My shelves display some of my interests, some of my wife's, some things we thought (silly us) the kids would like, and some of my parents' interests--books we inherited. There's a lot of Africa, a lot of history, poetry, religion, teaching kids, and of course a lot of textbooks in science and math.
None of the youngsters have exactly this spectrum of interests, and most have a slight "but not that many books worth" interest in this topic or that.
Vanity of vanities, etc
Somewhere around 20-25 years ago I worked out that important books in my niche field are often easy to find secondhand for very little money via an aggregator site such as allbookstores. It's cut my use of interlibrary-loan tremendously, partly because I receive the book so much more quickly.
ReplyDeleteMany of them come with handwritten notes in the front indicating that they were gifts either 'from' or 'to' people with names that were notable in my niche field in previous decades. When I pull out a book for reference purposes or to loan to a student, I feel the connection when I know it once belonged to e.g.: the first person to use computer simulations in my field.
Locally we have a used bookseller who specializes in academic and other high-level works; it's the only book store of that sort I've ever known of, but it's a treasure trove. You might look for one and donate the works you don't expect to be of interest, so that others who do have the interest can find them to buy and love.
ReplyDeleteHere's his website in case you wanted to call and talk to him, see if he's aware of anything similar that might be closer to you:
https://www.abebooks.com/harry-alter-sylva-nc-u.s.a/79745/sf