There is a unique shelter in Russia, a shelter for books. Well, I hope it still exists... I sincerely hope neither the war nor Putlerism have been able to slaughter that!
There`s this guy who believes paper books cannot be needless. He believes (and so do I) a book you (think you) no longer need should not be thrown away or sold to be recycled. So he opened a shelter for books people (think they) no longer need. He has rescued lots of doomed books, and he`s been right: lots of people come to the shelter in search of books no longer available elsewhere.
I painfully long for something like that in my country! Alas... Books, especially old books, seem to be no longer respected here, of not quite criminalized... as yet?
Bookshops have been disappearing; second-hand booksellers are an endangered species, there are very few of them still breathing; they have been ousted from every place; in my city, streets have long been cleansed of bookseller stalls; there still exists one last antique shop which also trades in books, but for how long I cannot say... I hope things might be better in the Capital City, but I`m not sure, what with them shaving the Castle hill bald and erecting a rusty pipe as an example of Fine Art...