That skyscraper of books in your room seems to be growing exponentially each week. School books provide a solid foundation but that apartment block of romance novels halfway up looks a little shakey and putting Altas Shrugged at the top of the tower is just asking for trouble. Better to truck your collection over to Green Metropolis, an online marketplace for book lovers to swap, sell and share excess literature. Sign up to sell your old books at preset prices or buy new books at absurdly credit-crunch friendly prices (just £3.75 a book!). Sellers are responsible for timely shipping but a star rating system keeps people honest and Green Metropolis themselves offset any excessive shipping costs. After you’ve made a sale, you can either cash out or shop around the wares of the other site sellers.

The Green Metropolis environmentally friendly outlook encourages avid readers to swap their favourite texts and possibly make a bit of money in the bargain, rather than buy a new copy of a tough-to-recycle book.

So before your tower of books comes toppling down, get your construction crews to ship it off to Green Metropolis. Don’t worry, with all of the selection available there, we’ll be building your literary cities again in no time at all.