The beginning is the most important part of the work.
— Plato
As an avid reader, I am obviously also an avid book buyer. Rest assured that I will NEVER leave a bookstore without finding at least one little gem in its midst. And while Wonderguy and my bookish friends not only understand but often act the same way, over the years I acquired quite a number of gems that have not yet had the chance of displaying their full potential as I haven’t read them yet.
However, because of the pandemic and trips to cities with excellent English bookstores — Vienna (Shakespeare & Company Booksellers), Bratislava (Oxford Book Shop, 11 books & books), and Paris (Smith & Son, Librairie Galignani) — my physical #tbr pile has grown significantly over the last 2,5 years. In December of 2022, I finally decided to do something about it. After all, I’m a reader, not (just) a collector…
Reading my shelves 2023 — rediscover hidden gems
After bringing home 24 books from Paris — made possible due to traveling by train — I had to do some reorganizing of my shelves to find adequate homes for my new acquisitions. Doing so I realized how many wonderful and inspiring books I already got on my shelves, which had fallen victim to my ‘out of sight, out of mind’ ADHD fuzzybrain. Thankfully, I only found one book I bought a second time, forgetting that I already owned a copy. Still, it was high time I started rediscovering my bookshelves.
Looking for inspiration online, I realized that I’m not alone in my quest to reduce my tbr-pile. Whitney Conard, a booklover from the US, created the “unread shelf” challenge way back in 2018 and has found like-minded people all over the world. This year, every month has an inspirational motto that guides her community through their reading month — and their unread shelves. If this sounds interesting to you, head over to her “Unread Shelf Project 2023.”
As much as I liked the idea, I’m much too introverted to look for outside motivation when it comes to my reading. There are some books I need to read for my academic work, and I’m a member of one book club. That’s enough outside reading guidance for me. Reading is my happy place, my primary type of entertainment, and my retreat from a world and work that requires us to be ‘on’ and ‘out there’ all the time. So my reading choices reflect my mood and state of mind and I cherish to have the freedom of choice most of the time at least.
Go with the flow…
Contrary to the Low Buy Challenges I did in 2020 (very successful) and 2022 (moderately successful), I will NOT work with a set of rules that regulate if and when I am ‘allowed’ to purchase books or not in 2023. I’ve tried book-buying bans several times and while the occasional No Buy month works for me, strict book-buying bans do not.
However, this doesn’t mean I will continue purchasing books like I did the last few years. I have a separate book wishlist I will use to remember the books I’m interested in. Having recently discovered Storytel I can use the audiobook app to dip into new books, authors, and series — I’ve already done so with Caimh McDonnell’s books featuring Bunny McGarry, listening to A Man with one of those Faces the first of the “Dublin trilogy”. Having read his “Stranger Times” series , published under “C. K. McDonnell”, I wasn’t sure if I liked his other books. Thanks to Storytel I now know I do. And I absolutely love the narrator, so I will continue listening to his other books as audiobooks.
Back to bookish realities besides the digital realm. While I will buy the occasional book — such as new releases in a series or from an author I love — I will do my best to ‘shop my shelves’ first before actually purchasing new reading material. Using Goodreads to keep an overview of my library, this way I hope to cut down my 285 tbr-books at least a bit.
And as we all know, hope springs eternal. Let’s see how far I get this time 🙂
