We're doing some redecorating in our home this month. My youngest child is finally at the age where he doesn't spill everything he touches. New carpet, new furniture. Yeah!! One of the rooms we are recarpeting is the one where I keep all my books. While the prospect of temporarily moving over 2000 books is daunting, it also provides a much needed opportunity to pare down the TBR pile.
I started collecting books around 1990. Before that, I would read and toss. I hadn't started any of that crazy glom behavior yet. Then I went to work part-time in a used bookstore. A customer would recommend an author and the books were right there on the shelf waiting for me to take them home. I don't think I ever took a paycheck home from that place. Back in the early 90's I collected Nora Roberts, Jayne Ann Krentz, Barbara Delinsky, Elizabeth Lowell -- all the usual suspects. When I glommed an author, I bought it all, no half measures for me. Unfortunately, I didn't really enjoy all those early books by most of these authors. Why was I reading those alpha jerks from Krentz? Maybe I would have enjoyed them in 1982 but not in 2006.
I remember bidding furiously on eBay in the late 90's for the Jayne Bentley books. Winning those books at the oh-so-cheap price of $125 gave me a lot more enjoyment than actually reading one of them ever could. So came the realization that I would probably never read these books and it was time for them to find new homes.
My reading tastes have changed through the years. I used to read almost any book from one of my favorite authors even if it didn't interest me. I am attempting to break that habit with this move. Out the door goes any book set in the American West -- I can't find anything romantic about the period but my mother won't read anything else, so she gets those. Out goes lots of romantic suspense with serial killer plots -- I've decided I like action adventure not grisly murders.
I've gotten rid of almost 600 books in the last week and I feel much better about what's left on my shelf. I might actually get around to reading a few...
1 comment:
Oh, how I identify with your dilemma! Just last night, as I was entering books into my FDB, I looked around and thought, "I have too many books!". New books, old books of authors I found, then ran out & found all of their previous books, just as you did. But how to start weaning them out? How do you keep your books on your home shelf? Category? Author? Series? Piles everywhere? I long ago lost the ability to shelve them alphabetically. I have several thousand books crammed willy-nilly on my shelves. I'm at the panic stage, there is no more room for my next round of books! How to start getting rid of so many books I'll never read? AAARGH!!! mcb
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