Read It Swap It

What to do with unwanted Christmas gifts? Swap them!

Got given a book you'd rather throw on the fire than read this Christmas?

Good news: there's a new way to get rid of unwanted Christmas books - swap them for books you do want, online.

The UK's first known book swap site, ReadItSwapIt, is kicking off the post-Christmas season with thousands of free books up for grabs. Which means members are not only recycling books and helping the environment, they're also getting a bargain.

Book lovers can swap as many books as they like for new ones - completely free of charge. Books are categorised by genre, with over three hundred books available in both the romance and thriller sections.

Neil Ferguson and Andrew Bathgate set up the site in the hope that it would encourage book swapping and giving in the UK. Despite incurring costs running the site, they do not charge members anything.

"We wanted to create a site that would enable people to gain access to hundreds of books, without having to spend any money," said 26 year-old ReadItSwapIt co-founder Neil Ferguson, a computer programmer who recently graduated from Warwick University and set up the site in his spare time.

"Christmas is about giving, not spending money, and that's really what ReadItSwapIt is all about," he added. So don't just look at that gift of A Guide to Trainspotting from your auntie Mabel and despair. Go online and swap it!