Who lives in a house like this? On a couple of my bookshelves

I do like the look of books in a house but do not have any myself, if I lived somewhere bigger there would be bookshelves with books on but just for the look of them.

I read three books a week on my kindle and do not feel the need for reference books as anything can be looked up online.

I probably have 4 or 5 books somewhere in my house,

I finished The House of Arden last night, Grandmasue and went to sleep with a happy sigh. I think I need to read more children’s books.

Good luck in ‘curing’ your book habit.

I think we have 16 bookcases plus additional shelves. We're having a sort out so there are now piles on the dining room table [thankfully we can eat in the kitchen!]. We also have a music cupboard! I'm trying not to buy novels now but I can't get rid of the classics - just in case the grandchildren want them but I suppose they get theirs via on line and not in books. We have books on all sorts of subjects - including old encyclopedias. [encyclopediae?] which I think are fascinating

We now only have one bookcase and it contains mostly “books for dipping into”; many are large reference books; quite a few on photography, painters and painting; some history and natural history. There is also poetry, some fiction and biography, and both the Anglo Saxon and Plantagenet Chronicles, which are my favourites and much thumbed for both their illustrations and their content. The whole of the bottom shelf is taken up by a set of encyclopaedias that are handsome but totally redundant. We bought them fifty five years ago. The children got some use out of them pre internet, but now they are just taking up space. Who on earth wants encyclopaedias these days?

We sent loads of books to the charity shop when we moved but then invested in a large oak bookshelf for the recess in the hall. It's now full of husbands spy novels, my cookery books (lots of Jamie and Mary) and miscellaneous reference books. I read on a Kindle.

We have one set of shelves in an alcove which has reference books, which I suppose are superfluous with the internet so readily available, a full size bookcase whose contents were culled during the lockdown, leaving favourites only, and a library shelf which generally has about 10 books on it.

SueDonim
'an E Nesbit title - and I’m really enjoying it. I don’t know why I’d never read it before, The House of Arden.'

As a Nesbitt fan, I had to find this. I got the Kindle edition and am now about a quarter of the way through it. I've got an actual Kindle and Kindle apps on my iPad and my android phone. I'm trying to limit my book buying. Last week it was 2 paperbacks, 1 hardback and 2 Kindles, so I'm improving

eazybee

*GrandmasueUK*, you wouldn't be Susan Hill by any chance?
^(Howards End is on the Landing)^

I read Susan Hill’s book and then tried to do the same thing the next year. I did buy a few books on Kindle but didn’t buy any physical books. It was fun, actually! It made me rake though the shelves to find something to read.

I’m currently reading an old paperback children’s book that I came across while decluttering - an E Nesbit title - and I’m really enjoying it. I don’t know why I’d never read it before, The House of Arden.

eazybee

*GrandmasueUK*, you wouldn't be Susan Hill by any chance?
^(Howards End is on the Landing)^

? I have both the Susan Hill book and Howard’s End upstairs, but not on the landing.
I do need to cull, but a lot of the books I have downstairs I re-read. I’m especially fond of the Beverly Nicholls book, The Tree That Sat Down. It has a witch in it called Miss Smith and I was convinced that it was a description of one of my feared primary teachers who had the same name. ?

Kim19

One of the hardest things I ever did was to get rid of my floor to ceiling bookcase and the contents therein. Many years later I've absolutely no regrets but boy was it painful at the time.

Exactly. They're not missed, which does mean that they serve a different purpose really. A friend I had years ago, a very intellectual woman, only owned about 10 books. She was a big library user and did what I do now. Read them and passed them on.

GrandmasueUK, you wouldn't be Susan Hill by any chance?
(Howards End is on the Landing)

One of the hardest things I ever did was to get rid of my floor to ceiling bookcase and the contents therein. Many years later I've absolutely no regrets but boy was it painful at the time.

I think bookshelves are a signifier of the middle-class. I used to have hundreds of books (English teacher) but when I moved about 10 years ago, I got rid of everything that I hadn't read in the last 10 years. I've kept the basics that I'm likely to use in my work, which still amounts to about 100 books, but I haven't missed the rest.

My mum also had hundreds of books when she died. I kept 8 of them. The rest either went to charity shops or were recycled. Very sad.

These days, if I get a new book, I read it and then pass it on.

We have masses of books in several bookcases - some of the shelves are double stacked! - and not in any sort of order, except size, if shelves are of different heights.
They all need a really good dusting!

I regularly take paperbacks to charity shops, but often end up buying a couple more. A lot nowadays is on my Kindle, though - it’s dh who will keep buying more - much of it relatively heavy non fiction and he’s a very slow reader with a huge TBR (to be read) pile already - piled up on a desk since no more room on the shelves!

I’ve given up saying anything though (e.g. ‘Why not just read the ones you’ve already got first?’). Might as well not bother.

Had a big sort out recently in anticipation of the decorator coming. DH was never a reader, so difficult to know why people bought him books! They’ve all gone, many back to the giver and all that’s left is DD1s collection of Harry Potters and a couple of odd ones of DD2s.
I’ve dozens of paperbacks but keep them in bags in the airing cupboard on a read one, put it in a separate bag to recycle to a friend basis.

Mine’s like yours Grandmasue, or at least it was until I took around 200 books to our library and emptied the rickety bookcase out before someone took it away.
I’m waiting for a new bookcase to be built then I will have another sort out. Mine aren’t in any particular order though the one in the bedroom is full of the newest purchases awaiting reading ??

Who lives in a house like this? An interesting woman!

Books enhance a home imo.

Books everywhere here and I never see them as clutter as I love them so much.
I have a massive dark wood carved Victorian bookcase from my FIL with bound, valuable books in the dining room and the living room has a whole wall of shelves for books.
My daughter decided to ‘help’ me and sorted my books into serried lines according to size.
Unfortunately I’m now confused as although it was untidy, I had a to read section etc. and keep coming across surprises..

I had a huge clear out of books and got rid of some Billy bookcases when my sitting room became more minimalist. All the books that I said that I would read but know that I never will, the books that I said that I would read again and again I know I never will. They all went to charity shops.
Now I use the library or read books on my kindle. My sitting room looks tidier, I’m spending less money on books and there is less stuff for my daughter to clear out when the time comes.
Having just had to clear out my dads house im wouldn’t wish that nightmare on anyone.

I still have a bookcase which was given to me for my tenth birthday and it now holds my collection of Bill Bryson books, poetry books and reference books. I never buy novels but use the library often.

We have heaps of books. Four ‘billy’ bookcases in the living room. Cookery books in a kitchen cupboard, and each bedroom and the landing has a book case. All full, all arranged by subject and all vertical.

We’ve recently disposed of probably half of our books, ready to move. My criteria was whether they’d ever be read or whether they had any particular significance to us. Some had print so tiny neither of us could read them.

I tend to keep books in very broad genres eg fiction, hobbies, my DC’s theses (unread ) and so on. Within that, I arrange them by height because it pleases my eye.

‘I don't think we have any in layers like you do Grandmasue.‘
I have most of my collection of childrens’ books in a bedroom bookcase in layers. It’s hidden behind a sliding wardrobe door. It’s the only way I could fit them all in. I gave up counting them when I reached 650!

We have parted with maybe 1500 books and now, having moved and packed up a study, only have about 20 removal "book" type boxes in my mother-in-law's garage left to go through...

All the books that made it into our actual house are on bookshelves but they're muddled up except for cookery which has its own "area" and childrens books which are on one set of bookshelves roughly 3m² in a bedroom. These ones are organised by size.

The idea of alphabetical shelving gives me a headache - but my husband had his alphabetically organised in his study at work (except for the oversized ones).

I don't think we have any in layers like you do Grandmasue.