Mystery Surrounds Bulk Orders of Old Books in UK and Ireland

Booksellers in Britain and Ireland are puzzled by a recent phenomenon: mass orders of used books from anonymous buyers. These orders are notable not only for their volume but also for the peculiar selection of titles, which seem to lack any discernible pattern or theme.

Booksellers who spoke to The Guardian reported that these orders originate from buyers in the UK, the US, Canada, and other European countries, with similar reports emerging from Australia. Stuart Manley, co-owner of Barter Books, noted that these unusual orders began appearing about three months ago. He described one order that included an Estonian translation of a John le Carré novel, a specific edition of an Anne Brontë book, and a 1983 issue of a warship magazine.

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They are not following the usual logic of a book purchase.

Manley estimates he has sold hundreds of these seemingly unrelated titles to three buyers for approximately 4,000 pounds. Jim Sogneshi of MW Books in Ireland described similar sporadic, large orders with no clear thematic link, ranging from 18th-century books on African agricultural tools to biographies of 1950s racing car drivers.

Another UK bookseller reported receiving orders for about 6,000 books, valued at thousands of pounds, since January. The buyers are reportedly paying premium prices without requesting bulk discounts. This has led many booksellers to suspect that artificial intelligence companies may be behind these purchases. Companies like Anthropic have confirmed that acquiring books is a common method for training large language models, as many texts are not available online and can provide new data for AI systems. However, there is currently no definitive proof linking these specific orders in Britain and Ireland to AI companies, as the buyers remain largely unknown and the transaction platforms have not provided clear answers.

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The orders are sporadic, large, and without apparent thematic connection: from books on 18th-century agricultural tools in Africa to biographies of 1950s racing car drivers.