BookCrossing – What is This?

Hello! 

I am obsessed with books and reading. And when I hear about something new book-related I am all ears. I first heard about BookCrossing and that a group of people meets every month on the second Friday usually at a bar/restaurant in Coburg, when the librarian in Rödental told me about it. I knew about these meetings for quite a while but for some reason I was never able to attend a meeting but thankfully I could do so in December as well as yesterday. The BookCrossing group usually meets at 6pm at the Hungry Highlander Restaurant in Coburg.   

What is BookCrossing? 

It is a social networking website for books that you don’t want to keep anymore or read again to get a new identity or a new life in a way. The great part about it is, that these books are registered, passed on to other readers and can be tracked which is a good way to connect to many other book-lovers. The United States and Germany are the two top BookCrossing countries. See their website for more information on other countries who participate. The mission is simply to connect people through books. All this is done by registering on the website and joining BookCrossing. It is free. You will all the instructions and can now print out a label and stick it in the books you want to share and “set-free”. Now you register the book and put a number in it. With these numbers you are able to follow where your book is, who read it and sometimes even read comments about the book from other readers or from the person who found it. Pretty sweet, right? 

As a book-lover you most likely have a nice collection of books and several shelves at home. Many books just collect dust however. BookCrossing is a way to clean up your library and give some of your books a new life. I used to donate many to my local library before but BookCrossing is such a good alternative. The great part is that it is sort of “reading and releasing” the books. Some books you will never find again – maybe someone loves it so much, they keep them. Sometimes you find your book in Australia. I love it and find it exciting. 

The BookCrossing team in Coburg is great. Below you see the picture from last night. A long wooden table with a plethora of books to browse, read, talk about and keep. Coburg’s BookCrossing Stammtisch helps to spread the word around and answers all your questions regarding how to join. It feels great to be among people who do share my passion of reading, buying books and talking about them. Like BookCrossing on Facebook to follow along. 

Are you invested in signing up at BookCrossing? Or would you like to go to one of the meetings in Coburg? The next meeting is on 12 February 2016 at The Hungry Highlander Restaurant at 6pm! Stop by and say Hi. Let me know if you have more questions. 

Thank you for reading my blog.