Secret Santa for Readers

SantaThing: Secret Santa for Book Lovers

SantaThing is LibraryThing's Secret Santa for book lovers. This is their ELEVENTH year!
How it works:

Become a Secret Santa. Choose your gift level ($15–50) and bookstore, such as Powell's, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and others. 

LibraryThing takes no "cut." If you pay $30, you get $30 worth of books (plus shipping at some sellers).

1) You can sign up for yourself, or make it a gift for a friend on or off LibraryThing.  You can do multiple SantaThings, one for yourself, gift ones for a family member or friend.

2) They choose a LibraryThing member to be your "Santee," the person you'll be buying for. They try to match up members with similar tastes in books.

3) You pick books for your Santee within the SantaThing system.

4) LibraryThing elves order the books and the books are shipped directly to your Santee. Only LibraryThing and the bookseller see your address.

5) You receive a package with the books from your Secret Santa—and rejoice!

Dates to know:
Monday, December 4th at 12pm EST (18:00 GMT). Sign-up ends. Secret Santas are chosen, profile messages are sent to the Secret Santa, and you can then enter your gift choices.

Monday, December 11th at 12pm EST (18:00 GMT). After the weekend, gift picking ends. LibraryThing sends the order via eight tiny ponies to the bookstore you chose.

Go here to sign in or start an account.

Secret Santa for book lovers

Interested in a Secret Santa for books?

SantaThing is a Secret Santa for LibraryThing members.


How it works
You pay into the SantaThing system (choose from $15–$50). You play Santa to a LibraryThing member we pick for you, by selecting books for them. Another Santa does the same for you, in secret. LibraryThing does the ordering, and you get the joy of giving AND receiving books!

Sign up once or thrice, for yourself or someone else. If you sign up for someone without a LibraryThing account, make sure to mention what kinds of books they like, so their Santa can choose wisely.

Even if you don’t want to be a Santa, you can help by suggesting books for others.

Sign-ups close MONDAY, December 4th at 5pm Eastern. By Tuesday morning, we’ll notify you via profile comment who your Santee is, and you can start picking books.

Picking closes Monday, December 12th at 9am

Eastern. As soon as the picking ends, the ordering begins, and we’ll get all the books out to you as soon as we can.

» Go sign up to become a Secret Santa now!

http://www.librarything.com/santathing.php

SantaThing and

Interested in a Secret Santa for books?

SantaThing is a Secret Santa for LibraryThing members.

How it works

You pay into the SantaThing system (choose from $15–$50). You play Santa to a LibraryThing member we pick for you, by selecting books for them. Another Santa does the same for you, in secret. LibraryThing does the ordering, and you get the joy of giving AND receiving books!

Sign up once or thrice, for yourself or someone else. If you sign up for someone without a LibraryThing account, make sure to mention what kinds of books they like, so their Santa can choose wisely.

Even if you don’t want to be a Santa, you can help by suggesting books for others.

Sign-ups close MONDAY, December 1st at 9pm Eastern. By Tuesday morning, we’ll notify you via profile comment who your Santee is, and you can start picking books.

Picking closes Monday, December 8th at 12pm Eastern. As soon as the picking ends, the ordering begins, and we’ll get all the books out to you as soon as we can.

» Go sign up to become a Secret Santa now!

 

 
 Penguin Random House to Give Away Books on Giving Tuesday

Penguin Random House’s employees will be giving out free books on Giving Tuesday, December 1 as part of its #GiveaBook social media campaign, in which the publisher is donating a book to "First Book" for every tweet with the hashtag #GiveaBook, up to 35,000 times.

Tweet to provide kids with books!

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Do you give books for gifts?

For cyber-Monday I was looking for the "I'm Buying Books for the Holidays" blog that ran in 2008 and 2009, but alas, it is no more.  I really liked the idea of promoting book buying which helped the publishing industry, authors, and artists while giving a great gift of reading.   I love giving books for gifts, maybe as part of a gift basket with teas or along with another present.  The gift of reading is something that keeps giving lifelong.
 

What I did find was this fantastic idea from LibraryThing called SantaThing (click here).  If you aren't familiar with LibraryThing, a reader's social networking site, it is free to sign up and fill your library with what you have read, join groups, write book reviews, and join this book swap.  The folks at LibraryThing have made it very easy.

You pay into the SantaThing system—this year $10, $15, $20, $25 or $30. You play Santa to a LibraryThing member they pick for you, and choose books for who you get, based on their LibraryThing library and a short description. Someone else (secret!) does the same for you.  If you pay $20 you will get the same amount in return so the processes is equitable.

LibraryThing does the ordering, and you get the joy of giving AND receiving books! LibraryThing makes no money from this even though they are facilitating the administering of the program.
 

You can sign up as many times as you like. You can sign up for yourself or for someone else, like a child. If you sign up for someone without a LibraryThing account, make sure to mention what kinds of books they’d like, so their Secret Santa can choose wisely.

Deadline to sign up:  December 1

Ordering books: December 4 - 9

I jumped on board, signed up, paid what fit my budget, and filled out my interests in reading for whoever will be my Secret Santa.  I am actually excited to pick books for whoever I get.  

In all the holiday sales and rushing, this is simple and easy with that touch of mystery since you don't know who is buying for you.  I guess little things tickle me.