Do you love books? Do you have too many of them? A new community organisation is encouraging you to leave a book in a public place or tourism hotspot to surprise and delight someone who finds it. And a bit of delight is what we all need in these coronavirus-infected times.
Paperback Planes was founded by Georgia Briggs. Like all good ideas, hers was a simple one. And it had immediate benefits.
"Science has proved that doing something for someone else makes you feel good. I can also personally attest to this," Georgia said.
"Paperback Planes wants people to feel good by giving to someone else in such a simple way, with an element of fun too, which in turn will make another feel good when they find a surprise book.
"We don't make any money out of it and participating in it is free. We have a free PDF of the Paperback Planes bookmarks which anyone can print themselves and then they just place it in the book and hide it somewhere.
"There is no minimum or maximum amount of books a Paperback Pilot can launch into the world, it is entirely a matter for them. Books can be first or second hand (as long as they are good quality) and can be any genre, including children's books."
The idea was "born out of simply wanting to do something nice for someone else".
"I have been involved in charities for a long time in different capacities as a volunteer and I always get a wonderful feeling when I help another," Georgia said.
"I get the same thing out of leaving the books, and even more so if people find them and contact our Instagram page. I'm giddy with excitement and you can't wipe the smile off my face for hours afterwards.
"Just imagine a person taking a walk on their lunch break, or catching a bus home after a long day and finding a book sitting there with a ribbon around it! You'd be chuffed I know I'd be, and I would tell lots of people that I found a surprise book and it made my day. We have had comments from people who have found our books who have said exactly that: 'you've made my day', 'what a nice surprise', 'we were lucky enough to find the book'."
The Instagram page is set up to allow connection between the Paperback Pilots and those who find their books.
"Ideally, one day we would like the Instagram page to also be used as a bit of a scavenger hunt of sorts, where a post goes up as to where a book has been placed and people can try to find it first," Georgia said.
"Again, ideally one day, we could work with publishers to promote new release/exclusive books by having a few distributed to different Paperback Pilots in different cities to launch and have people find them.
"But right now we've very happy just being what we are. When I started this, only about a month ago, I wasn't sure it would work at all. The fact that we even had one person contact us, excited that they found a book, genuinely makes the whole thing worth while anyway, but that it has occurred consistently is even better."
There are Paperback Pilots in Canberra, Wagga Wagga, Sydney and Melbourne, and more to come in Adelaide, Wollongong and Toowoomba.
- More info at instagram.com/paperback_planes/
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