I think BookCrossing is broken.
Either that, or no one that has ever found one of my books has bothered to log on.
I joined BookCrossing last year. I vowed to buy cheap books at the Augustana Book Sale and then release them. My page is here. It lists the books I’ve released. It was supposed to be a fun little project.
The concept is easy – you log books, assign them a number, and give them away. And I did – I gave away a whole crap load of books. A year ago, I gave away tons of them on a rummage sale, with only the instructions to log on to BookCrossing.com and chronicle the book’s travels. I dropped some off at coffee shops. I finished it off a few months ago by dumping the rest of my books at a Dunn Brothers here in Sioux Falls.
Each book has a large sticker on the inside front cover that explains Bookcrossing.com. It gives explicit instructions – step by step, from finding the site to finding the book.
And though I have 27 books on the loose – released into the wild for some unsuspecting reader to find and enjoy – none of them have been “retrieved.”
I know they have been physically retrieved. I saw people take them. But no one wants to log in and let me know where the books have gone.
BookCrossing seems like a great idea. The only problem is getting other people to buy into it.
So if you’re out there and have found one of my books (and this isn’t a stretch – I also placed a sticker that let the book finder know that it was “lost by Black Marks on Wood Pulp”) let me know. I’d hate to think all the time I spent logging and releasing books was all for naught.
Thanks.
I remember Book Crossing from way back. I tried it too, but I never got a response, and I’ve never found a Book Crossing book left by someone else.
On a related note, I got my first Where’s George dollar last year.
BookCrossing isn’t broken. Sometimes it takes many months to receive a journal entry on a book that has been released; then you might receive three in one week. It’s a good idea to give some thought to release sites. Places where people aren’t just rushing by, or where they might not want to carry a book with them. I’ve had some recent catches in waiting areas at restaurants, on top of newspaper sale boxes, in post office lobbies (on counters), on public benches outside buildings, around outdoor statues, and at visitor centers/rest stops along the highways. Some people who will pick up a book just won’t write a journal entry, but they may pass the book on and you’ll hear from a third or fourth party. It’s best to just let it go, and then, one day when you least expect it…..that exciting email will arrive!