What do with Mother's library?

littlerock

My mum died a couple of years ago and left a library of books, some of which might be worth some money (some are early first editions.) At the time I tried to give the library to a couple of university libraries (they are all books by famous Victorian novelists) but they said they were full up. Booksellers all wanted me to cherry pick them for them first. That was a step too far at the time. So they ended up in boxes in a lock up near me.

I really need to move them on. I was wondering about putting some shelving in the lockup so that I could store them in the form of a library and gradually sell off the better ones. Would this be allowed? My friend says just offer them in total to a charity. Would one even accept them and which one? I would estimate there are around 2000 books.

FreeBear

Storing books in a cold damp lockup will do them no good. Pick out the ones you want to keep, and any valuable ones - The latter you can sell. The rest would be welcome by most charity shops, and some will even come and collect for free.

My local PDSA shop collected a bookcase full of Mills & Boone type novels for free and a local Air Ambulance supporter took another bookcase full.

Ozzuk

As above, keep the best, sell on ebay (or via a book seller). There is a commune style community not far from me - I gave them all the books.

You can also sell job lots on ebay, buyer collects obviously!

kazwookie

Get the decent ones out of the lockup unless it is heated, and store at yours,.

The rest send to a charity shop, or maybe there is a local car boot near you,, sell the rest of them for 0.50p a go or 3 for a £1, keep the money and buy some thing you want, or donate it to your mother's favourite charity.

The rest of them, get valued and send to a speclisit book auction or similar.

Mojisola

littlerock wrote: »

My friend says just offer them in total to a charity. Would one even accept them and which one?

If you want to do this, try http://www.oxfam.org.uk/shop/books

trailingspouse

ebay can be time-consuming, but might be worth it. I bought a mixed lot of books from our local auction for £7.00, because there was one book that I particularly wanted. I then sold most of the rest on ebay and made £23.00 profit.

Re the first editions, depending on what they are they could indeed be worth serious money - I've just spent £600 on one (and that was a bargain, as I'd seen it at £1000). Totally worth a bit of cherry picking!

littlerock

Sorry bit misleading it is not a lock up garage, I was using the term in a general sense, it is a proper air con storage unit and I checked the other day and the books are still in good condition.

I thought if I bought some cheap shelving and put it in the unit and put them on there I could more easily identify the better ones to extract and sell. There is no room to do this in my house..

Norman_Castle

No reason not to put free standing shelving in a lock up although this sounds like you're planning to store the books rather than sort them. Could you take 100? books home each week with the intention of separating the valuable books and disposing of whats left with none returning to storage or having a clear out at the storage unit of the obviously low value books?
I would be careful not to spend a lot of money on storing books which are unwanted by you and have no real value.

As above try Oxfam. They have specialist bookstores which hopefully get the best prices for valuable books.

sparkiemalarkie

I sold an old penguin book a couple of years ago on Ebay.
I was going to put it in the recycling but my husband suggested that it might have some value.
It sold on Ebay for £149......

It's definitely worth taking some time to research their value regardless of whether or not you want to keep the money or donate it.
I have used Ebay in the past to sell book with the proceeds going to charity (they used to give a discount on fees I believe).


sparkie

glasgowdan

Researching 2000 books to try and find some that are worth a few quid sounds like epic effort for possibly no pot of gold! I'd be tempted to sell them in batches on eBay as and when you get time. I'd love to inherit a library of books, not to sell but to keep. They're wonderful decor!

FreeBear

glasgowdan wrote: »

I'd love to inherit a library of books, not to sell but to keep. They're wonderful decor!

That's another option - Sell them to an interior "designer" for so many ££ per metre.