Former South Attleboro resident Cheryl Babbitt says the children in the village of Usa River in Tanzania, Africa, need a lot of things.

Better housing and more nutritious food might be a start.

But what they need most, she said, is books.

`` I have been to 20-plus schools here, and not once have I ever seen a book. Not one,'' said Babbitt, who relocated from South Attleboro to Tanzania about a year ago after visiting on safari and `` falling in love'' with the children she met.

Babbitt is now starting a library for the village. `` I have never even seen a teacher's book,'' she said. `` All week we have had classes on how to hold a book and how to turn pages. Imagine having to be taught how to hold a book or turn a page.''

Babbitt is doing what she can to fill the void by collecting books for her library -- most importantly, reference books. That way, she said, residents of the village can learn a trade.

`` This cycle can't be broken until someone teaches them a trade,'' she said. `` Right now they finish seventh grade and spend the rest of their lives sitting and watching their cows and goats from dawn to dusk.

`` Where you (and I a year ago) are sitting, we can't even comprehend what one book means to a desperate child,'' she said.

That kind of need can be hard to fathom when juxtaposed with the nearly mind-boggling surplus of books here at home.

In many households, boxes of books collect dust in some attic or grow damp in a dark basement.

Used book stores are on the receiving end of large quantities of books from those looking to unload their surplus, and the stores often end up turning many books away.

`` Sometimes I have to say no to a perfectly good book because I just don't have the space for it,'' said Christine Craun, owner of Browser Books in Seekonk, adding that she reluctantly throws away some items she receives, namely books in poor condition and dated textbooks.

Textbook turnover is another issue entirely.

Schools routinely update their textbooks, often sending hundreds of books at a time into a nether region of resale or recycling. Jackie Proulx, principal of Attleboro High School, said that textbooks are changed as condition and curriculum demands, and that at any given time some course or department could be replacing old textbooks with a new version.

At Attleboro High School, old textbooks are sent back to the issuing company for credit toward new books, Proulx said.

Babbitt said the children in her village could benefit greatly even from these `` outdated'' textbooks, because many of the basic principles don't change with time.

But more often than not, they end up in the trash bin.

Several `` Friends'' of local public libraries also report massive amounts of leftover books after book sales, and the need for creative strategies to avoid throwing those books away.

Terri Murphy, treasurer of the Friends of the Plainville Public Library, was typically faced with 40 boxes of leftover books after a three-week book sale at the library, even with a `` free week'' where every book was available at no cost.

It usually took Murphy two car trips to deliver books to nursing homes, prisons, other libraries, and used book stores that often wouldn't accept many of the titles she brought them.

Now, however, a new solution has entered the picture that echoes what Babbitt is trying to accomplish in Tanzania.

For the past few years, Murphy has brought her excess books to a collection site for Hands Across The Water, a nonprofit organization that donates books to needy areas around the globe.

The site is located at the Norfolk transfer station, and its placement was arranged by Mary Jo Gothorpe, president of the Friends of the Norfolk Public Library.

`` We just were stymied with what to do with books after the book sales,'' Gothorpe said. `` (Now) it's very easy and nice for us to know that they're going somewhere and they're being used and we don't have to throw things away.''

The absurdity of throwing books away is what prompted the formation of Hands Across The Water by founder Jane Miller Webber, who quit her job as a lawyer to start the organization in 2000.

Like Murphy and Gothorpe, Webber was an active member of her local library's `` Friends'' group, and saw that surplus books were often being trashed.

Through friends she had in the Peace Corps, Webber also knew of the desperate need for books in impoverished areas.

Webber envisioned that Hands would equalize this `` tragic imbalance of resources'' -- the local community facing an excess of books and a remote community facing a scarcity of them -- and ultimately effect social change.

So far, the charity has donated more than five million books to needy areas around the globe, including the United States, and has collection sites throughout Massachusetts -- locally in Norfolk, Easton and Cumberland, R.I. -- as well as Connecticut, Georgia and Washington.

Most recently, Webber said she shipped about 100,000 pounds of books to Tanzania (Babbitt said she is not familiar with the organization), sent books to victims of Hurricane Katrina, and has an upcoming shipment going to Kenya.

Jan Harkey of Millis is engaged in a similar activity, though on a smaller scale, in her efforts to send books to children in Appalachia.

Harkey was already sponsoring several children in Appalachian sections of Kentucky through the organization Save the Children, but was looking for ways to help beyond simple sponsorship.

Local Save the Children representatives indicated a strong need for books in the region, so Harkey began collecting used books and sending them to McCreary County, Ky., an area where Harkey said most residents are lucky to graduate high school.

`` These schools have very little funding for books,'' she said. `` People can't afford books in their home; they're struggling just to pay for food.''

Upon arrival, books go to the school library, teachers in classrooms, and students' homes.

Harkey has been told that reading scores have gone up since the program started twelve years ago, and says she can see it reflected in the quality of the letters students write to her.

Shipping costs are an issue, Harkey said, as Save the Children funds shipping to some of the schools she sends books to, but not all.

In the end, though, Harkey said it's not about shipping books.

`` It's reversing the cycle,'' she said. `` If in fact they're excited about reading, maybe they'll be excited about learning other things, maybe they'll finish high school. Their world expands when they can read.''