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Dreams Come True: Check Out These Book Buses

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German Book Bus

Photo: Bookstr

It’s not secret from anyone that I’m a bookworm. My to be read pile (TBR for all the cool kids) is currently covering my small kitchen table. I just got back from driving four hours all together on a weeknight to see an author speak at a library, and I treat all signed books like precious stones. With those facts in mind, imagine how I reacted when I learned about book buses in Germany. That’s right, I went Kermit-arm-flail crazy.

Kermit Yay

Me right now

Germany’s VHH bus company, which serves the city of Hamburg, has installed bookshelves in its buses right behind the driver. The books are free to read while riding the bus and if a particular tome catches your attention and you cannot finish it in one ride, you are free to take it home. When you finish the book, you are expected to return it to the shelf on the bus for others to pick up. If a non-Hamburg resident wants to finish a book, no problem. Readers can mail books back to the store, Stilbruch, that helps provide books to the shelves to be placed back in the system. The store collects used books and donations to stock the “Buchhaltestellen,” or Book Stops.

This all sounds very familiar to people acquainted with the Little Libraries that have been popping up around the world, which invite passersby to take a book and leave a book. The book bus’s assistance from Stilbruch, though, ensures that there is a good mix of books on each bus and that shelves do not run out. I wish the program success, and maybe the idea will come to America soon, because I would hop on a bus more often if I knew books were waiting for me.

News Source: Bookstr