• If possible, please hold large donations until after our Saturday and Sunday Sale Days.
• Books brought in a day or two before the sale may not make it onto the shelves that month. (If you wish to see them on display, plan accordingly)
• We're crowded. Please limit your Sale Day donations to a bag or two of books.

If you cannot attend the book sale, please drop by the Friends Bookstore located inside the Downtown Library and open during library hours. It is restocked regularly with a unique selection of books for all ages and interests.

 
Suggestions?

Members Early Sale Set for December 13th

The FOPAL Board of Directors has set the annual Members Early sale for Saturday December 13th. If you're a Member of the Friends of the Palo Alto Library, you'll be able to get in to the Main Room early at the December 13th sale! At this twice-a-year event, Life Members are allowed to enter the sale at 9am and can purchase up to 50 books. Members at all other levels can enter the sale at 10am and purchase the normal 12 books at a time. Enjoy a less crowded main book room and get first crack at our wonderful collection of materials. Books are always a welcome holiday treat!

Tickets for early arrivers are handled differently at the Members Early sale. Tickets given out are for the 9am and 10am lines at the Main Room, since most people who come early are Members of the Friends. Each Member will get just one ticket, although Members at and above the $30 levels may bring in their families, consisting of one or two adults and children. No tickets will be given out for the 11am line.

You may renew your membership, or join FOPAL, that day. Renew, or join now at www.fopal.org/join!

 
Super Special Saturday Sale in Room H1 November 8th, 10am-4pm

FOPAL has reserved Cubberley Room H1 again for another special sale on this Saturday November 8th, 10am - 4pm! We have received many unique Ephemera items that we've been holding for just such a special sale. Think large serving pieces, porcelain collectables, ceramic sculptures, art work and many more unusual pieces.... Look for these Ephemera items and a selection of "Better Signed" books that Jerry Stone has set aside as unique holiday gifts for the person that has everything.

Also, managing this super special Saturday sale is FOPAL Intern Charlotte Cutkosky. Charlotte is a Palo Alto resident; recent graduate from Mills College with plans to be a librarian. Charlotte has been honing her book value research skills with FOPAL for the past two years. We are extremely happy to have Charlotte's help again as she brings a vibrant energy and strong work ethic to her position as FOPAL Intern. Thank you Charlotte!

 
Preview Our Shelves

Check out some of the thousands of books that will be on sale this weekend using our shelf preview photos.

 
Special Seasonal Selections

Long time section manager Althea Andersen has been working hard to bring out all the seasonal Winter Holidays books. You'll find a large selection for Thanksgiving, Hanukkah and Christmas. If you are looking for great ideas on how to liven up your holidays, look no further. We have an entire cart of holiday CDs we've been collecting these many months. For the November sale you are sure to find something you'll be excited to read, listen to or share with loved ones during this upcoming holiday season. Look for the festive red and green display as you enter the Main Room on the right. Also, because we have even more Hanukkah and Christmas stuff still packed away in storage, look for more of our collection to be put on sale in December. And, check the Bargain Room/H2 for a large holiday selection as well.

 
Art

The section manager for Art has created a special Impressionism & Post-Impression. "Impressionism emerged in the mid-nineteenth century in opposition to the finished style of academic painting. It often depicted scenes of daily life, and used painterly strokes and shifting color areas to capture the effects of light and atmosphere. Post-Impressionism refers to a host of artists and styles that emerged after Impressionism in the late nineteenth century. Although diverse in style, they tend to share an emphasis on intense, sometimes arbitrary, colors, expressive forms, and painterly brushstrokes." (from TheArtStory.org) Look for this October/November special in the bookcases just outside the sorting room (opposite Travel & next to Winter Holidays).

 
New Mitchell Park Library FOPAL Bookstore is Open!

It's been well worth the wait! FOPAL volunteers have been busy stocking the shelves of new 10-foot-x-10-foot Mitchell Park Library and Community Center "Friends" bookstore in anticipation of the MPLCC soft opening on November 6. This new FOPAL bookstore is now open on a self-serve basis. You'll find the MP-FOPAL Bookstore just to your left as you enter the library! Now you are in the know! Also, remember the MP Library and community center will have a grand opening on December 6.

This new FOPAL sale space holds approximately a thousand great books from our popular sections like: fiction, large format/coffee table books, mysteries, science-fiction, biographies/memoirs, history, classic literature, cooking and crafts to name but a third of what will be available for purchase during all MP Library business hours. These books will be priced $2 for a hardcover and $1 for a paperback. For this new FOPAL bookstore we'll also be offering DVDs, CDs and better boxed greeting cards.

FOPAL volunteers will be monitoring this bookstore Monday-Friday 3-5pm and able to sell better books from our Better Book Gondola as well as school supplies (pencils, erasers, pens, FOPAL green tote bags...). If you are interested in volunteering at the new MP-FOPAL Book store please contact FOPAL Book Sale and Volunteer Manager Janette Herceg at jherceg@fopal.org or at 650-494-1266.

 
General Fiction - new novels galore!

"Look in the usual places for a wide selection of recently published novels: hardcover and paperback, 2013 and 2014 - almost all in gift-giving condition. In fact, we have so many new books that we made extra space on the bottom shelf under the display of Pulitzer-prize winners." -Marian Knox

 
Health for Fall

"Do you want tips on growing old 'gracefully', whatever that means? Check out our aging/memory section for these best-sellers: Magnificent Mind At Any Age, Daniel Amen (his PBS program is based on this book), Aging With Grace, David Snowden, a groundbreaking study of nuns and memory, and From Age-ing to Sage-ing, Schacter and Shalomi. Our new and growing section on Caretaking has many more books this month, as do our Herbal and Alternative Medicine sections, to mention a few. All of our books, even the 'Red Dot' specials which are still in bookstores, are priced in the $2 range. Come and browse. -Karen & Verne

 
Music & Sheet Music

"As usual we offer books on a wide variety of musical topics. This month look for: Woody Guthrie - A Life; Gravikords, Whirlies & Pyrophones - Experimental Musical Instruments; The Beatles Complete Chord Songbook; Songs, Science & Spirit; The Tuning of the Word - The Musico-Literary Poetics of the Symbolist Movement; John Lennon conversations channeled by Linda Deer Domnitz; Shanties from the Seven Seas - Shipboard work songs and songs as work songs from the great days of sail; White Trash Bluesman; Baryshinkov at Work, Just Kids by Patti Smith; Aspects of Love - The New Andrew Lloyd Webber Musical. Also, come to browse our wide selection of sheet music." -Charlotte Epstein

 
Highlights from the Nature Section

"We have books about mountaineering and rock climbing. If you are interested don't look for them in Sports, they are in Nature. Going on vacation? Check tropical fish section, or hiking/walking guides for many parts of the country. Not going on vacation but want to enjoy crispy fall days outside, we have many bay area hiking guides and also local nature guides. It is not quite holiday shopping time yet but why not get ahead? Look for beautiful picture or other books for animal lovers on your list. My favorite is gorgeously published book called Wolves." -Irina Cross

 
Humor for November 2014

"November is the perfect month to start getting your holiday gifts and don't forget all books in Humor are only 50 cents! We have a real variety in new arrivals this month, including books by Billy Crystal, Tina Fey, Mel Brooks, and Oscar Wilde. New titles include Yeatman's 1066 And All That, Hodgman's That is All, The Decline and Fall of Practically Everyone, and a biography of Thurber. As usual we have an excellent selection of high quality cartoon books all on the top right shelf. For more humor, especially cartoons, don't forget to visit the Bargain Room. -Nigel Jones

 
European Languages

"My Spanish section has a fair number of novels by Francoise Sagan (in translation), romantic novels by Rafael Perez y Perez, history books, and four Tarzan paperbacks." -Susan Strain

 
Philosophy for November 2014

"The two Philosophy bookcases are arranged so that the left one is primarily about specific philosophers, their works, and commentaries on their works, whereas the right is more to do with philosophical topics, historical overviews and schools of thought. Two new arrivals to look for in the left case are a very good edition of Bloom's translation of Rousseau's Emile, and a Clarendon edition of Plato edited by Burnet with the text in Greek and English. Recent arrivals in the right bookcase include: The Psychic Life of Power, Sartre's autobiography The Words, an Emerson biography by Allen, Freedom Evolves by Dennett, Out of Chaos by Halle, Great Thoughts by Seldes and Other Selves by Pakaluk. Don't forget to visit the Bargain Room for even more philosophy books." -Nigel Jones

 
Greeting Cards

"In cards this month, in addition to the regular cards and boxed cards, there are holiday cards, both individual and boxed. Get them now before it's too late: the next sale is in mid-December." -Marda Buchholz

 
Children's Room

For this month the Children's Room has a great selection of Hanukkah books. Look for several shelves and boxes filled near the children's language section. Here are several titles for your consideration: Hanukkah, a counting book in English, Hebrew & Yiddish by Emily Sper, Latkes & Applesauce, a Hanukkah story by Fran Manushiken, A Hanukkah Treasury by Eric Kimmel. -Janette Herceg

 
November Book Reviews - Arushi Sahai

The Book Thief by Markus Zusak is one of the most powerful and thought-provoking books I have read in a long time. Meant for more mature readers (I would say 6th grade and older), this book highlights the life of a young girl living in Nazi Germany. The story is about the girl, Liesel, discovering the truths about the Nazi regime and what it means to her family. Meanwhile, she is learning to read, and she realizes how powerful words and books are. When her foster family takes in a young Jewish man, Liesel is shown the kindness, but also the cruelty, of humans. Throughout the war, Liesel faces tragedy after tragedy. This book is immensely popular amongst readers who are ready to face the reality of the second world war, and I strongly recommend it to more mature readers as a book that will stay with them for a long time.

The Little House on the Prairie series was one of my favorites when I was younger. The series depicts the life of young Laura Ingalls as she first lives in the woods, then moves to the prairie, then to the banks of a river, and so forth until it seems that she's lived in every possible place in this country! Set in the 1860s and 70s, the series focuses on the hardships and frugalities of country life. It is especially appropriate for elementary school children because much of the social studies curriculum focuses on that time period. The image the author creates is also very candid because she is writing about herself as a child growing up in those times, so it is not just historical fiction; it's a sort of biography! Overall, it is just a fun read for kids waiting to see how Laura grows up in a life so different from their own. -Arushi Sahai

Here's a big THANK YOU to the dozens of FOPAL volunteers who make this sale possible. It's in part because of our amazing volunteers that the FOPAL book sales are a great success. While attending the sale offer a "Thank You" to the volunteers you see. If you'd like to become a FOPAL volunteer please email jherceg@fopal.org or call 650-494-1266.