This is an article from Lauren Landry at Bostinno.com that provides five great ideas to help you save money on textbooks. 

Hate to be the bearer of bad news, but those back to school commercials aren’t just a figment of your imagination. With August mere days away, it’s time to face the facts: your final month of freedom is here, and it’s fading away, right along with that perfectly-crafted tan you’ve been basking in the glow of. (Go ahead, call me a Debbie downer. I’ll try not to be offended.)

With the fall semester almost here, now is the time to start thinking about purchasing your textbooks. Because I’ve bummed you out, however, I’ve decided to help you out, by saving you from the sticker shock you’d be reeling from all semester if you actually went and bought your textbooks straight from the school store. (You feel bad for calling me a Debbie now, don’t you?) Go ahead and take some of the burden off your wallet with these five tips.

Head to the Library

Keep rolling your eyes and muttering “Hello, Captain Obvious,” but a lot of college students don’t realize nearly every school reserves copies of their most popular textbooks, allowing students to read for free. At the Emerson College Library, professors can put their books on reserve, and students can check them out for two hours at a time. Although they’re confined to the library once those books are in hand, two hours is really all it takes to skim the assigned chapters and jot down a few notes.

Try Swapping and/or Renting

Nothing like the ridiculously high cost of textbooks to spark a Textbook Revolt. The site allows students to compare rates, rent books and then return them for free.

Chegg has always been a popular rental source, as well, with their 21-day satisfaction guarantee for physical books and 14-day for eTextbooks. CampusBookRentals provides a 15-day grace period, giving customers the opportunity to rent a book early or hold onto it late, while Amazon also launched a textbook rental store for its Kindle eBook service earlier this year.

Three more options? TextbookStop.com, which allows customers to ship books back for free;BookRenter, which automatically enters you into a $500 drawing every time you make an order; and ValoreBooks, a site that offers next-day air and lets users return their books for free.

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