The Books are in the Fridge

Books in the fridge? What madness is thins, who would put books in a fridge? It may seem like a weird and way out thing, but in the small South Australian town of Mallala, there a brightly coloured fridge carefully placed just on the other side of the fence, so it’s between the Dublin Road, and a house. that is loaded up with books.

I know about this strange thing, and I was happy to be able to go along and have a look. The fridge is actually a Little Free Library ! If you’ve never heard of Little Free Libraries, they are tiny libraries, most often out in the open, often near someone’s home. That ‘someone’ may be the ‘steward’ who looks after the Little Free Library. There is more information about this cute little book homes here – Little Free Library

I’d heard of these little book halfway homes before, but had never actually seen one, even though I certainly thought about the possibility of having one myself. I decided my house doesn’t have enough traffic pass through it to make it a viable option for me. So, like some other good ideas, nothing more came of it.

I still love books, and libraries though, for sure. So when a resident at my closest town put up a notice on a Facebook Page I have, Mallala Crossroad Chronicle, I immediately wanted to help out, with further advertising this wonderful service. The town of Mallala certainly has a normal library, inside a room at the Adelaide Plains Council building in Mallala, but that is only open twice a week, for a few hours on each of those days.

Now, Mallala has its own Little Free Library, and yes, it’s inside a fridge! This fridge is an old fridge, that was bought and painted in bright colours to make it beautiful, and also obvious. If you drive past the house where the fridge is place in front of, you can miss seeing the Little Free Library.

So I got some more information about this Little Free Library, from the people at whose house the fridge is, and I put it on the front cover of the May issue of the Mallala Crossroad Chronicle. This a newsletter that I edit, that comes out once a month. So on the front cover of the May 2020 issue of the Chronicle is the story all about the Mallala Little Free Library. Christine, the woman whose idea it was, wrote the article, and provided me with a great photograph of the fridge/Little Free Library.

If you go here, and scroll down, you’ll find another photo of the Library, as well as a little bit about it all. I’ve been thinking about taking a look at this library ever since I heard about it last month, and today, when I visited my mother, she gave me two books for me to take along and put in the library! I was thrilled, finally, I would finally get there! So I did. I opened the fridge door, and there were many, many books! Grown up’s books, and children’s books, fiction and non fiction, lots of lovely pre-loved books.

So I placed the two books from my mother into the library, and took out four books to bring home. One of the books I took, I will give to my mum, and the others I will keep. I’m going to take some of the books I have at home, to the Mallala Little Free Library soon, perhaps tomorrow. I have lots of books, and sharing them feels like a good thing to do!

Have you heard about Little Free Libraries before? Do you have one at your place? This is a big thing, a world wide thing, and sharing books with others is surely a fine thing to do! I’d love to hear any thoughts you have about it!