Where Do Your Books Go?

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Three years ago I arrived in this city with a couple boxes of books in the back of a car.  As of this morning, my wife and I have a one-bedroom apartment with a bookcase on almost every available flat wall.  At this rate, in another year we’ll have to replace our furniture with an elaborate bookcase-maze.  And this isn’t counting the closet full of boxed books I have in storage back in Tennessee.  It was the same in China: arrive in a new place with maybe half a shelf of books, leave with a bookcase and a half.  And that’s when living in a city without a single English-language bookstore.

My point isn’t to complain about the number of books we have.  I love our books! (Though they make moving a pain.)

But when I visit other people’s apartments, I notice: most of my friends have maybe a couple shelves, unobtrusively stuck in corners somewhere in their living room.  These are people who read, who read voraciously, and yet somehow the books seem to roll off them.  I don’t imagine they’re throwing the books away (horror!), but I also never hear about mass trips to used book dealerships, or secret e-Bay selling binges.  So, what gives?  Where do your books go?

6 Responses to “Where Do Your Books Go?”

  1. Teresa Frohock

    Mine go the library a lot. I donate to either the library where I work or the public library. Even if they decide the book isn’t right for their collection, they can put the book in their book sale and generate funds for much needed items.

    My reference books I keep and fiction I think I will re-read, I also keep. When you come to my house, you don’t see the four boxes of books in my attic. 😉

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  2. max

    Libraries – excellent idea! I was worried that donating to libraries would just saddle them with too many books; you have a good point that even if my books don’t become part of the permanent collection, the resale will help the library.

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  3. scott gf bailey

    We have thousands of books, and bookshelves in every room except the bathroom and kitchen (well, we have a shelf of cookbooks in the kitchen). We’re working to finish the attic so we have more places to put up bookcases. We have two 7′ tall bookshelves in the basement, too. And some unopened boxes of books down there as well. We keep buying books even though all the shelf space is gone. When the apocalypse comes and all the kindles and nooks have died, we’ll open a lending library for the survivors.

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  4. max

    Scott – When I have a house, that’s the way it’ll look. My wife and I are still in the young-and-rootless phase, though, and the prospect of moving the Lending Library of the Post-Apocalypse scares me.

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  5. Gen

    When I finish a book, it either stays on the shelf if I will refer to it or re-read it, or I give it to someone else. If it’s so bad I don’t want anyone else to re-read it, well, a local charity swings by the neighborhood every few months to pick up whatever we leave on the curb. I’m still running out of shelves (they seemed so plentiful when I moved in a year ago), but at least it’s partly under control. Except for the shelf where I keep the books I haven’t read yet…

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  6. max

    Hahaha! Yeah, the TBR pile just keeps growing. It doesn’t help that the surest way to make myself feel better after a rough day is to stagger into a bookstore and walk out with something new. There are worse habits, I guess…

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