By Olivia Shumaker
Special Writer for The Review
For local book lovers, the Orion Township Library has a cheaper answer to finding a new read, with no overdue fines or serious price tags.
Friends of the Orion Township Public Library is hosting a used book sale starting Wednesday, Sept. 21.
The organization supports the needs of the Orion Township Library through fundraising efforts. The volunteers are experts at running the book sales, hosting three of these events annually, as well as maintaining a gently-used bookstore in the library.
Donations of books are accepted year round, and twice-a-week volunteers Tom Reuter and Sally Pelletier, among others, bring the donations to the library storage room and sort the books by category. Books are then boxed for the next book sale. Coordinator Marie English estimated that they collect about 10,000 books for each sale.
While the book sales get an expected stock of numerous young adult, teen and children’s books, there is often an oddball genre that appears in great numbers.
‘Sometimes we get a ton of science books, and other times we only get one. Sometimes we only get a few Westerns, sometimes we get two or three boxes of them,? said English. Books in abundance this year include homeschooling books and nursing textbooks.
Considering the price that the books sell for compared to bookstore prices, those textbooks and others could be a hot commodity. All children’s books and paperbacks go for 50 cents each and all hardbacks and large soft backs go for one dollar each.
In addition, Saturday, Sept. 24 is bag day, in which buyers pay four dollars for one grocery bag full of books.
The ultimate goal of the used book sale, English said, is to help the library plus recycle books for others to read.
‘Now that funding has been cut, we really feel like we’re doing a good service to both the people and the library,? English said.
The book sale goes from 9:30 a.m. to 8:30 p.m. Wednesday and Thursday, Sept. 21-22; from 9:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on Friday, Sept. 23 and from 9:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on Saturday, Sept. 24. It is hosted at the Orion Township Library on Joslyn Road in Orion Township.