Choose from thousands of books at the Friends of the Marshall Public Library sale this weekend
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POCATELLO – There’s something for everyone in the thousands of books listed for sale Friday and Saturday at the Marshall Public Library.
“We have biographies, hobbies, sports, classics, adult fiction, young adult fiction, science fiction, westerns, travel, languages, children’s books, religion, cookbooks — we have all kinds of things,” says Linda Davis, with Friends of the Marshall Public Library.
Davis says the Friends nonprofit, which is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year, has somewhere between 2,000 and 3,000 books available for purchase. The sale began Friday morning and will run until 5 p.m., then again on Saturday from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Patrons will find the book sale in the library’s community room and lobby, as well as a small store area near the circulation desk. Hardcover books can be purchased for $2, and paperback books cost $1.
As a nonprofit 501 (c)(3) organization, the Friends use the money they raise to benefit the library by covering some of its programming, equipment and event costs.
The way that Davis sees it, the Friends “put the frosting on the library cake.”
Some of the books that are on sale are ones that have been phased out by the library, but Davis said that “doesn’t necessarily mean they’re in poor shape.”
“It may be a book that was temporarily very popular, but now it’s not circulating,” she said. “They have a limited amount of shelf space, so the library cannot store everything.”
However, the majority of the books on sale have been donated by people in the community.
“We have many people who will come in throughout the year and just give us books. They’re cleaning out their own personal bookshelf, they’re cleaning out mom’s house, (and) they just want it to go to a good home,” Davis said.
While the Friends are too busy to accept donations during the sale, they’ll begin accepting donated books, DVDs and CDs again on Monday. The Friends don’t accept donations of cassette tapes and VHS tapes.
In celebration of the Friends nonprofit’s 30th anniversary, this book sale also features a special raffle drawing. Anyone who spends or donates $30 during the sale will receive a raffle ticket for a chance to win one of several gift baskets, filled by a variety of local businesses.
And for anyone inspired by the book sale and wanting to help the Marshall Public Library further, Davis said the Friends are always looking for new members.
“If anybody’s interested in lending a hand or getting involved with an organization such as ours, they just need to find one of us, talk to us, and we’ll invite them to a meeting, and we’ll see if we’re what they need in their lives,” Davis said.
For more information on the Friends of the Marshall Public Library organization, visit its Facebook page.