Book Sale returns this weekend

Thousands of books — hardbacks, coffee table, paperbacks — will be on sale this weekend, Saturday, May 28, at the Shelter Island Public Library.

Celebrating its 45th anniversary, the Book Sale committee, headed up by Cynthia Needham, continues to contribute to the library’s coffers. Proceeds from this Friends of the Library activity are earmarked for the 125th Anniversary Fund, established to renovate the library’s lower level where the book sale is housed and where many community events take place.

In the early years, the library’s book sales averaged $250 a year; now the annual sale brings in $13,000.

When the current library building was dedicated in 1965, a history of the library stated, “The annual sale of used books finds neighbors and friends donating their unwanted books and gleefully taking home an equally large armful.”

That hasn’t changed. Earlier this month, the Reporter received this email from summer residents Tanya and Eben Lenderking. “After several years of buying large quantities of books at the annual Shelter Island Library book sale, [we] finally took receipt of 37 boxes of books in Marrakech, Morocco. Why buy a book when you can buy a wall of books!”

They later explained that they have three small hotels in Marrakech and they stock up on cookbooks, collections (art, works of Shakespeare and Thackeray) and “thrillers or airport reading.” Most all of the books come from the library but they admit that one box may have been put together from the Goody Pile. It cost more to get the books through customs, they said, than to ship them duty free all the way from Shelter Island to Casablanca.

“We had the shelves built and were just waiting and waiting, but were so excited when they got here, it was like a second Christmas,” they wrote.

The Book Sale will continue on Saturdays from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. through June 25, and then Thursdays and Saturdays from July 2 to September 3.

The Lenderkings will be back for this weekend’s sale opening — so plan on stocking up early or book now for your trip to Marrakech!