I’ve had that problem too, but I had a queen sized bed. I slept on one side and the other side became a book repository. Every two or three weeks I’d try to shovel 'em off and cram them into a case or top off one of the floor piles. But if I got really busy, the stack on the bed could grow for months.
One of my friends dropped in and barged into my bedroom and saw this (don’t usually let guests in unless it’s tidy). She promptly began telling our friends and teachers “She does learn through osmosis. She sleeps with books.”
When we started inventorying the books Back Home, Mom and Dad said they didn’t want to go over 2000.
I stared at them, saw they were serious and proved to them that they were already over 3000!
She’s now somewhere around 4000… even if you discount “mine” (I have several novels in one of the bedrooms, plus the Universal History of Abuelito José is mine, mine, mine and I also have claims on the Father Brown, Father Coloma and Father Camilo, only one of which is the author. Oh, and the Mafalda is mine, as well as the Asterix. The animal books are Middlebro’s, Littlebro took most of his already).
I made a librarian in North Miami very happy by raising her SciFi and Fantasy count from two books to about 5 dozens. The Official Language School in my home town has a library that’s “students (and Nava) only” - the and Nava is because they like my donations, specially since I can tell them what level a book will be good for, which ones are good to work on grammar and which on vocabulary, whether a book has a lot of author-invented words or people who speak with an accent…
So I’ve proven I can give books away.
But I’ve also proven that I can live in a flat with one matress, one working bathroom, and all my stuff in a large suitcase… except for those piles of books on the floor, which don’t fit in the suitcase :o
Last time I moved, I sent all my books to myself media rate mail.
It ran me between 3 and 6 dollars a box - each box was between 20 and 40 pounds.
After what was (for me) a severe pruning, I only had 9 boxes.
My husband and I are anticipating moving again in the next year or so, and I don’t even want to think about the chore moving the books will be. He reads like a fiend, I read like a fiend and both of us are anti-book-giving-away people *and * completionists. It’s like a tidy person’s idea of hell in our house.
All of our bookshelves are filled to capacity (and “capacity” is herein defined as "no more spots where one could possibly cram a book and stacked high enough on top that one can barely reach the topmost book on the pile), and we have Random Piles Of Books ™ in strategic locations such as the bedroom floor, the living room next to the door (where I pick up and deposit the books for reading on the train), and around the computers. If I had to guess, I’d put our total somewhere in the 3,000 - 4,000 range.
Fritz Leiber had a story where a guy slept with books on the other side of the bed. This Leiber called the “Scholar’s Mistress.” In the story the books came to life, so do be careful.
This is the way I feel about DVDs. Why collect them when Netflix will send me any one I want?
Books, on the other hand, I have a complex about. I must keep them, and they must be located where I can access them readily. I have almost stopped going to the library because it hurts my feelings to give the books back when I’m done.
I have a lot of books now, and I don’t know what the hell I’m going to do when my mother dies. She has every book she’s ever bought in her life plus all of the books my grandmother had when she died.
It really depends on the kind of book for me. If it’s some ratty paperback, I have no qualms about chucking it, but I don’t think I’d part with the few leather-bound Easton Press books I have for love nor money.
I had over 600 paperbacks at one time. I gave away several boxes of paperback books I wasn’t planning to re-read and I still have 3 book-cases full. And growing. I’m seriously considering another vigorous prune. I’d really like to give up at least one book-case to my husband for other purposes and to get some wall space back. But then I’d have to get rid of a few hardbacks as well…
I feel the same way you do about DVDs. I don’t even want them as presents anymore, due to Netflix.
I go to the library to get books I don’t collect. But as far as sf goes, I’ve got a lot more in my collection than they do in theirs. Plus, 50% of my paperbacks are not Star Trek and Star Wars novels.
very. the book boxes are nicely made. i’ve stood on them. they hold large amounts of books.
the deep boxes can hold hardbacks 2 deep. mass market paperbacks 3 deep.
the medium boxes are 1 hardback, 2 paperpack depth. they stack nicely together. thus far i have them stacked 2 high, in lovely dark cherry. just got a new catalog today.
