Unpopular opinion: the library book drop ate my copy of Dune and I blame the design

Last Tuesday I returned a borrowed hardcover to the downtown branch drop box. Slipped it in nice and careful. Got an email two days later saying it was never checked in. Now I'm out $28 and the library lady said "maybe next time just hand it to a person." Has anyone else had a book vanish into those metal slots? I'm thinking of leaving a sticky note trap on the next one.

3 comments

3 Comments

max_hernandez2710d ago

Man, that exact same thing happened to me but with a DVD of The Fifth Element at the L.A. Central Library back in 2019. I slid it in around 9pm on a Tuesday, got the fine notice Wednesday morning, and they never found it. The librarian told me sometimes the drop box has a little lip inside that catches thick cases or hardcovers and they just sit there in a dark void forever. I actually taped a piece of cardboard with my phone number to the next book I returned, wrote "please text me when you check this in" on it, and nothing happened so I think those slots just eat things.

pat_stone10d ago

So if the drop box really ate your DVD, wouldn't that same lip catch a ton of other stuff too? I mean, thousands of people return items daily, so after a few years that void would be stuffed full of cases and books. Someone would have found a mountain of lost stuff by now when they opened it for maintenance. More likely the librarian just gave you a story to get you off their back, and your DVD got scanned wrong or lifted by another customer.

leehall10d ago

...but I honestly don't buy it, @max_hernandez27. I mean, think about how many books and DVDs get dropped into those things every day. If there was a "lip" or a "dark void" that caught stuff, eventually someone would have to empty that void, right? Libraries have to clear out the drop box regularly, and if a case was stuck in there, someone would find it when they opened the mechanism. I think the more likely thing is that the DVD just got mixed up with other returns and was checked in wrong, or maybe someone else grabbed it before it was scanned. Plus, librarians are pretty sharp about weird technical stuff like that, so they'd probably notice a pile of cases sitting in the drop box after a few months.