OMG! What Have I Done?
A few weeks ago I announced that I was going to put myself on a book-acquiring ban. Well it was with a slight shock yesterday that I realised that it was upon me. December the first is here!
You can check out the full rules I’m imposing on myself here, but simply put, for the next three months, I can only bring in one book for every five I read…
So it seems appropriate to take stock of what is actually sitting there on the shelves, and if I’m honest, it’s not quite as bad as I suspected, but as of this morning it was still a healthy 170 books.
One of the things I promised myself was I would clear out any books I’m never going to read anyway, and that cleared 22 books from the pile and these are going to be dropped of at one of my local charity shops, over the next few weeks. Which leaves me with a TBR pile of 148 books.
That’s still over a years reading for me, so the ban is a necessary one, to try and get some semblance of control over the darn thing!
If I can get it down by 15-20 books over the next three months I’ll consider it a success.
Wish me luck!
PS: Would it be considered cheating to choose all the shortest books first,to build up some credit? 
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Posted by Darren on Tuesday, December 1, 2009 at 10:10 pm
Filed under Blog · Tagged with Book Buying Ban
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I think it’s completely allowed to choose short books first! Builds up a sense of momentum, right?! And just because they’re short that doesn’t mean they’re not great!
You see! My thoughts exactly. And any other benefits are purely co-incidental…
Though I’m no longer on a book ban, I have a huge number of unread books on my shelf and I’m considering starting all the ones I’m not really sure if I want to read. If I can eliminate a good 20 books by reading just a bit of books and abandoning them, then that’ll make a good reduction.
I always start with the shortest books – builds up a persons confidence, checks things of lists, etc!
You see, that’s what I thought!
Only if you pick them specifically because you want to get them out of the way? ^-~ But I admit that I gravitate towards starting the shorter/smaller books myself. I think it might be a natural/normal reaction. Partially because, as others have said, it builds up confidence and momentum (I can do it! See? I read five books already!), but also because… well, we’re book acquiring addicts, right? So the shorter books means we get our next acquisition fix sooner.
So no, I wouldn’t consider it cheating. I would, however, consider it slightly imprudent. What are you/we going to do when we’re left with only chunksters? No more easy/fast reads then! In theory we might have built up a great momentum, but what about impractice? Won’t the page count be utterly daunting by then and the sheer amount of big books left be crushing?
Er, I’m not intending to put you off the ban or anything, but I’d say that, while it’s not cheating to start with the shorter books, throwing in a bigger one every now and again before you run out of them might be prudent.
I sort of fell off the bandwagon today, but… I won’t count them towards my totals since I got them for my job. That doesn’t count, right? And huzzah on reductions! Your TBR pile is under far more control than mine. (I’m still stuck in the 190s with regular weeding of what I no longer have that much interest in. I envy you your TBR pile, even if it’s scary much still.)
Great advice! Thanks!
(and no, if they were for work, it certainly doesn’t count!)
Definitely not cheating
Good luck!
That’s just what I thought!
If you really want to tackle your TBR stack (it doesn’t qualify as a mount yet, I’d say), then you should read one short and one longer book – take turns so it doesn’t get too much of a plight. That’s just my take on it. I know where you’re coming from, because I’m trying to put myself on a book buying ban as well. I wish you luck with your “project”
(By the way, your post would be a wonderful opportunity for me to promote the event I’m hosting
If you want, check it out )
Ooh, what a cool idea!
Glad you like it
I need to get myself on a ban. I have way too many books but I love them all. I keep them all. I read them more than once but I still have tons of books I haven’t read yet.
Good luck on your journey.
Thanks! Do feel free to join the madness.
Not cheating at all. If they count as a +1 when you put them on the pile, they count as a -1 when you clear them off the pile.
It’s clear logic like that, that makes so much sense!
Oh my gosh!!! Good luck with your self-imposed book-ban. I would try, but I don’t think I could do it. I did tell myself not to buy anymore books this past Friday. But then again.. I tell myself that every week.
You can do it! Join the madness!
I decree that it is in no way cheating to start with the shorter books. How could it be cheating? But it might make sense to intersperse some of the bigger books in there too, or else by the time you get to them, you’ll have given up on the book buying ban.
Ah a decree! *grabsatanyexcuse*
I definitely wouldn’t consider that cheating – because I’d do the same thing!
do what i would do….change the date of the ban to January 1, 2010…LOL
LOL, Don’t tempt me!
148 books is nothing!! I refuse to actually count the number of unread books I have on shelves and various corners of my home. I have a sneaking suspicion it will be well higher than yours!!
That said, for the sake of the almighty $, I’ve had to impose my own ban. It’s not so bad because I’m been using the library a lot more. (on a side note, at the moment, I have roughly 36 books checked out.) So I guess if you want the pile to dwindle, maybe it’s best to stay out of the library!
I’ve had to include library books in my ban as well, because while they don’t really add to it, while I’m reading them I’m not reading the TBR pile…
I don’t think it’s cheating. It’s a confidence builder. However, I have to agree with Shanra. I recently made the mistake of reading all the quick books first and now I am stuck with these long ones and I am losing a bit of motivation.
I’ll probably be mixing them up, but well I need to at least have the chance of buying a book or two!
I totally need to do this myself. To my credit (sounds vain doesn’t it?) I usually never buy new so the books are only 1.50 at most. I do need to put myself on a library ban. Good luck!!!
It’s not so much the cost (most of mine are from Bookmooch) but more the fact they are sitting there, all lonely and unloved…
Or not so lonely!
It’s definitely not cheating to read the shortest books first! It’ll help you feel like you’re getting somewhere (because that is quite a large TBR pile you’ve got there!). Good luck on the ban =D
Also, I’ve given you the Honest Scrap Award!
Ooh thanks!
Good luck w/ the ban! I think I can, I think I can, I think I can …
I hope I can…. I hope I can… I hope…
Good luck with it Darren!!! I hope yours lasts longer than mine did :p Christmas just completely destroyed mine this year…and then um, bookcloseouts had a 50% off fiction sale and I might have bought 7 books the other day :/
Might have bought eh…
October 2008 I vowed to my family that I would not buy a SINGLE book for ONE YEAR. I did pretty good. Christmas I got gift cards for our bookstore so that didn’t count. And then my birthday came in April and again.. gift cards. I then totally caved and bought myself “birthday presents” for about a month! The GREAT thing about it was that I actually read books off of my own shelves and put a sizable dent in my pile!
GOOD LUCK!!!!!
Thanks! I’m really hoping I can put a sizable dent in mine as well. One of the reasons I’ve picked now to do it is I figure with Christmas & new year upcoming most of Dec and Jan will naturally be fairly easy not to buy any books in, leaving me a light at the end of the tunnel, that the end should be manageable.
At least that is the plan!
Not cheating, motivating. Good luck! Hope you survive.
Hehe Thanks!
Oh good grief….you just put my TBR pile in terms of *years* it will take to read it….I’d never thought of it that way before. Using your rough calculations, I’ve got 8 years of books here. Yikes. I won’t tell if you won’t.
Erm… Oops!
LOL. A reader after my own heart!
Good luck with your ban! I read an awful lot of shorter books right off the bat when I started mine. It did give me a nice sense of accomplishment, but then I was all out of shorter books and so had few options later on in the year. I’d recommend interspersing the shorter reads with a couple of mid-size or longer books, just so you don’t run out of the short stuff too quickly.
I probably will to be honest, still the quickest way to earn books is to read them…
No, I’ll be good.
Probably…
Maybe…
…
I like this idea! Unfortunately in 2009 I read less than last year – but seemed to receive far more review copies. So my own TBR mountain has remained mainly untouched
I think 2010 may have to be a reading year again LOL
I hope you have a great reading year in 2010 Clare!