littlefuzzy

I have thousands of books, most of them being science fiction/fantasy, with a smattering of mystery, classics, kids books, and non-fiction. I probably have 75% paperback, with the rest hardback.

I have two 3-foot high shelves holding hardbacks in my room, as well as a long built in counter-top under a window that has stacks of books on it (and under it.) I also use a chest-of-drawers in my room to hold paperbacks. Leaving my room, I have another 3-foot high bookshelf in the hall, and then several boxes of books behind the couch, as well as a huge stack in the hall leading to the living room.

My mother has four 6-foot tall shelves in her bedroom, and another five sets of shelves in the office and living room, ranging from 3-foot tall, to 6-foot tall. Most of her books are inspirational fiction and non-fiction, classics, writer's guides, and current events.

Just curious, does anyone actually have a specific room set aside for a library, or do you just have shelving in other rooms?

darkside

After going through years of trying to find room to store all my paperbacks and hardcovers I finally just donated most of them. I have one small bookcase left with about 30 of my favorites.

I buy ebooks now from Peanut Press and Fictionwise and my 100 or so titles fit nicely on one CD-ROM. No more storage problems.

littlefuzzy

Eep!! 130 books total?? I couldn't live with that amount of books... I've already read 47 books since Jan. 1st.

tjr2mental

I have right around 500 I think. 6' x 4' case filled, plus more in the closet because we ran out of room to hold them all.

I am proud to say that I have every book to the Dragon Lance collection. Been collecting those sence 1990 I think.

Vampyr

I must have over 4,000 books by now. I wish I would have started a database years ago, but it's too late now! I can't even think of beginning to make any kind of list.

I have custom wood shelving in various rooms. The one with the most shelves is used as a kind of library. It is holding about 1,500 books (mainly hard covers of music, history, biography, military and some German language novels), almost 700 DVDs and over 6,000 classical music cds. The classical music cds are in a separate area on shelving that's approximately 10' high by 20' long.

I plan to move in about 3 years and the new house [I]will[/] have a library, which will hopefully be large enough to fit the entire book, DVD and cd collections with space for growth.

I would show pics but I don't have a digital camera or the computer knowledge to use it.

Merin

When spouse & I bought our house, the first thing we did was set aside the other two bedrooms. The first one, I use just for my hardbacks, and is going to take some planning as I slowly come to realize that I don't currently have enough shelves.

The other bedroom is set aside for paperbacks & "other" stuff & I want to eventually turn it into a mini-sitting/reading room with paperback books lining the walls.

The odd thing is, once all these books are shelved (somewhere) then I plan to sit down & read the ones I havn't read yet & trim & discard as much as possible. I find that I'm doing some of that as I go along. Of course, the most frustrating thing is putting two copies of a particular title on the discard pile (because you already own one copy of it) and then coming across a third copy. If I only I had already known.....

Feneant

I never knew that people could have so many books except some professors... I know a history professor here has around 3000 in his basement but myself as a casual reader only have around 100 or so books and I thought that was a lot...

If you have 4000 book and room for them, I salute you.

Scarecrow

I'd guess about 1,500 or so right now. I won't know for sure until I get them all entered into BookDB. I'm just slowly plugging away at cataloging them a few shelves at a time.

Holly E. Ordway

We have about 2,000 books or so. They're in nice wooden bookcases, several of which were custom-built to hold paperbacks (ie. with shelves fairly close together so there's not a lot of wasted space above the books on the shelf). Our "dining room" also doubles as the "library": there are bookcases on three out of four walls (a total of six bookcases in that room). In the living room, there's one other bookcase, and in the office, there are three more. Books are good!

Recently we did do a "weeding out" of titles. I like to own books, but if left unchecked, they will slowly but steadily take over all available space... We culled all the books that we'd read and didn't like, or thought were OK but not worth re-reading. There are still a LOT of books in our house but now they're all ones that either haven't been read yet, or are worth re-reading.

Geoff H

Hey, whenever a similar question gets asked in the DVD Talk part of this forum, lots of people submit pictures!

Anyone care to submit some photos of their book collections?

bishop2knight

I currently have about 200 hardcover first editions, and maybe another 40 paperbacks. It doesn't sound like much, and when looking at my bookcases (which are about 75% filled) it doesn't look like much either.

But when you understand these considerations, it's not so bad after all:

1) I only buy first edition hardcovers in fine/near fine condition (except for the pbs, of course)
2) I read every book I buy (although I just bought 8 books in the last two weeks, so I'm close to a 15 book backlog).
3) I've been collecting for less than 10 years.

I'm proud of my collection, and I'm excited to see it grow. Right now I'm using 7' cases I purchased from American Furniture Warehouse. The two bookcases are currently residing in my office at home. They look good enough for now, but in the next four years or so I to buy a house (instead of my condo) with an extra bedroom that I can make custom shelves.

BoatDrinks

I have no idea how many books I have. I have three bookcases in my home office (two floor-to-ceiling, one small) that are filled.

I collect HC 1st Editions of certain authors, those have their own shelf space.

I have a lot of paperbacks (that I use to mark in) mixed in with my HC's.

Jason Bovberg

I have about 3000 books, with a concentration on first-edition hardcovers of crime/horror/literature. A couple years ago, a carpenter friend of mine helped me turn an extra bedroom into a full floor-to-ceiling library. It took us 3 months, but now it's my fortress of solitude.

lorenzoh

I'm not sure of the total number of books in the house. Two large shelves with mostly hardbacks. A small shelf with kids books. Several large boxes in the garage. A handful at work. A couple on the nightstand. Plus a box that slowly gets filled and then donated. Then there are the ones I pile up and burn because they don't align with my religious beliefs.

madcougar

I would guesstimate that I have about 500 books and about 200 comic book trade paperbacks. I thought I had a lot of books until I read this thread. Heck, I thought I had a lot of DVDs before I discovered this forum.

ziggy

In my butt, right next to my cds.

I just have 4 wooden shelves full - 2 of which I built. I'd guess I have around 200 books now, but I have had many many more.

WarriorPrincess

I'm impressed! I thought I had a lot of books, but now I can show this thread to my boyfriend to prove how I do NOT go overboard on books.

I have two 6' tall bookcases in my spare room (computer/exercise room/study) with about 220 hardback, 10 trade pbs (usually trilogies), 300 pbs, and a few hundred comics and graphic novels. In the living room is another 6' bookcase with one shelf devoted to some of my favorite childhood books (mostly Disney and Dr. Seuss), and my mom has about 150 childhood books (mostly young adult reading like Judy Bloom and my myriad of horse books - a lot of Black Stallion ) in my armoire at her house. Lots of my paperbacks are in double or triple rows because I need at least another 6' bookcase but have nowhere to put it. They're hard for me to read anyway because my eyes get so tired when the text is so small and cramped together. I replace them with hardbacks when I find a good deal, but some are only available in paperback form so I'm stuck.

In contast my boyfriend has probably about 100-150 hardback/trade pb/mass pb combined (hard to tell because they're not grouped by type, and some shelves are doubled up) also in the spare room. He thinks I keep way too many that I might not reread for several years. I tell him that I'm a collector by nature, which is why I much prefer 1st ed hardbacks in new/like new condition, and rarely buy used unless I can see it first or have some guarantee of quality. And I've read over half, just got behind when in school the last 3 years. I'll catch up eventually because lately I buy only one a month or so, and I've read 3 in the past week...so I'm making progress.

Someday I'll have a dedicated library/study with floor to ceiling bookshelves, and a barrister bookcase for my most valuable books.

shrike

I have thousands of books and most are in boxes stored in a large walk-in closet. My favorites are displayed in a variety of shelves and bookcases throught my home; living room, bedrooms, hallway. My valuable books are in one bedroom displayed in a set of barister bookcases. I have pretty much run out of room between my movies, books and music. I go through the boxes of books in the closet about once a year and sell some to used books stores, give some to friends, and donate some to our local library...just to make room for more books. =)

Geoff H

Pictures pictures pictures!!

?

littlefuzzy

What is the best way to put pictures in a post? I have a very crappy digital camera that I can use to get 'em to the computer. I guess I would need to up them to a web site or something...

JawsAddict

We have at least a thousand books, many of which are hardcover. We keep the signed first editions and rare hardcovers and paperbacks in 2 special 6-foot bookcases with glass doors. We also have three more 6-foot bookcases in the living room, 3-foot bookcases scattered in various hallways and bedrooms, and our fourth bedroom has been set aside to be converted into a library. It currently has 6 6-foot bookcases filled with a mixture of hardcover and paperbacks.
There are also several boxes full of paperbacks waiting to be unpacked from our move last year.
As we unpack the rest of the books we are paring down our collection and taking some of our books to Half Price Books and donating some to the local library.

Darren H

I'd never really thought about it, but I guess I have about 500. A good friend of mine (who is only 26) has at least two bookcases in every room of his house. The first case you see when you walk in the front door contains books by authors whose last name starts with A. By the time you walk all the way through to his back bedroom, you have worked your way through the alphabet. Pretty cool.

smirnoff

Here is my small collection. The shelfs I got at Ikea from the clearance section for 5$.

WillieTheShakes

I'm a writer.
I've got an honours degree in English Lit.
I've worked in bookstores for more than 15 years.
I've been a reviewer and commentator on books for 6-7 years.

I have too many books.
An estimate? Probably about 15,000 titles. At least. I have a dedicated study/library - completely shelved - for reading and writing. I have shelves in every other room (well, except the bathroom - there I just have a stack). Every time I open my mailbox, books fall out...

It's a wonderful way to live.

wendersfan

I'm guessing between 5 and 10 thousand.

Once, about 20 years ago, I found myself unemployed and living with my parents for a while. With little to occupy my time I read a lot, and ended up reading every book I owned. When that happened I vowed I would have so many books that I would never have time to finish them all. Since then I've probably bought on average a book a day.

My wife and I have bookcases in every room in our home, plus we have books stacked up four feet high in some rooms, and boxes of books from floor to ceiling in one room.