I stumbled onto my first book sale through a coworker who showed up one day with a taped cardboard box full of “exotic” books I had never seen before. Bukowski, Genet, Bryson, Hornby, their names staring up at me from the weathered book spines. I had always been a fan of reading throughout my childhood, but after high school, real life took over and I had lost the passion for a good book and a quiet afternoon. While thumbing through a few of the books and listening to a rather convoluted, but compelling tale of the wonders of library book sales, my curiosities were piqued and I was on board to attend a sale the following weekend.

The first sale I was brought to is a weekend sale that runs from Memorial Day weekend through Labor Day. It’s hosted in the small western Connecticut town of Kent. After fishing through about 7000 books, I was hooked. The thrill of the chase, finding an old copy of an Encyclopedia Brown book (a childhood favorite), and enjoying some small town life were huge draws to what would become a weekly routine. The best part however was reserved for the pricing. My first giant haul from the Kent book sale came to a whopping $23.25. I walked away with over 30 books. Go into any Barnes and Noble or Borders and bring 30 books to the counter and see how much money you will be forking over.

As I said, the Kent book sale became habit forming. Every Friday, since we worked together and I was the boss, my friend and I would rock, paper, scissors to find out who would get to take an extended break from work to go hit up the book sale first. Once one of us came back we’d show our cardboard box full of books to the other, defend the merits of our purchases, drop hints on the location of a good book copy that we had hidden for the other, or on some occasions, complain about the lack of a quality offering. This went on for a month or two until I was directed by a late night web search to the absolute Mecca of book sales.

For me, Connecticut Book Sales completely took off after finding this website.

Instead of being just a Friday afternoon, once a week event, booksailing(my affectionate term for sailing down the rows searching for good reads) became a new hobby. A pastime for the ages. A complete and utter obsession! Google maps were made to track out directions. Charts were made to see what sales overlapped one another and which one was more likely to produce a quality pull. Work schedules were adjusted to make room for what promised to be a bountiful sale.

The beauty of going to all of these sales was found not only in walking away with 2 stuffed full cardboard boxes of 48 books for $40(almost always you walk away with more books than money spent), but also in getting out and exploring all of the different towns in Connecticut. Many people have never traveled to some parts of the state and they have lived here their whole lives. In one summer I had visited or drove through just about every town in Connecticut, stopping at a lot of new restaurants, visiting interesting shops, and finding out a lot about the state I have lived in most of my life. On one AWESOME Saturday, I traveled through 73 different Connecticut towns on a state wide book sale trek, a record that still has yet to be broken. All of these travels partially inspired the creation of this website. I highly recommend visiting the above website and finding a sale in your area to attend so you can see for yourself just how fun it can be.

There are a few things to know when attending book sales that will make the time spent much more enjoyable.

1. Be courteous of other people there. You’d be surprised how low priced books in combination with mother hens can ruin a good book sale. I’ve never gotten into a screaming match with someone, but I have purposely pilfered from their boxes while they left them unattended because of just plain rudeness. This segways into the next point.

2. Keep an eye on your box of books at all times!! At most book sales, the books are just stacked on tables with cardboard boxes scattered around everywhere. It’s very easy for you to put down your hour long search for some good books, only to see your box go missing and all your books re-shelved by an event organizer. ALWAYS keep your books within an arms reach.

3. There will be a lot of book dealers there. Unfortunately. Book dealers are people who sell books either on Amazon, Alibris, or other internet book selling sites and they are in abundance at these sales. They usually pay the $10-15 fee to get into the book sale early. You will see them with cases upon cases of books stashed in the holding rooms or filling the back of a truck bed with boxes. Personally, I hate these people and the way they decimate a book sale by grabbing stacks of books to sort through later, but it’s an open sale and they have a right to be there. With that said, don’t ever let a book dealer push their way through a stack you want to look through.

4. The overall money spent at these sales goes back to the library or special cause that is putting on the book sale. The books are being sold extremely cheaply and the money is going back to the community where the book sale is being held, so bartering or bargaining is bad form. I’m all for getting a good deal on things and making sure not to pay more than I have to for some things, but these are small time events run mostly by volunteers with the benefits usually going straight to the library.

5. This point I’ll share from my own personal experience from going to book sales. Don’t bother with a sale that is offering less than 10,000 books. First off, the book count is always overestimated and 10,000 is usually more like 4,000. Secondly, unless you are one of the first people that have had a crack at the books, there will be a good 2-3000 gone within the first hour due to the above mentioned book dealers. Thirdly, the libraries don’t usually inform you of the book count in each category. With this in mind, 10,000 books can mean 4,000 of them are romance and cookbooks and if you are into current trade paperbacks, you will be highly disappointed.

6. Bring cash! Most of these book sales work on little more than a volunteer with a cash box. Some of the bigger, more established sales will take credit cards, but a good majority of them only take cash. I’d recommend bringing between $30-50 just to make sure you don’t have to leave the sale to run to an ATM.

Some of the better run sales are usually touted as such on the library websites. Some of the sales that aren’t advertised as being fantastic sometimes turn out to be some of the best sales I’ve visited. The top ten sales I’d recommend for first time booksaliers are as follows. This by the way isn’t a complete list of all the good sales. There are a ton more that are really good, but these are the first that come to mind whenever I give out advice as to which sales to attend.

1. Newtown Sale in July. This sale usually fills up two high school gyms with tables upon tables of books. It’s one of the best organized by category and almost everything is alphabetical as well. Just a monster sale! If you can’t find at least 20 books you want to buy, you either aren’t doing something right, or you have a wall of 2 deep stacks in your house already.

2. New Canaan Castle Sale. This book sale is set on a nice piece of land in New Canaan called Waveny Park. I call it the castle sale because the place looks basically like a castle. It’s a well organized, good book sale. The only drawback is it gets unbearably hot inside if there is a lot of people looking for books.

3. Kent Summer Sale. This book sale is a favorite of mine, but the drive is killer. It runs Friday, Saturday, Sunday from 12-5, Memorial Day to Labor Day. My best advice is to call ahead to see if the sale is going on before making the drive. This sale is outside with no way to protect the books from rain beyond tarps, so if there is a chance for bad weather, the sale shuts down for the day. They add new stock every week to replace purchased items so there is usually something new with each visit. Towards the end of the sale however, you will see a lot of the same books that haven’t sold since the beginning and not a lot of new offerings.

4. South Port Sale. As the name states, this sale is in Southport, CT. It’s an outdoor sale under a huge tent and it always is a winner for not usually seen books. A lot of the book sales unfortunately carry a lot of the same books. You can go on a weekend sale run and see the same copy of  100 different books at each sale. This sale however seems to always have a few books that I’ve never seen anywhere else. I picked up a pretty rare copy of a Lawerence Fernlinghetti book of poems from this sale. If you are also interested in some fancy shopping, Southport hosts some upscale shopping and dining all around the downtown area.
5. Branford Tent Sale. Another outdoor sale under a big tent, quite fitting they actually call this sale The Big Tent Sale. This sale is usually held right on the green during the later summer months and is sometimes cross evented with a town fair. There is an awesome Italian restaurant right on the main street and there is also a good ice cream shop nearby as well. The atmosphere of this sale is very laid back and it’s one of the few sales I have seen that book dealers usually don’t get all the good pickings.

6. In the Middle Of Nowhere Simsbury Sale. I love to drive around and listen to some good music and enjoy my surroundings, but this particular sale is always one I mildly dread going to even though it has a fantastic selection of books. Sorry to all the Simsbury dwellers, you have a great town, but seriously you need to move somewhere a little more accessible. =) I joke, but this is always a quality sale and I make the trip up every year and enjoy playing the country driving game of “Where is the best place to hide a body” =)

7. The Dirty South Sales. Brookfield, Danbury, New Milford, and Roxbury usually host all of their sales either the same weekend or a week a part. All of the sales usually have around 50k in books and all of the sales usually are of top quality as far as their inventories go. The only complaints I have about these sales are the timing of them. I don’t know if it’s a conspiracy to get people to drive down over the period of 3 days, but these sales seem to always be timed where you can’t fully enjoy more than two sales in a day. One will run from 10-3 and the other from 11-4 and the last from 9-2. You usually always end up missing one out of the bunch due to either booksaling exhaustion, or the fact that you just can’t physically make the drive in time for it to be worthwhile.

8. Redding In The Woods Sale. I got lost the first time I went to this sale and ended up driving around for a few hours before finding it. Make sure you get accurate directions to this sale! They’ve been putting on the Redding sale for a long, long time. I believe next year will be the 50th year this sale has gone on. This sale is usually one of the best sales I attend every year,  and it should be listed higher, but unfortunately this sale is hit harder by book dealers than any other sale I’ve been to. I don’t know what it is, but there is usually a collection of just nasty erudite people who poison this sale every year. The book selection is top notch, the people selection is bottom of the barrel.

9. Enfield Fair Days. Enfield is WAAAAAAY up north, if you take a wrong turn you will be in Mass in about 2 minutes. This sale is always fun more for the way it is set up than the actual books. Don’t get me wrong, the selection is good, but for some reason I like the aesthetics of this sale and make sure to travel up to it every year. There is a town wide fair that happens in conjunction with this, so traffic and parking are a pain. The outside of the library is set up in this kinda cool cement maze pit. They have books above and then books in the pit before walking inside to a lecture hall(the seats all have books on them) and a basement like area that is just JAM PACKED with books. The books are not very well organized so hunting is a must, but it’s well worth the time spent.

10. Guilford Green Sale. Another on the green library book sale. I especially like this sale as a good majority of the books are newer. A lot of the sales pad their book count with a lot of junk, but the Guilford sale usually has a much bigger proportion of newer trade paperbacks and less cookbooks and trashy romance novels. On top of the good book selection, they have a killer bake sale! If it’s a nice late summer day, taking a dip at one of the beaches along the shore is the perfect compliment after a good day of booksailing.

11. THE MYSTERY SALE!!!!

I’ve put up one last sale, The Mystery Sale. This is the absolute best book sale I have ever been to as far as quality items week after week. However, I am keeping it a secret from the general browser. If you want to know the location, leave me a comment on this article and send me an email asking for directions. The sale is a one day event and it’s in a very nondescript location that you would probably pass without second thought. It’s gone mostly unnoticed by book dealers for quite some time and continues to be a great source for some really hard to find items.

Hopefully I’ve enticed you to go out this weekend and enjoy hunting through stacks and stacks of books, looking for those perfect paperbacks to enjoy on a quiet afternoon. As I’m finishing this, I just happened to look at the website I referenced above and saw there was a last minute sale added for this week that started yesterday.

See you in the stacks!

Enjoy A Few Pictures From A Day Out At The Kent Book Sale!

I make a proposition to my girlfriend.

“Honey, I have an awesome idea for this weekend. How about we get on a plane and go down to Austin, TX and do a BBQ run! Trust me it will be the tastiest $189 round trip ticket you will ever find west of the Mississippi.”

I think a simple no would have sufficed, but the response of “you’re joking right? That’s seriously the dumbest thing I’ve heard come out of your mouth” had a bite to it, a smokey type bite. I was obsessed at that point, I needed some good brisket or a pulled pork sandwich.

Even though my vision was clouded with 15ft long smokers filled with sausage, beef, and pork, I remembered a few months prior my good friend Tim had brought me out to a little slice of BBQ heaven.

SouthernQueBarBQ was going to be the place to satisfy my longing for the delicacy that is a perfect plate of Southern BBQ.

Located on a side street near downtown Meriden, driving up to SouthernQue the first time left me a bit, wary would be quite the perfect word. I fully trusted my friend Tim’s choice of restaurants as we have uncovered quite a few gems in our travels, but this one was pushing my limits of believability. The service area, cooking area and seating area are all located about 15 paces from the road in a quaint trailer remodeled into a shrine to the art of BBQ. The seating area is nothing more than a few old fashioned picnic tables and some blues music piped through a few outdoor speakers.

I shot my friend Tim an incredulous look. He shot me one back that tried to assuage my worry, to trust that while it may not look like a fine dining establishment, the food is second to none.

I settled up to the picnic table with a plate of baked beans and a pulled pork sandwich topped with coleslaw, a specialty of SouthernQue’s. On the outside, things were looking good, but my taste buds would be the final judge of the matter.

With the first bite into the pulled pork sandwich, all of my worries melted away with each tangy taste of BBQ sauce and each crunch of perfectly mixed coleslaw. I managed a few grunts of approval towards Tim whose mouth was too stuffed to give me anything but a head nod in return. With each bite, I was slowly realizing that all of the glitz and the glamor that many restaurants use to draw you in, masks the fact that their food is of sub-par quality to establishments that take care and pride in what they serve to their customers.

An unassuming trailer on a back road in Meriden, had just put before me a plate of some of the best BBQ I’ve had to date.

Back to the present, I had just taken the right hand turn onto Pomeroy Ave and I was already salivating like a well trained Pavlovian Dog. One of the best BBQ eateries in Connecticut was right around the bend.

Just to include a few more non-story details about SouthernQue BBQ to highlight a great BBQ joint in Connecticut. Although many people equate a BBQ spot with thick molasses like sauce dripping from ribs, SouthernQue uses a different style for their food. Most dishes are served with the “Eastern Carolina Style” BBQ, which is more of a vinegar based, thinner sauce. Hickory wood is also used to give the meat a distinct flavor during the slow roasting and smoking portion of the cooking. Some people not accustomed to this type of cooking process are in for a treat to say the least.

The best deal by far is the pulled pork sandwich with cole slaw and a small side dish. Coming in at under $8.00, it’s pretty unbeatable for a good lunch, early dinner combo. Go to a local grocery store and pick up one of the rotisserie chickens and you are looking at paying $5.99 and up for a small chicken. At SouthernQue you get a whole bird for $8.50 and it’s out of this world delicious. I’d take one of these home on a regular basis if given the chance. Overall the pricing is affordable and doesn’t stretch the wallet given the high quality and unique flavor offered.

One of the drawbacks to SouthernQue is the limited hours. Unfortunately they are only open Thursday – Saturday, but they do stay open from 11am till 8pm those days. This makes SouthernQue a fantastic weekend event, but leaves you craving during the week for something good to munch on.

I haven’t tasted all of the BBQ spots in Connecticut, but if SouthernQue is not in the top 3 in the state I’d be very surprised.

Finally what would a post about a restaurant be without a few pictures?

Enjoy the full size picture gallery featuring SouthernQue BBQ