Free Book Pickup in Placitas
Free book pickup on Placitas foothill drives, scheduled by route — or the 24/7 drop box about 30 minutes away.
I pick up donated books all over Placitas — Old Placitas along the acequia, the Homesteads, Ranchos de Placitas, Overlook, Anasazi Meadows, Sundance Mesa, and the custom homes off Camino de las Huertas. Placitas pickups are usually big retirement and estate libraries, and gravel or gated drives are no problem.
Schedule a free Placitas pickup — for a big collection, call ahead and I’ll plan the pickup around it.
Comparing the Placitas Community Library and other options? See where to donate books in Placitas.
Free In-Home Book Pickup Across Placitas
Placitas sits on the north slope of the Sandias, roughly 30 minutes from my warehouse at 5445 Edith NE via I-25 north to NM-165. I come up for pickups anywhere in the village and the surrounding ridges — Old Placitas, the Homesteads, Ranchos de Placitas, Overlook, Tecolote, Anasazi Meadows, Sundance Mesa, and the scattered custom homes tucked along Camino de las Huertas. Unpaved driveways, gated access, and long rural hauls are routine here; none of it adds a fee.
Sub-areas served across Placitas
Village-center adobes along the acequia, the larger-acreage retirement homes above NM-165, the Anasazi Meadows and Overlook developments, and the rural parcels that stretch east toward the wilderness boundary. I also pick up in the nearby pockets of Bernalillo and Algodones that residents group with Placitas.
What pickups typically look like here
Placitas skews toward retired artists, scientists, writers, and academics — people who moved out of Albuquerque or up from the coasts specifically for the landscape, and who have been building libraries for forty or fifty years. A typical Placitas pickup is thirty to eighty boxes from a single home, heavy on natural history, geology, archaeology, regional fiction, art monographs, and hand-press chapbooks from the Placitas Mountain Craft and Soiree circles. I've cleared studio libraries where the fine-press editions outnumbered the trade books, and ranch houses where the field guides alone filled a closet. Downsizing to a smaller home in town or to family out of state is the most common trigger; estate clear-outs for heirs who live on the East or West Coast are the second.
How a Placitas pickup works
- Text or call 505-250-3804, or use the online form — tell me what you have, plus your Placitas address, the gate code and where the boxes are.
- I schedule it by route — Placitas usually shares a run with Bernalillo.
- I load everything — no sorting, no boxing.
Placitas drives are often gated or gravel. Text me the gate code and where the boxes are, and I’ll load from the garage, casita or studio.
Driving to the 24/7 Drop Box from Placitas
About 30 minutes: NM-165 down to I-25, south to the Alameda Blvd exit, then Edith south to 5445 Edith Blvd NE. Books in any condition, plus DVDs, CDs and other media, go in the box — here’s everything I take.
What’s on Placitas Shelves
The Placitas community has always drawn naturalist writers, which shows up in what arrives on pickups — Edward Abbey titles with well-worn spines, John Nichols's New Mexico Trilogy paired with his nonfiction, Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony and Almanac of the Dead, and N. Scott Momaday's Pulitzer-winning House Made of Dawn. Placitas sits directly between Sandia Pueblo and San Felipe Pueblo, and that geography puts Native-voice pillars on almost every academic/artist-estate shelf up here: Simon Ortiz (Acoma Pueblo — Going for the Rain 1976, From Sand Creek 1981), Paula Gunn Allen (Laguna Pueblo — The Sacred Hoop 1986, Spider Woman's Granddaughters 1989), Luci Tapahonso (Diné, inaugural Navajo Nation Poet Laureate), and Joy Harjo (She Had Some Horses 1983, Poet Laureate 2019–22) all surface regularly. Frank Waters's Book of the Hopi (1963) is common in Placitas geology-and-anthropology libraries, and Ansel Adams is a regular on photography shelves.
I also see recurring stamps from Salt of the Earth Books (Albuquerque, 1987–2011) and Santa Fe's Collected Works on Placitas collections — the Placitas-Santa Fe axis was a real one for book-buyers. The Albuquerque bookstore history covers both stores.
Questions from Placitas Donors
Do you pick up books in Placitas?
Yes — anywhere in the village and the surrounding ridges, including gated and gravel drives. Pickups are free, any condition, and scheduled by route; text 505-250-3804.
How far is the drop box from Placitas?
About 30 minutes. Come down NM-165 to I-25, go south to the Alameda Blvd exit, and head to 5445 Edith Blvd NE, Unit A. Open 24/7.
Downsizing a Placitas Library?
Tell me roughly how many boxes and how to get through the gate, and your Placitas pickup goes on the route.
Schedule a free Placitas pickup →