxfam shop during opening hours or  post them in one of their 300 donation banks situated in Salisbury’s car parks. Of course there is nothing to stop you having a little browse while you are there!
Don’t forget that Oxfam also has an on line shop which you can visit here or learn more about from our Frugal Fiction post on charity shops here.
Post by Caroline