In 2016, I started an experiment by leaving books in airports and train stations; the book contained a message, some rules, a log of the previous locations and dates, and my email for contact. I hoped people would take the book with them, read it, and leave it in some other public place during their travels for someone else to pick it up and repeat the process. The instructions asked the reader to write the location of their drop-up in the book and contact me with that information.

The experiment failed; unfortunately, I have never received a message from anyone.

Travelling is a big part of my life, and connecting people through travelling and books without even meeting them would be a fantastic idea. And the book itself would travel all over the world.

I was curious to see how far the books would get and how many different locations they would travel to. As well as all the people the book would meet. This experiment highly depends on people’s collaboration.

They had to leave it somewhere else. People may need to remember to take the book with them on their next trip or may feel uncomfortable abandoning it in public, among other reasons for it to fail.

Let me know if you found one of the books or if you know of someone who might have found any of them. I am interested in learning if the experiment worked, but I just didn’t get notified about it.

Here is an incomplete list of books I left in public places over the years for people to pick up:

Book Date Place
Good Omens 11/10/2016 Barajas Airport, Madrid
Remote 11/10/2016 Barajas Airport, Madrid
The Time Machine 27/11/2016 Berlin Hauptbahnhof, Berlin
Of Mice and Men 31/10/2018 Schönefeld Airport, Berlin
Around the World in 80 Days 05/05/2019 Shanghai, China *by post

I tried tweaking the experiment a bit by focusing on one single book - and which better book than “Around the World in 80 Days” by Jules Verne - which I would send by post to someone, who would send it to someone else, and so on, causing a chain reacting. The goal was the same: seeing how far the book gets. This version also failed; the first location was Shanghai, but the book never arrived.

I haven’t given up yet, and I want to restart the experiment, see what I can change to make it work better, and see the results.

If you want to receive a book as part of this Around the World Book Experiment send me an email.

Good Omens Of Mice and Men