A couple of months ago I was looking at all the books on my bookshelf, and wondering why I was keeping them. As much as libraries make the most sense for the frugal reader, I'm just not a fan of dirty books. So I buy my fair share of books new from online sources. But what about when I'm done with them?

They go onto my bookshelf with all the other. There are about 30% of them that I want to keep and have read more than once. The rest of them are taking up space, and I have no good reason to really stay there. So why not sell them? Selling your books to a used book store is one option, but everything I've read indicates that you'll get about 50 cents to $1 per title, if you're lucky.

If doing a little extra work doesn't turn you off, selling your books on Half.com (an eBay company) can get you a better return on your investment. You still won't get a ton of money. Plan on selling a book that cost you $15 or $20 for $3 to $7. If you can make more than that, congratulations, but that seems to be the most reasonable range to expect. Half.com collects shipping fees for you, and you can send the books via U.S. Postal Service Media Mail at a reasonable cost.

Although New York is definitely not the book wonderland that it once was, it still has quite a few places for the hard-core bibliophile to curl up, search the stacks, and find a great book at a great price.

However, as a cheapskate and recovering bookaholic, I tend to check out books from the library first, choosing only to buy the ones that I really, really need. By following this method, I've managed to cut down my yearly book purchases to only a few dozen volumes; by my standards, this is just a small fix, a little something to get me through.

This, by the way, is the bibliomaniac version of methadone treatment.