#Buy and sell old library books plus#

I have been buying ex-library books for years. However, remember publishers produce ' library editions' with sturdier bindings to withstand being handled and reshelved many times. It's true that they may have been read numerous times. Sadly, ex-library books have a poor reputation because an old library book can have many miles on the clock and there is also a lot of them available online. It will also probably carry some sort of stamp bearing the word 'discarded' or 'withdrawn', or the barcode has been obscured with a pen. It could be a stamp, or a barcode label, or an 'old school' pocket for the checkout card. It doesn't take a genius to work out how books get stolen.An ex-library book will carry some sort of marking indicating the name of library that previously owned it.

#Buy and sell old library books plus#

So theoretically one dishonest person could join 11 times in our local authority, one for each branch library, giving a false name and address each time,and he could borrow 12 books on each ticket plus 2 DVDs. There are people who do this.Īlso, a few years ago our library managers adopted a 'No ID policy' when people joined the library. I don't know if this helps you to decide but I can tell you that we had many library books stolen from our libraries. Some books just look 'Boring' and never get borrowed, so a criteria has to be set that if a book hasn't been borrowed once in say, 6 months, or whatever, then it gets withdrawn from stock.ĭoesn't matter if it's an expensive book, or a rare book, or what, it has to go. If it's an obscure book, fiction or non fiction, it could have been withdrawn. If the book is a popular one by a popular author, or a best seller I would guess it's been stoilen. Having said that I would look at the title and genre of a book before I wondered whether it had been legitimately withdrawn. It is actually cheaper to buy a new book than to have the old one rebound, staff cutbacks has made it impossible to find time to repair books, so many books that would not have been withdrawn in the past, are being withdrawn now. Years ago books had to be literally falling to bits before they would be withdrawn from stock.īooks would be repaired in our workroom, given new jackets, the binding glued up, sometimes they would be sent away to be rebound. In the whole of Oxfordshire there is one copy - out on loan.Īs a retired Library Assistant, I've worked in libraries nearly all my life. That particular library does not have a copy of the book although seven other local libraries do. The library stamp named a library in the Republic of Ireland. Could this really be a library book which was withdrawn? The hardback is immaculate with slip-covered jacket, library stamps on the pages and with the lending insert stamped to indicate it was borrowed 4 times, with the last return date in August 2015.

Today I received a book which sparked this post. However, some are in pristine condition with no evidence that the library had no longer wanted them.įor a long time I have wondered if some of these books were not really ex-library. I have bought many ex-library books and most are obviously genuine with Withdrawn stamps and evidence of being well read enough to warrant the library selling them off. I only look in about once per week so will not necessarily respond in a hurry.

If anyone is still glancing at the Books Board I would be interested to hear their opinions about this conundrum.