Monday, May 17, 2010

Thoughts on Future Book Organizing


The books are packed!  My shelves are empty, dusty, and forlorn.  I can't WAIT to unpack and reorganize my books this weekend.  The key word in that sentence is ORGANIZE; as I was packing I was thinking of a different way to organize my books.

Here is how they are organized now:  large fancy books, graphic novels, poetry anthologies, short story anthologies, non-fiction (organized by country, then time period), then alphabetical by author through all the fiction titles.

I'm thinking about doing something different and organizing some titles by publisher.  All my Viragos, Persephones, NYRBS, Penguins, and Oxfords would look REALLY nice stacked horizontally on my shelves. The rest of the books will be organized as usual.  Do you think this will work?  With my LibraryThing account I can still keep track of my books and I believe it will look stunning.

Has anyone ever tried this method of book organization?  Will I love it or want to kick myself later? 

Give me some feedback people!

2 comments:

Thomas Hogglestock said...

How exciting Amanda. I will soon be packing and unpacking my library as well and I have been contemplating some of the same questions. Right now my fiction is all alpha by author with non-fiction grouped loosely by topic. I have already decided that at the new place the Persephones and other special small collections will remain together. And I may even separate my paperbacks from the hardcovers. It's all just so exciting, I just like thinking about it.

Hannah Stoneham said...

Yes this sounds like a whole world of a project.... I wait with baited breath to hear/read how you eventually do this. the reason is that about 80% of my books are in a storage depot on the outskirts of London, 5% are dotted around the house of my husband's parents and 15% are in our house in France - come January I plan to unite these disparate kingdoms and I do not know how to organise the collection - but know that it must be done somehohw if I am ever to find anything - so I am ready to be inspired!

I like the idea of organising by publisher - that works for small publishers and imprints that print very similar kinds of titles.

Lovely post - thank you for sharing

Hannah