Texbooks 'R' Us

Its that time again...textbook shopping. I went with Amber to the university bookstore, only to discover that textbooks had not magically dropped in price now that I had a child in university. Drat. Turns out her books are going to cost her $415 for new. I tried to convince her that I could find them online somewhere for much cheaper, but she wasn't having any of that. Until she saw the price of her history book - $138 +tax. So she bought just four of the 5 books. I went shopping online last night and found the history book for $22US used, or $42US new, so bought the new one. Found her sociology book online for $19.95US (was$86.95CDN at bookstore) and couldn't find her psych book for any cheaper, unless she was willing to go for the 5th edition, instead of the 6th. Then I could get it for $1. yup, just a buck...US funds of course. Isn't that just crazy? Looks like the editors of the book update it every other year making each edition obsolete for most students. What a money grab. Anyhow, I have managed to save her a few hundred dollars, which is fine with both of us!

And then there was the book I found on e-bay for work. We have a standards manual that refers to it and we decided we wanted the source of information. I found that book at Chapters for $188CDN. I found it on e-bay for $2US. yup - 2 dollars. So I bid and won.

Many of my friends buy their textbooks online now...if you're lucky, you can even get brand new, like I did for a fraction of the cost. I wish I had been able to buy online when I was in school, but was not too adept at the time in online shopping. At least now I can save Amber some money.

My favorite site, besides www.ebay.ca is www.abebooks.com check them out!