How to feed dd1's addiction to books without breaking the bank?

[Marne]

Dd1 is 7 and loves books, due to our local library closing i cant afford to keep driving to the nearest library. She's getting through 3 books a week (as well as the books she brings home from school), her bedroom looks like a book shops, she reads them once and thats it (they get put with the others), i have spent a fortune on 'dairy of a wimpy kid' and similar books and i can't afford to keep buying them, i look in charity shops but can't find the kind of things she likes to read.

Is there anywhere where we can swap books? or anywhere really cheep where i can buy them?, just seems a waste spending £5-£10 on a book and it only lasts 2 days .

Talk to the school and see if your DD could set up a book club at school. Children (and staff) could bring books in and talk about them, then swap them around.
Worst witch, Enid Blyton, rainbow magic, Roald Dahl, Beatrix Potter, Michael Morpurgo, Terry Pratchett's "Tiffany Aching" stories, Colin Dann's "animals of farthing wood" series, lemony Snicket's "a series of unfortunate events"
My DD is also 7 and a bookworm. She regularly swaps books with friends at school, and maxes out her library card.

Find out more about, and use, the library service you have. Is there a limit on books? Are children fined for overdue books?

I think that's how the mobile library works

This has just reminded me of how unsupportive my school were of voracious readers
When I was 10 I read over 30 books during the christmas holiday. In our first 'library' class after the holiday the teacher asked what we had read. when she got to me she accused me of being a liar and had a go at me in front of the whole class. I never borrowed books from the school library again.

is she interested in non-fiction at all?

Whoops I thought you asked for recommendations above but I don't think you did!

Good luck, I was a reader like your daughter (but an avid re-reader too, and didn't really get new books, just second-hand and library books).

Try Project Gutenberg? They have out of copyright books available to download. They will be 'old fashioned' but plenty of good ones (little women etc)

digging- she will read anything realy, she loves non-fiction as much as fiction, anything to do with space, our planet, dinosaurs, animals ect..ect.., she has been reading non-fiction sinse she was 3 and is a walking book or knowledge , i don't know where she gets it from, i have never been a great reader.

At what age is 'harry potter' suitable? (i keep finding them in charity shops but not sure if she's too young for them).

She loves Diary type books (loved diary of a wimpy kid, these are the only books she has read twice). I have just bought her 'alice in wonderland' as she likes the film.

Lots of good suggestions here. Not free at all, but you can get children's books (particularly old favourites) reasonably cheaply on [http://www.abebooks.co.uk/ Abebooks]] especially if you buy a few from the same seller. I would generally reckon to get at least three books for a tenner including postage.

And I think you have to encourage her to re-read!!!

Try eBay. I have sometimes bought job lots for myself relatively cheaply. I think last time I paid £15 for 45 books. They were worn but I will read anything so it didn't bother me. When I was done I sent them off to the charity shop.

the good thing about non-fiction is that it is always age appropriate and you can find loads in the charity shops! encourage useful skills like 'car repairs for dummies' etc!!

If she is 'booky' at the expense of other things then non-fiction can be a great way to get her out and about (I had a great summer with a pair of binoculars and a book on british birds)

the other thing is magazines - you can often pick those up cheap on ebay etc

Our library lets you order books in online and they email you when they're ready to collect. It's just like Amazon except you have to take them back again. Our library is tiny so we wouldn't bother if it wasn't for this. I reckon it saves us about a thousand pounds a year!

We order library books as well (online, and free). You can have up to 12 at a time, the loan period is 3 weeks, and you can renew online up to twice (and if needed I can take out childrens books on my card) so in practice we can take up to 24 books and keep them 9 weeks if needed to minimise library trips. . .

Has she read the How to Train your Dragon books?

Harry potter - I would say first two are def. fine for a 7 y/o, they do get darker as the series progresses (eg in I think book 4 a boy who is a fairly major character gets killed). DD read the earlier ones a couple of years back but is only just reading the later ones now (age 9)

My 7yo DD reads Harry Potter, the first 3 or 4 are fine but 5 onwards have adult themes.

Managed to raid the charity shops today and got a few books, found 'the secret garden' and some 'jaqueline willson' books (even though she said they are too girly) and a few other books (spent about £4 so really pleased).

I think she has the 'how to train your dragon books' somewhere .

Will keep an eye out for Harry Potter books.

When I was that age I enjoyed stuff like the famous five, secret seven by Enid Blyton.
There was also a series of books about the children of Green Knowe which I loved, although I can't remember at what age I read those.

My DD loved the Narnia series and you can usually pick them up very cheaply.
Terry Pratchett's bromeliad trilogy (truckers, diggers, wings) is good too.

Not sure if it's already been suggested, but have you tried Freecycle? You can put a "wanted" post on, as well as requesting any items that other members offer. All the items listed are completely free.

another vote for charity shops - I pick up loads from there for DS

My favourite ever kids books (for age 7/8), none are "girly":

Land of Green Ginger
Finn Family Moomintroll
Five Children and It
A Gift from Winchelsea

I would say kindle and then something like these

www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_nkw=childrens+ebooks&_sacat=0&_odkw=children+book+disk&_osacat=0&_trksid=p3286.c0.m270.l1313

Our house is looking alot less like a book shop since I got one.

The screen is not backlit and actually easier to read then many books.

There are loads of free kindle books.

I was looking in charity shops recently for some books and was horrified at the prices they were charging £2-3!!!!

It does depend upon the shop; Oxfam tends to be quite expensive but our local hospice shop sells children's books for 30p. Hardbacks maybe as much as a pound.