"If you love your books, let them go."

The New York Times

If you’re a bookaholic like us, you’ll for sure already know about BookCrossing, a worldwide project aimed at spreading the pleasure of reading. BookCrossing is the act of giving a book a unique identity so, as the book is passed from reader to reader, it can be tracked and thus connecting its readers. There are currently 13,923,851 books traveling throughout 132 countries!

The (romantic) idea behind this project, born in the US in 2001, is pretty simple: if you keep a book inside your library, you’re basically“imprisoning” a story, preventing it from being known by other people. That’s why it’s better to leave your book around the world, to let other people find it. The mission of BookCrossing is straightforward: “We aim to connect people through books”, they state on their official website.

To do so, every book must have its own identity: if you want to participate in the project, all you have to do is just registering on BookCrossing website and generate a label (with a code) to place inside the book you’re going to “leave into the world”.

Interestingly, at Lake Como there are specific spots where you can find free books inside little, lovely libraries. The rule is always the same: “Pick a book, leave another one”. That’s the golden rule that generates the virtuous exchange that spreads culture.

Curious to know where these libraries are located at Lake Como? We have divided all locations in 4 main groups. Continue reading, and… happy BookCrossing!

Lake Como Poetry Way and its 12 little libraries

The Lake Como Poetry Way is a 16 km pedestrian-cultural itinerary told through the works of sixteen authors (like the two Plinii, Mary Shelley, August Strindberg and Alda Merini, to name but a few) that goes from Maslianico to Brunate and aspires to officially become one of the Italian Literary Parks.

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The path was born in 2019 starting from an idea by poet Pietro Berra and, little by little, it’s been enriched by twelve free libraries: lovely wooden houses for the free exchange of books in all languages.