Book Collections/Buying

So TikTok has been an adventure. It's been exciting and a more than a little scary. A new form of social media always is.

I posted this last week and got an overwhelming response. When I said 400+ books = small collection, I was thinking of all this booktubers and booktokers who have WALLS full of books. They have insane amounts. So my little 2 bookshelves feels small to me! But I won't make that mistake again. I realized I'm blessed to be able to purchase books in the amount I do.

It also got me thinking about it more, and honestly, I don't spend all that much money on books. It's really important to me to not be spending $20+ on every book. I buy almost all my books from Thriftbooks and Goodwill. I make it a rule to only spend that much on new releases by my absolute favorite authors. Other than that, I buy everything second hand.

Thriftbooks is honestly an addiction. Majority of the books on there are under $5, and if you spend more than $10 you get free shipping. Their reading rewards program is also pretty good. Since 2016 I've spent $666 on Thriftbooks for 108 books. That's an average of $6 per book. That's a steal. And honestly, I know that's still a lot of money and a lot of books. I on average buy 20 books each month. That's a lot. That would be over 200 books a year! and some of those are new hardcover books. Pricey. And also crazy. I, on a good month, read maybe 8+ books, but 3 or 4 is a more average amount for me. I'm buying way more books than I could ever read! and while a vase majority used to be books I'd read, it's beginning to be more and more books I haven't read, thus increasing my physical TBR by 15+ books a month.

The other trade off with my collection is I've only read 52% of the books I own, most people with smaller collections, or less money to spend on books, treasure the ones they do have, and have read the books they have. Something I definitely need to be better about. It's definitely something to think about. I don't want to have a lot of books to seem cooler, or whatever. I want to treasure them. I want to look at my shelves and see stories that have affected me in some way. Characters I fell in love with, journeys I went on with characters, world that I would give anything to be able to be there. I don't want to see just books.

Now, I posted this on my Instagram a few days ago, thought I did re write it some and elaborate on a few things. But it had been on my mind this week, then today I went to the local library into their little for sale section about bought 6 books, then to Goodwill about bought 2 more. Only one I'd read, the rest were ones I might want to read. I even bought another Stephen King book, even thought after the last one I told myself I was probably done reading Stephen King. Oh well, I'll learn my lesson eventually. Change takes time, and it's hard to keep in mind things like this, like wanting there to be meaning to books on my self when I'm staring at walls of books, wanting them all.

I've only recently learned, because of TikTok, that people do book buying bans for themselves. I... I understand, but I just never would have thought of than or done it.

I don't know. A lot of thoughts swirling around my head. I'm curious what others think. I'm also curious how large of a book collection do people consider large? Is my 400+ books a large or small collection?

~ Thane Attor