The contents of the $7/box
There is no official “start” to the summer book sale season, but one great place to whet an appetite is at the Friends of the Byram Shubert Library in Greenwich, Connecticut.
This sale is usually held the 2nd weekend in June at the St. Paul’s Lutheran Church across the street. Book Sale Finder advertises the sale as “Exceptional”, “Well worth the trip!” and “Great Prices!”
Suffice to say, the sale was as advertised.
The Friday Preview night sells hardcovers $3, softcovers $2, small paperbacks .50 or 3/$1. On Saturday, prices are reduced to hardcovers $2, softcovers $1, small paperbacks 5/$1, children’s .25-.50. But it is on Sunday, a Bargain hunter’s delight, that there is a “bag and box” sale $5/bag, $7/box or 2 boxes/$10.
I went in the last few hours on Sunday, and the tables were still tidy. The fiction was plentiful, but the non-fiction and young adult choices very picked over. Nevertheless, in 20 minutes, I selected 34 great titles that I placed in a box provided by the Friends of the Library.
13 copies of books outlined in our curriculum mapping
On the tables I grabbed titles we offer in our Grade 11 Vietnam War literature unit: 3 copies of In Country by Bobbie Ann Mason and and 2 copies of Tim O’Brien’s The Things They Carried. There were also books assigned in our curriculum for Grade 10 World Literature: Mark Haddon’s The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night Time and William Golding’s Lord of the Flies. Finally, two clean copies of Agatha Christie’s And Then There Were None will be placed in our grade 8 mystery unit. Summer reading for the Advanced Placement English Language is Kim Edward’s The Memory Keeper’s Daughter while Toni Morrison’s The Bluest Eye is one of the choices offered to these students during the school year.
The 13 books I found outlined in our curriculum mapping would normally retail for $139.00 if purchased new. The additional 21 books in the box will be added as independent reads in classroom libraries or suggested as “satellite reads” to complement a whole class novel.
34 books for $7.00? That is an amazing bargain. The 2013 summer used book sale season is off to a great start!
Used Books in Class 