I ran into Rick Brooks recently and, not surprisingly, talk soon turned to Little Free Library -- the project he co-founded that places small boxes offering free books in places where people will find them.

You’ve probably seen the cunning little book depositories that have sprung up on the Madison landscape like daffodils in spring: on the bike path, in the coffee shop, and maybe on your neighbor’s lawn.

You may have read this story about them that was posted on madison.com last summer.

But you probably didn’t realize what an international sensation the libraries have become.

Brooks has told me a movement was spreading, but it wasn’t until a friend gave me a nudge this week and I checked out littlefreelibrary.org, that I realized just how far and wide the seeds of Little Free Library have gone.

“We’re now in 34 states and 17 countries,” says Brooks, an outreach manager with UW-Madison’s Division of Continuing Studies who, with a handful of other volunteers, runs Little Free Library.