University of Western Australia: 100,000 books for sale at annual charity event

Keen readers and collectors will be able to choose from about 100,000 books at the annual Save the Children book sale, which starts next week at The University of Western Australia.

The event, which raises money for children’s charities in WA and overseas, has been running for 59 years and will again be held in historic Winthrop Hall’s Undercroft.

Save the Children’s WA Community Fundraising Manager Sonia Holmes said 60 volunteers worked throughout the year to sort through donations of books, records and games for the winter sale. Another 150 volunteers help during the sale, which is held over six days.

Shirley Withers, 94, has been volunteering for almost 25 years helping to sort goods at the Book House donation headquarters and working at the Australiana stand during the sale.

“You just get addicted to the books,” Mrs Withers said.

“There’s the joy of working with people who share similar interests and the satisfaction of helping out for a good cause.”

She said one year, a large number of new books was donated after being withdrawn from the school system for being considered ‘inappropriate’.

Mrs Withers said they were snapped up by buyers for $10 and she later discovered they were collectables and were being sold for hundreds of dollars.

The books will be organised in to 62 categories this year with a separate section for music.

“There really is something for everyone at our sales with thousands of books in a huge number of categories so everything from war history and true crime to vintage collectables and architecture,” Ms Holmes said.

Other categories include tiny books, gardening, graphic novels, hardback fiction and politics.

The sale starts on Friday 19 August at 3pm and ends on Wednesday 24 August at 3pm.