PaperBackSwap.Com

www.paperbackswap.com

WARNING for book junkies: Do NOT click the above link if you do not want to become hopelessly addicted! This site has thousands upon thousands of books available, and these books are not for sale…they are for trading and swapping amongst the members of the site. If you have a few books that you want to get rid of, then the idea is simple: you become a member, and you make a list of books you have available for trade, plus a second list of books that you want. Other members read your lists, and they make arrangements with you to trade their books for yours. As you trade more and more books, you build up a number of credits that allow you to trade them in for books (typically at a cost of 1 credit = 1 book). No money changes hands; the shipping costs are paid by the people sending the books. (Actually, you can also pay money directly to paperbackswap.com in exchange for book credits.)

Naturally, many of the books here are popular mainstream books, but there are quite a few obscure and out-of-print titles to be found here as well. When you become a member, you may find yourself looking for cheap books at the local Goodwill and library sales, so that you can make them available for trade on paperbackswap.com. Lots of other people do the same thing, and most of the books available here are used. (There are also a lot of hardcover books and audio books being traded here; it's not exclusively limited to paperbacks.) You're practically guaranteed to find a lot of books here that are nearly impossible to find elsewhere. NPR did a piece on paperbackswap.com recently, and it brought a lot of new members into the fold – which also resulted in a general increase in the variety and quality of the books available here.