Do you keep all the books you''ve read?

[MichelleCarmen]

When moving a few months back, my husband and I realized we had FAR too many books and decided to weed out those we didn''t like and/or finish, or were embarrassed to have in our collection (books such as Stephen King ones that we read 20 years back in 10th grade) and we accumulated enough to fill *10* boxes worth of "duds," that we took to a used book store and sold for a whopping 42 bucks!

Now our bookcases are filled with favorites that we''ve read and loved, books we have memories attached to (like ones given by loved ones), OR books with great photos and are just plain fun. The ones I''ve yet to read are in my room in a stack next to my bed!

So, those of you who are huge book buffs, what do you do with all your books? How many books do you think are in your collection?

 

[KimberlyH]

I am a book hoarder, as is my husband. Between the two of us we probably have about 500 books in our house, plus he has a collection, of goodness knows how many, in storage. I donated over 200 books the last time I moved, 2 years ago, I weeded out the ones I didn''t love but kept the rest. I do this every great once in a while, but I''m always sad after I give books away. Silly, I know, but true.

Lately I''ve been trying to buy a lot fewer books, and am using the library a lot more frequently, because I feel guilty about the amount of $ I spend on them in a year. Now my goal is only to purchase those that I can''t imagine not owning.

 

[Miranda]

If the books are beautiful hardbacks I keep them. Also, if they are useful health books or something of that nature I keep them in a cabinet. I love books and have many, but, I HATE cluttter. Paperbacks I read once go to a donation center. My hope is that someone else will love them.

Childrens'' books are another story. We have 4 bookcases full of childrens'' books. I cannot bear to get rid of them. Some are mine and DH''s from when we were children, some were my mother''s and father''s childhood books. I even have a few from my grandmother.

 

[Kaleigh]

We have donated many books. I took the overflow to our new house in Nantucket. I don''t donate a fave book, those I keep. But will have to start donating them to the nursing home where Nanny lived. Their library was seriously lacking. Thanks for the reminder. WE are avid readers, so go through many books. I buy a bunch when I can''t decide which is best, usually when going away. I need to give those away. I always pick a keeper, a real page turner. It kills me when some of the other''s are just so so. What a waste of money and my time for trying to get into it. Like OK, this is slow, it will get better, everyone else loves it...... Yeah been there done that.

 

[VRBeauty]

No. I keep a select few (my bookcases are overflowing) but I also give a lot away. I''ve been using the library a lot too, especially for "quick reads." I work just a block from our central library so I have no excuses not to borrow books!

There are a couple of series I follow religiously that I''ll buy and then pass on to my mother or SIL, then they pass it on to someone else and so on down the line. I once counted the number of people who started to read Jan Kaaron''s "Mitford" series this way -- I stopped counting when I ran our of fingers!

There are a few times when I get the urge to re-read something in a book that I''ve passed on, though.

 

[Dee*Jay]

I feel like I keep very few books because I rarely reread anything, but yet there are still so many on the shelves upstairs?

Books for us have become this "cycle"; there is a used bookstore near us where they will either buy your books outright or give you twice as much credit as the cash so of course we take the credit... and then we get more books with it... and when we''re done with those we trade them back in for credit and get more books...

At one point we had over $500 in credit (keep in mind the books there are only a couple of bucks) so I took one of my clients over who I know is an avid reader and I told him to go crazy. I found him down in the lower level debataing whether or not to get something that cost like $2. I said, geez, if it has ANY appeal to you at all get the damn thing! We both left there with two shopping bags full of books and I''ve still got a ton of credit!

 

[iheartscience]

Yep! I have tons and tons of books! I''ve never counted but I''m sure it''s at least 400 or more. I was thinking about buying another bookshelf because the ones I have are overflowing, but then I realized that would be encouraging myself to get even more books, so now I have to get rid of some books!

 

[Elmorton]

We *might* be moving (inspection woes today) so we went through our bookshelves to see what we can donate to charity - there is nothing worse than moving boxes and boxes of books! Anything that is work related (and I teach English, so we have lots of those) stays on the shelf, but DH and I read a lot for pleasure, and we figure unless we''re really going to pick up something and read it again, a book is meant to circulate.

 

[Sabine]

I''ve been hoarding books that both myself and DH buy because I like to fill my classroom with as many varied books as possible (who can predict what book will be the ONE book to finally get a teenager to enjoy reading?) but I think after I''m done teaching, it would be nice to donate the books I don''t plan on reading again. We already don''t have enough room for the books we have, and I don''t even buy books often since I use the library so much!

 

[Tuckins1]

Yep. We keep all of them and we read them multiple times. I never get rid of books, unless it''s a terrible book, then I give it to someone else or donate it.

 

[lovegem]

I rarely buy books. I usually borrow from the library (I usually have to pay a fine on them because I am terrible on returning on time). My guy on the other hand has about 20 boxes of books (NON-fiction). I've never counted them, but I know each box was about 30 lbs from our last move. Since we move almost every year, we don't unpack them anymore, when he wants to read them, he just fetch them from one of those boxes. He actually reads them again and again. I have never read them though. The good thing about internet is that, he can read fictions online. Phewwww, no hard copy.

 

[purrfectpear]

I''m a prodigious reader, reading an average of 9 to 11 books a week in the winter, slightly less in the summer. If I bought and kept them all, I''d be broke and have a house that could pass for a library.

Thank heavens for public libraries

I once moved to a small town of about 2600 people. Within 2 years I read practically all the books in the library

. I''m interested in everything, non-fiction, true crime, novels, anything but bodice rippers.

 

[jewelerman]

I didnt buy books...borrowing from the library instead...but with the internet having so many jewelry books at low prices i will add to my jewelry books collection that way....i also have a hard time giving away books that are gifts from people or heirlooms(leather bound)...i have maybe about 50-60 books on my book shelves.

 

[pennquaker09]

We're huge readers, but I tend to only buy books that I really want. We have books everywhere and I really didn't know what to do with them because some of them are not in the best of shape, but leave it to Oprah to help me. I buy the Book Club selections and I have a lot of old, valuable books that are still in my childhood bedroom. I'm going to get them when I visit next week.


http://www.oprah.com/slideshow/oathome/200809_oah_private_library


http://www.oprah.com/slideshow/oathome/200809_oah_private_library/3

 

[btrflygrl23]

Yes, pretty much

I keep ones I love b/c I read them again and again.
I keep textbooks b/c sometimes I need to refer to them over some little detail and they cost a ton so I hate to just get rid of them.
I keep ones with any pics like some autobiographies or whatever b/c I like to look back at the pics.
Yes they take up space but I like the look of them.

 

[corgan]

I try and weed out all the ones that I didn''t like or I am not going to read. I keep all the ones that I love but not all of them are displayed (I don;t have enough book shelves) so a lot of them are still in boxes since we moved almost 5 years ago!

 

[radiantquest]

i dont buy a lot of books. i have my fave author and i have all his and i buy books usually every 2 months and am starting a small collection. on the other hand my mother has TONS of books. she has been carting them around for her entire adult life and recently decided to let most of them go. she still has many bookcases full.

 

[neatfreak]

Hubby and I are in academia, so suffice it to say we have PLENTY of books. We only keep our favorite pleasure reads though, we both read so much that we''d be sitting here with books out of our ears if we kept all those too.

 

[SailorsSweet<3]

I have too many design books, especially large photo journals and art history volumes! I''d love to keep them all and as of now they''re stacked around my room. Im hoping one day I''ll have a nice design library for my reference and my favorite recreational reads. As far as those go, my friends borrow my favorites after I suggest they read them so they''re always filtering in and out of my hands. I should really start keeping a list of names, ha!

 

[diamondfan]

I keep them but am starting to see I must start culling a bit. Our shelves are overflowing. I think when we move we will lose some of them, older paperbacks and stuff. But I do tend to re read my favorites, so I like having them!

 

[princesss]

I am a total book hoarder! I currently have no idea where about half of my books are (I'm pretty sure they're split between BF's parents' house and my parents' house) but I find it really difficult to get rid of any. There are a few that I keep meaning to donate, but other than that I don't really get rid of them. I do use the library for throw-away books, unless I can hit up a used book store (I love having my big box of trashy romance novels around for when I get stressed out and need serious escapism).

Right now I have a bookshelf full, and then some random shelves filled up. I need another bookshelf, though, to lessen the load on the shelves I have right now.

ETA: Timely topic. BF and I just got back from a very successful trip to Borders.

 

[pennquaker09]

We both kept our college textbooks, mainly the science and math related one, but I feel like such a huge dork . . .

 

[LtlFirecracker]

No, only the ones that either are useful or meant a lot to me

 

[somethingshiny]

Interesting thread, mostly because I''m trying to figure out how to downsize the book collection for our upcoming move!

I have several hundred books, probably a thousand or more. It doesn''t seem like a lot to me because growing up, my mom always had several thousand books. I''ve always been surrounded by books and I''ve always loved it. A few years ago my mom''s house burned down and she lost most of her books. Of course, it sucked. She''s managed fine with just the 2-3oo she''s collected again. But, it''s still weird to not have all the books there.

So, saving books for posterity just doesn''t make much sense anymore. I''ll keep my extensive horror collection, those are my favorites. I''ll keep all of my first editions and collectors editions and anything "special". I haven''t figured out what I''ll do with all of my encyclopedias. I realize they''re not of much use in this internet age, but there''s something so gratifying about picking up an encyclopedia and reading about the "dogman" as fact before it was proven a hoax. Other than that, the rest are gonna be donated. The hardest part for me is to NOT save every book I find along the way.....

*sigh* I have a big job ahead of me!

 

[GoingCrazy29]

My sister sent me this link to an interesting way to "share and recycle" books with others.... I haven''t done it yet because I can''t bear to part with my books yet- but maybe someday I''ll give it a try. I''ve kept my eyes open for others, but haven''t found them. Part of me is nervous that someone would throw it away (

) and I would feel I should have just given it to charity. Interesting though!

BookCrossing- The World''s Biggest Free Book Club

 

[dragonfly411]

I have a ton of books. Literally. TONS! Every now and again I go through them and sell some at a local used book store when I know i won''t re read them..... but I keep a lot

 

[wishful]

Yep I sure do. I''m a slow reader for whatever reason...so when I actually get through a book I feel very accomplished. It''s a collection of sorts.

 

[AmberGretchen]

Hmm...if I kept them all we''d barely have room to walk in our apartment

I tend to offer them to friends, and then if they don''t want them to give them away to charity.

 

[Haven]

I do not keep all of the books I read, however I also don''t generally buy books before I''ve read them at least once.

I purged myself of many, many books before hubby and I moved in together this summer. I was living in a sea of books before. Remember Olivier Martinez''s place in Unfaithful, with the books stacked everywhere? Yeah, that''s what my place looked like.

SO, I gave many books away to my local library, my school''s library, and (this is the beauty of being and English teacher) my own classroom.

I also gave several boxes of books to my local Freecycle group; they were having a book give-away and it worked out perfectly.

I love books. I love breaking in the binding, and reading and rereading them until the covers are soft and bendable in my hands. And then I love to give them away so someone else can enjoy them, too. Yum.

 

[pjean]

Hi, my name is Pjean, and I''m a book hoarder.

Well, recovering hoarder, really. With some tactful prodding (and some not so tactful prodding) from my FI over my last 2 moves, I''ve managed to slim down my collection to just 2 large bookcases, although one of them is double and triple stacked. But I''ve gotten rid of an entire bookcase full of "things to read" that realistically I was never going to read.

I gave a lot of them away to friends or to charity, and I swapped a great many through Paperbackswap.com. Of course, swapping doesn''t always result in a net efflux of books, so I ended up requesting things for friends, or selling credits to people online.