Nerdy and philanthropic Stanford students alike will be pleased to know that the Friends of the San Francisco Public Library will hold its quarterly mini book sale next weekend. All books will be sold for $1 or less.

The sale will take place Saturday, Jan. 28 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. and Sunday, Jan. 29 from 10 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. at the Fort Mason Center in San Francisco.

The event is sponsored by the Friends of the San Francisco Public Library, a private organization separate from the San Francisco Public Library itself. The organization works to create a “superior, free public library,” according to its Web site.

“Our mission is to fundraise and advocate for the library,” says Colman Conroy, director of communications at the Friends of the San Francisco Public Library.

Byron Spooner, director of book sale operations at the Friends of the San Francisco Public Library, says the quarterly book sales attract “about 100 people at the 10 a.m. opening” and that there is a “steady crowd of 100 to 200 people throughout the afternoon.”

In its 10th year, the book sale employs what Spooner calls “an army of volunteers,” who in the morning must transport as many as 10,000 books from the storage area using “a motley of wheeled vehicles,” mainly various book carts.

The thousands of books offered will cover a range of topics. But the sale will not include condensed books or magazines, according to Spooner. Children’s books will be sold for 25 cents, while all other hard-cover and soft-cover books will cost $1. There will also be a table of free books at the event.

The book sales never offer library books, nor do they accept them.

“All books are donated by the people and businesses of the Bay Area to benefit the San Francisco Public Library,” Spooner says.

About 20 volunteers take turns manning the stations at the sales. Though Spooner says that most of the volunteers are retired senior citizens, he remarks that “anybody can come and volunteer for us.”

Spooner adds that with its numerous events, Friends of the San Francisco Public Library is “always looking for more volunteers, of all ages.”

Next weekend’s sale is what Spooner calls a “mini sale” because it is one of the quarterly sales leading up to the “Big Book Sale,” held over a 5-day period each fall. In addition, Friends of the San Francisco Public Library holds monthly book sales on the steps of the main library on the first Friday of every month.

Friends of the San Francisco Public Library organizes many other fundraisers and events throughout the year. One event — also on Jan. 28 — will commemorate the work of 18 writers who died over the past year. Their colleagues will read passages from and speak about the deceased authors’ work.