I’m somewhat ashamed to say that although I love books and have been a KC Public Library cardholder since I moved here in 2005, I’ve never actually checked out a book. It’s so easy in the era of the internet to just toss a few books into my Amazon.com cart whenever I need to fulfill the $25 minimum for free shipping on an order and call it good. The result is that I now have shelves and shelves of barely used books, most of which I’ll most likely never reread. I’m here to tell you there’s a better way.

I was quite surprised to find that of the 31 books that currently reside on my Amazon.com Wish List, 24 of them are available and on the shelf at the central downtown branch of the KC Public Library…five blocks from my front door…for free. What’s more, six of those books are also available in audiobook format and five of them are available for download as ebooks from the library’s website. For free. I also have three albums on my Wish List…two of those are available in CD format at the library. In addition, it’s just a cool place to go…the architecture is beautiful, the people watching is second to none and they have gallery exhibits. I took these two shots when I was there recently (iPhone quality):

Untitled, Lynus Young, 2011, KC Public Library

Kansas City Public Library - Central Branch, Downtown KC, MO

I also just downloaded Jay-Z’s book Decoded directly to my iPhone from the library’s website. It’s unlikely that I’ll read an entire book on my iPhone, but I wanted to do it because I could. If I had an ebook reader, I would be super-excited about the ability to do this.

Jay-Z, Decoded

I know it’s an antiquated action and that we’ll probably see the end of print newspapers, magazines and maybe even books in our lifetime, but take a trip down to your public library. If not to save a tree or some cash, then do it because someday they may not be there.