Finding the perfect gift for book lovers

All right. If someone in your life is particularly deep into book talk and can't put down their latest page turner, or you want to buy some screen-free hands-on gifts, we have someone here to help with our holiday list. We welcome Barbara Hagen, Vice President of Thrift Books. Good morning, Barbara. Thank you for joining us. Good morning, Pam. Thanks for having me. I love the report that says 64% of consumers are prioritizing screen-free gifts. Yay. Let's start with books. What are some of the popular must-read titles you're suggesting? Yeah, it's been wonderful this year that everyone's leaning into the analog holiday and having some books. And at thriftbooks.com, we recently published our best books of the year for 2026, as well as our holiday gift guide to find some inspiration on our site. But I have a few of my favorites I can highlight here. The first is the very popular, just a couple of weeks ago, A Court of Silver Flames. This is book number six in the A Court of Thorns and Roses series. By Sarah J. Maas, very, very popular book. I haven't read it yet, but I will put this on everyone's gift list. And then another one I'll just highlight, very timely. This is Sunrise on the Reaping. This is in the Hunger Games series, and the movie launches next weekend. Nice. So it's a great gift idea for people who have gone to see the movie. Nice. What if you know someone who loves to read, but you're not sure what they've already read? What do you suggest? suggest that you figure out what genre or their favorite author is and then you can see what new releases came out you can go to thriftbooks.com for some recommendations but another great way is if you're a reader out there just go to thriftbooks.com make yourself a gift list that you can share with your friends and family so that way you're I'm sure that you're going to get a gift that you really want. Nice. I love it. So kind of a book registry. I also love cookbooks. I love cookbooks. And I think that seems like a great gift, particularly now people are increasing their protein or they're going plant-based. Do you have a lot of variety for specialized cookbooks, vegan, all kinds of things? Yes, there is so much variety on thriftbooks.com for cookbooks. You could go, this is like, this is a new release cookbook. It's kind of a cookbook slash coffee table book. It's so beautiful and big pictures. But we also have like vintage cookbooks. Remember the Betty Crocker cookbooks from like your grandmother used from like years ago. We have those available for sale, but we also have very specialized cookbooks as well. Everything you're looking for, I'm pretty sure you can find it at thrift. That's the beauty of thrift stores, used books, right? You can find those vintage books. Talk about that for kids too, because I love sharing some of the classics that I grew up with, with the kids. What kinds of things do you have for those people looking to buy something special for kids? Yes, I love that you mentioned the classics because we have a whole variety of classic children's books on there. I recently finished the Hardy Boys series for my son from thriftbooks.com, so you can go back to old school books like that, but we also have the latest new releases of... Like Dog Man just came out with a new book in the series. So there's really something for everyone, no matter what stage you're in and what you're looking for. Which is nice if you want to look for something special from your childhood to share. Some other ideas for making a book gift, a reading gift more special and more personal? Now, people include a little bit of a hand note as to why you chose that particular book. A book is a very purposeful decision when you make it, when you choose it as a gift. And so share that that rationale and that journey that you went through on choosing that gift with your with the person you're giving it to. Just write a little note inside the book for them. I love that. That suggestion because I cherish books that I have where my grandmother's handwriting or my mom's handwriting now that she's gone. So that handwritten note is such a great idea. You can just have that forever and then pass it along. Barbara Hagan, vice president at Thrift Books. Thank you so much. Anxious to start our thoughtful, screen-free holiday shopping. Thank you, Pam.