This past August, I was lucky enough to get to work a handful of shifts at my local library’s annual autumn book sale. I’ve frequented the sale for many years, but this was my first time there as a librarian (rather than a patron), and my first time behind one of the registers! It was pretty fun, and I was surprised at how many people I saw there that I knew from outside of work. When I wasn’t helping set up in the morning, or cashing out purchases, though, I was able to take some time to browse the selection – I ended up coming in on one of my days off, just so I could take an hour for myself to see what titles were still available. Contrary to popular belief, the book sale isn’t filled with discarded library books (though there are a few of those for sale), but by donations from the community and patrons. Most of the books you can buy are still in new condition; others are more well-loved, but the majority appear as if they’ve been read only once before, if at all. So with the quality so good, and the prices so cheap, it’s definitely first come, first serve – a lot of the newer, more popular and in-demand books were gone the first hour of the first day the sale was open to the public. Nonetheless, I managed to snag some great reads for my personal collection at home. Most of them pertain in some way to British history or literature, one of my favorite subjects (as you’d expect to hear from someone who minored in British Studies!).

Fiction:

The Quick / Lauren Owen

Ripper / Stefan Petrucha

The Angel’s Game / Carlos Ruiz Zafon

The Dracula Dossier: A Novel of Suspense / James Reese

London / Edward Rutherford

Macbeth / Jo Nesbo

Gone Girl / Gillian Flynn

Myst: The Book of D’ni / David Wingrove, Rand Miller

Myst: The Book of Ti’ana / David Wingrove, Rand Miller, Robyn Miller

Nonfiction:

The Library Book / Susan Orlean

Eleanor of Aquitaine / Alison Weir

Eleanor of Aquitaine: A Biography / Marion Meade

Losing Our Heads: Beheadings in Literature and Culture / Regina Janes

Beautiful Death: the Art of the Cemetery / David Robinson

Public Enemies: America’s Greatest Crime Wave and the Birth of the FBI, 1933-4 / Bryan Burrough

Juvenile / Young Adult Fiction:

Leviathan / Scott Westerfeld

Dear America: Dreams in the Golden Country / Kathryn Lasky

Redwall / Brian Jacques

Poetry / Drama:

Beowulf and Judith / Richard M. Trask

Hamlet / William Shakespeare