Have you heard of Little Free Libraries? They've been spreading around the world in the last year or so and are now sprouting up around Toronto in the Annex and Beach neighborhoods. These birdhouse-sized libraries offer free books with the request that if you take a book, you leave a book.
Always open and free of charge, these libraries operate on the honor system. Some of the Little Free Library locations were set up to promote reading among children, while other organizers include popular books for adults.
Monique Richard, a Toronto Little Free Library steward, invested hundreds of dollars to purchase and install a Little Library for which she has frequent return visitors. She keeps her library stocked with recent magazines and bestsellers, including The Help and Fifty Shades of Grey, along with some of her favorite Canadian novels. It's a great alternative to the long waitlists for new books at many public libraries.
Have you seen a Little Free Library? For more information on finding or starting a Little Free Library in your neighborhood, visit the Little Free Library website.
(Image: Alex Pietrowski from the Torontoist Flickr Pool via Torontoist)
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This is such a heart-warming, wonderful concept. May it spread throughout the cities, and worldwide!
This is so cool! It reminds me of when my husband was at Florida State for grad school and they had a bike system where you could ride these bright yellow bikes around campus, and once you parked the bike someone else could then ride it. I hope that program is still going, but the pessimist in me says it's probably not.
we have lots of these in and around St. Paul MN. they are just as cute in person as they are in the photos
Love this. Only thing I would worry about is me putting in a bunch of really good books and having them all eventually be replaced with sub-par books that no one would want to read.
Mntngr, that's pretty much what happened at a similar library at an institution I frequent. I am optimistically thinking that at least the good books went to another person who really wanted to read them, and they will eventually return them - I know I did return most of the good books I took, even after 6 months.
There is one across the street from me in Milwaukee and it gets lots of traffic. So far the books have come and gone and have had a good mix of quality and, uh, 'guilty pleasures'. And it's not full of Chick Tracts either!
we have them all over our neighborhood! Love them! We're in Madison, Wisconsin
What a fantastic idea built on the honesty of others. Glad to hear its working well in Wisconsin. Its fairly new to us here in Toronto but I'm hoping it will grow!