Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ

I'm building some shelving for my ginormous stack of books sitting on the floor. Anybody have resources/tips for organizing the shelves? I've always done all genres alphabetical by author. I'm pretty sure I have enough books to fill 2-2x7' shelves. The orderly side of me wants to recover all my books to make them easy to read

Whimsy is fun sometimes. I like to put all the books I haven't read up front, makes it more likely I will read the new story rather than the comforting one I know. Organizing by color so that your shelf looks like a rainbow is fun. It's also fun to put Pride and Prejudice next to A Clockwork Orange.

:) My technique is as follows:

1 - Do my best to keep a series all together
2 - But I like my shelves looking nice so I try to also group books by their sizes. This overrides 1 because I sometimes end up with mix of mass market paperbacks/hardbacks/trade paperbacks and they look terrible all side by side with each other in sequence, so I'll shuffle them around, sometimes double shelve them (if shelves are deep enough) so the mass market paperbacks are behind the hardcovers/trade paperbacks (which are usually close enough in height to go together).

Because of 2 I really don't bother with ordering by authors (though 1 helps to kind of keep most of those together) and I have enough books that I can dedicate an entire bookcase to a genre, I have one that is mainly SF/F, another is fiction/mystery/historical/non-fiction. But things spill over in both directions if something fits nicely in one place but not another.

The fun comes when a new book in a series comes out and there's no space with the rest of the books of that series. So over time I just stuff things in randomly and every now and then do a full reshuffle to get them all sorted up again. And frankly, I don't even have room for new bookcases anymore...so when I do that reshuffle I try to cull my collection (so hard to part with book! even if I know I'll never have time to read it again).

Maybe in your plan, keep in mind the work involved in inserting new books into your system.

Nevada wrote: "Whimsy is fun sometimes. I like to put all the books I haven't read up front, makes it more likely I will read ...i>

Thanks Nevada! I like the idea of a "to read" area. My current area for that is a bar counter...our house is always covered with books in some stage of reading or about to be read.

:)

Andrea wrote: ":) My technique is as follows:

1 - Do my best to keep a series all together
2 - But I like my shelves looking nice so I try to also group books by their sizes. This overrides 1 because I sometimes..."

Great advice! I will definitely keep future book additions in mind. That is an area I had not even considered. I think you've saved me mounds of trouble.

:)

I order mine alphabetically by author and then by chronological order within that frame.

I do have a 'system' & I can always put my hand right on a book (even describe where it is to my wife if she calls me) but it doesn't seem to make much sense to anyone but me. We have about 2500-3000 books scattered around the house. I made one wall of my bedroom into bookshelves & I don't think there is a wall or room that doesn't have one on it.

I pretty much have separate shelves for fact, fiction, & sort-of-nonfiction (SN - philosophy, religion/mythology). I build my bookshelves to hold both (10" height opening). I quit separating fiction genres because too many authors cross the lines & some (Zelazny!) I can't figure which they belong in. I usually alphabetize fiction, but rarely nonfiction. Fiction can get out of order if it means keeping an author/series together better on a big shelf.

Nonfiction & SN are grouped by subject. Since nonfiction often includes outsized books, it can get a bit scrambled, sometimes by author, other times by subject. I have a lot of books about trees & wood, so I group by subject & then author, but carpentry/design is a separate shelf.

I separate out some authors with a lot of books into smaller bookshelves & keep one just for anthologies. Because my daughter is into PNR/UF books, I have one bookshelf just for that genre which are also arranged in alphabetical order. I put Patricia Briggs' PNR/UF books on this shelf & her fantasy in with the rest of the fiction books, but I don't do that with Fred Saberhagen. I also have John Jakes' Bicentennial series & others like it on a shelf with nonfiction history.

Obviously, I find a 'system' is a nice idea, but I don't practice it too hard. Hope that helps.

I use genre then author, then series.

I mix SFF standalones if they don't have corresponding authors who also write series that I own.

Sometimes I also put series in the mixed shelves, e.g. I put my Expanse books with the First Law trilogy just because they fit in one shelf together.

I put to-read in a separate shelf as well, unless they have a corresponding authors who have either standalones/series that I own.

Somebody once asked whether I want to arrange based on colors, I said nope. It may look good but I'll go crazy if I see nonfiction shelved with fiction.

Andrea wrote: ":) 2 - But I like my shelves looking nice so I try to also group books by their sizes. This overrides 1 because I sometimes end up with mix of mass market paperbacks/hardbacks/trade paperbacks and they look terrible all side by side with each other in sequence, so I'll shuffle them around, sometimes double shelve them (if shelves are deep enough) so the mass market paperbacks are behind the hardcovers/trade paperbacks (which are usually close enough in height to go together).."

I hate then this happens. My Harry Potter and ASOIAF collection is a mess since I have all paperbacks, hardbacks, translated version, illustrated editions, graphic novels, companion books, essay collection, but in different editions/publishers/sizes...I ended up putting each series and related books in one dedicated shelf.

Silvana wrote: "Andrea wrote: "I hate then this happens."

The worst is when its not even your fault. For example the publishers just stop making mass market paperbacks in preference of trade paperbacks. Or the size is just slightly different. And even the cover styles change so they no longer look like they belong to the same series. For example I have original mass market paperbacks of the early A Song of Ice and Fire books which have actually illustrations, but now they all come out in solid colours so my collection doesn't match (fortunately all same height though!)

And sometimes it's my fault, I couldn't resist getting the trade paperback of Green Mars during a charity fundraiser, but Red/Blue Mars are mass market. Maybe I can put it next to my inherited copies of Lord of the Rings where the Two Towers is a kind of mini-trade paperback and the other two are mass market, could have this interesting up and down effect :)

I hate when publishers change sizes. I have one series where the last book is both shorter and narrower than the rest and consequently much thicker. It aggravates me every time I see it. I have another series that I have been very careful to only buy the identical hardbacks but then a friend bought me 2 paperbacks. I wanted to strangle her for messing up my shelf.

As far as organizing goes, I sort by genre, then author, then chronological order.

Lynne wrote: "I order mine alphabetically by author and then by chronological order within that frame."

Lynne, do you seperate genres at all? Also, how many books do you think you own? (Trying to gauge a system for how many books I think we'll end up with overall.)

:)

Snickers wrote: "I hate when publishers change sizes. I have one series where the last book is both shorter and narrower than the rest and consequently much thicker. It aggravates me every time I see it. I have ano..."

I have a series like that, I have the first 8 or 9 in paperback and they recently decided that they needed to do hardcover for the series
and i have to wait like three months before i can get the paperback.

These problems should be added to that Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ list of 20 Problems only book lovers understand. I know one of my friends would look at me funny if I mentioned the agony of mismatched series...especially since after a book passes through her hands it comes out looking like it went through the dishwasher >.< When I get through a book you can't even tell it's been read. So understandably I don't lend her my books...

Though that's another criteria for my shelves, put the pretty ones in good condition out front, the beaten up ones in back. Or the beaten up ones go where the sun shines on them, so I don't fade the pretty ones.

I also have the books I haven't read yet upstairs in my room, and the ones I finished reading downstairs in the guest bedroom. With a special pile on my floor for the books I'll be reading in the next couple of months (subject to change depending on my mood of course)

Jim wrote: "I do have a 'system' & I can always put my hand right on a book (even describe where it is to my wife if she calls me) but..."

Jim - great walk-through. Thank you for all the info on your system. I've noticed it's tough keeping non-fiction organized the way I've been doing it. Also, fellow wood worker/crafts(wo)man here. I'm working on building shelves for our current collection. In addition to the 10" shelves, did you leave one larger shelf on the bottom of each bookcase (or perhaps the shelves are adjustable) or did you make a specific case just for larger books? Also, do you separate your fiction and non-fiction into different living areas?

:)

Silvana wrote: "I use genre then author, then series. ."

I agree on the colors thing. I would lose it!!

:)

Snickers wrote: "I hate when publishers change sizes. I have one series where the last book is both shorter and narrower than..."

I'm a rebel, if someone gifts me books and they don't match, I upgrade them then give away or sell the non-matching ones, as is right and proper!! My fondest dream is to have all my favorite sets in hardbound, matching sets. Of course, in dream world, I could afford all those too ;) Heh heh.

Roger wrote: "Snickers wrote: "I hate when publishers change..."

Agggghh!!

Andrea wrote: "These problems should be added to that Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ list of 20 Problems only book lovers understand..."

I'm with you on lending, I only lend books I'd be willing to never see again. Most of the time I don't even offer. And I'd never, never ask to borrow a book either, just in case! Books are pricey! Even 10$ per paperback means a good several thousand dollar investment over your lifetime. $$$$$$$

Rachel wrote: "...In addition to the 10" shelves, did you leave one larger shelf on the bottom of each bookcase (or perhaps the shelves are adjustable) or did you make a specific case just for larger books? Also, do you separate your fiction and non-fiction into different living areas? "

Both fiction & nonfiction books are scattered throughout the house. The 10" opening is just for my main fiction bookshelves since they just have to handle HB & PB books of normal size & that's the bulk of the fiction. They are in my bedroom in the bookshelf covering the wall, above my bed, & a shelf across the foot of the bed.

Nonfiction books that we reference frequently are where we use them the most on whatever shelf is handy & will fit them. There are some out in my shop, but nonfiction is primarily in the living room due to the shelves. I have 2 bookshelves from Ikea with adjustable shelves flanking a bookcase/shelf that my great grandfather made in the living room which hold most of the nonfiction & snf books. The Ikea shelves have adjustable shelves & do have oversized ones at the bottom for coffee table sized books. The rest of the shelves are about a foot apart, more than I'd like, but I don't have quite enough room for one more. G'grandpa's shelf is also oversized, so that holds many of my larger reference books.

You might be able to see them in the background of this picture of our poor, abused dogs.

It's all perfectly simple. :)

First of all, each genre gets its own set shelves.

1. In sci-fi & fantasy,...

1.A. Novels are alphabetical by author.

    1.A.1 Co-authored novels set in the universe of one of the authors is alphabetized under the author who "created" the universe. Thus, 1633 is alphabetized under Flint, not Weber, while Crown of Slaves is alphabetized under Weber, not Flint, and all the Wheel of Time books stayed under Jordan.

    1.A.2. Co-authored novels with original universes are alphabetized under whichever author I like best. Thus Lucifer's Hammer is filed under Niven, not Pournelle, and The Light of Other Days is under Clarke, not Baxter, & Deus Irae is under Zelazny, not Dick.

1.B. Anthologies are in their own section, alphabetized under editor, except...

    1.B.1. Anthologies which are distinctive series (E.g. Sword and Sorceress) are kept together, alphabetized by the first editor.

    1.B.2. Anthologies which are in a shared universe are alphabetized together under the editor of the first volume: Thus all Wild Cards is under Martin & all Thieves' World are under Aprin.

1.C. Books with two novels by different authors, e.g. "ACE Doubles" or "TOR Doubles", are alphabetized under the author of the story I'm most likely to come back to. E.g. Alpha Yes, Terra No! / The Ballad of Beta-2 is under Delany, because who the heck is Emil Petaja?

    1.C.1. Sometimes this is a tough call. A Meeting With Medusa/Green Mars is alphabetized under Clarke, but more than once I've gone looking for Green Mars under Robinson.

    1.C.2. If I didn't like either story, it gets filed under whichever author comes first alphabetically, though it probably should've gotten filed in the trashcan.

1.D. Ebooks are in Calibre, nicely searchable.

1.E. Audiobooks are in a folder cleverly labeled "Audiobooks", which sadly is alphabetizable only by title.


2. Non-fiction, it's by subject matter... astronomy over there, archeology there, electronics there, physics there, chess over there, humor over there, History over there.

2.A. History is grouped by period, so antiquity, 20th century (WW-1 stays together, WW-2 stays together), and a bunch of "modern history" books which for me is >1950.

3. Oversized books (e.g. "coffee table books") have their own stack because they just don;t shelve well.I don't have enough to worry about organizing them.

4. Graphic Novels have their own shelves. When applicable they're grouped by character. I don't have that many of these. The longest run is the 16-book Cerebus "phone book" editions. (I don't know whether it's odd, but I keep collected volumes of newspaper strips, such as Dilbert, Doonesbury, Calvin & Hobbes, with the humor instead of graphic novels.)

It was so nice of the kids to move out and leave more rooms for books!

I put up a picture of picture of my SF/F shelves once upon a time.

G33z3r wrote: "It's all perfectly simple. :)

First of all, each genre gets its own set shelves.
..."

That's some intense explanation there, thanks for all that!! Also, your shelves look great. I've gotten better and getting rid of books that I don't enjoy. I felt super guilty about gifting the library a popular author that I thought was horrendous so I sold it to Half Price Books instead. ^ . ^ I'm also up in the air on what to do with oversized books.

Oversized books are always an issue. I'd like to rotate them to the coffee table, if I could find it under all the junk that gets piled on it. We have a couple that are too big to fit any shelf well.

Does Lois McMaster Bujold get filed under McMaster or Bujold?

Randy wrote: "Does Lois McMaster Bujold get filed under McMaster or Bujold?"

Bujold. Now if she hyphenated it McMaster-Bujold, I'd put it under McMaster.

I can't, off the top of my head, think of any author who published under an unmarried name and subsequently changed their name upon getting married or conversely changed their name upon getting divorced.

And although no one asked, I alphabetize under the name on the book; so authors who publish under multiple names get shelved in different places depending on the name they use. E.g., Feed under Grant and Rosemary and Rue under McGuire; The Dragon's Path under Abraham and Unclean Spirits under Hanover.

Was going to ask what people do with pen names. Anne Rice and Stephen King come to mind. There are a few though with three names where I'm not sure if the second name is a middle name, part of the first name, or part of the last name. But then I don't sort by author so doesn't really affect me much.

I file them by how I think of the books & that varies. There are a lot of oddities. I have King's Bachman books with his others, but I currently have all of Mark Twain's filed under C for Clemens. Books written by 2 authors are usually filed under the first on, but that's changed occasionally over the years. Often depends on space.

It doesn't matter that Karl Edward Wagner wrote Conan: Road of Kings, the first copy went on the shelf with the other Conan & other Robert E. Howard books. When I got a second copy, it went on to Wagner's shelf. I have almost everything published by both, but Conan belongs to REH.

I only have one copy of Venus on the Half-Shell & I have it with Vonnegut's books, although the name on the spine is Kilgore Trout (one of his fictional characters) & Philip José Farmer actually wrote it with Vonnegut's permission.

I usually have notes tucked into shelves with an author's books. The notes sometimes have odd facts, emails between us, but more likely a list of all they've written & which ones I have. Those pages will also point out other books to look for, if they're not right at hand.

Jim wrote: " I have almost everything published by both, but Conan belongs to REH...."

Yeah, I treat Conan under rule 1.A.1. :)

I've always shelved all my SFF books together in alphabetical order by author. My nonfiction gets organized by subject matter (history, nature, philosophy, art, etc.)

Oh, the one exception are my Tolkien books. They haves shelf all their own. With four versions of The Hobbit, three versions of The Lord of the Rings, The Silmarillion, a complete set of the History of Middle Earth book, as well as several analyses of the autbors works by various Tolkien scholars, it's quite a big shelf!

Once upon a time, life has been easy: Reorder bookshelves to the momentary state of mind. It is contemplative, meditative.

But in the dawn of digitalization, things become really complicated: How can I find a work if I don't know if I've got it as ebook, as dead tree edition, or as audio? What to do with the online versions of stories that I've read but not downloaded?

In the future, everything will be easy. Because everything is digitalized in the cloud and I don't sort things myself but let it do by a personal A.I. Bookshelves then are projected on a wall. When I search something, my AR highlights it. Reordering is a matter of microseconds. And throwing away not an issue anymore.

Andreas wrote: "Once upon a time, life has been easy: Reorder bookshelves to the momentary state of mind. It is contemplative, meditative.

But in the dawn of digitalization, things become really complicated: How can I find a work if I don't know if I've got it as ebook, as dead tree edition, or as audio? ..."

Dawn? No, we're well into the morning.

Moving books in any quantity among my physical shelves can take hours. Generally enjoyable hours as I revisit old friends.

I don't trust the cloud nor do we have very good Internet service & it's one more area to check, so I always download, strip any DRM, & keep them in 3 formats: epub, mobi, & pdf. Then they go on to a USB drive in either the ebook or audiobook folder by author's last name. I break them up into fiction & nonfiction. Audiobooks are also broken into half a dozen rough fiction genres & about as many nonfiction subjects. Ebooks don't have the fiction broken into genre, though.

For the authors with a lot that of books that my wife & I read, I generally have a list of all their works made from . I copy the author page, paste it in notepad, & save it with their books now. That strips most of the extraneous garbage & gives me a great starter list which I update with notes. For instance, in front of the books there is often an 'a', 'e', &/or 'p' for the media. I print many of them out & have them stuck in with the physical books. When I started, I often started the list by dumping the directory to a text file & filling it in manually, unless I just did the whole thing manually.

It sounds like a lot of work, but I started this system early in the digital age & have been diligent about keeping up with it. Some of my audio books were ripped from cassettes back when I had Win95 on a 386 & stored them on Zip disks & CDs. I guess that's close to 25 years ago now. I even have some text files I transferred from my Atari back even earlier. I remember using Word Perfect 5 to translate them.

I always wanted to keep an updated database of all my books. I even wrote a couple; one in Paradox, another in MS Access. I could never keep up with them, though. With the kids around & book swapping sites, physical books just changed too often.

A few years back, I tried a nifty program (can't recall the name) that would let me scan in the bar code from a book & would look it up on the web & fill in all the data. Unfortunately, it wasn't flexible enough to allow customized fields I wanted & I have quite a few old books without bar codes or even a basic listing. Those took far too long to put in manually, so I still rely on my memory for physical books.

IIRC, GR didn't have an 'owned' field in the bookshelves when I first started, so I've never used it. By the time we got it (or I noticed it) I had too many books shelved to want to fill it in. I really should try to update it, though. I could use GR & the bar code. It would be nice to have even a rough list.

I regularly export my GR library to a spreadsheet where a clunky variety of macros massage the data into yearly reads with totals & averages for stars & shelves. One sheet has totals so I can compare my reading by years, genres, & such. I really need to spend some time coding it better. Maybe when I retire...

Like several of you, I lately use Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ' shelves to keep track of whether I have a book in physical copy, e-book, audiobook, or borrowed (KOLL or library), sometimes more than one. And I download the cvs export from Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ at least once a month.

My book list is kept in a google drive spreadsheet so that I can access it quickly from phone/laptop/work. I don't keep e-books on hand as I only read paper copies. But it is nice to have a searchable list. I have not read every book we own as some of them are business/communication/finance books that my husband reads. Also, I do not want to clutter my Å·±¦ÓéÀÖ with unwanted suggestions by adding those books; I made the mistake of adding a couple classic stories to the "romance" shelf and GR has been suggesting romance novels non-stop.

I am a former librarian and actually use LC call number order. I know. ;)

James wrote: "I am a former librarian and actually use LC call number order. I know. ;)"

Heh heh! I've considered it.

I guess I never gave it any thought as to how to organize books. I've always organized them by author with hard cover in the back with paperback laid down with the spine facing upwards so I can still see everything. Makes finding something easy. I also keep read and unread books segregated. Although I have a bookcase that is 8'x10'x1' I still dont have enough room for them all.

When my shelves are where they belong (yay house renovations...) I try to separate them fiction and non-fiction, and then alphabetically by relative size (i.e. all mass market books on a shelf at the top, all textbooks at the bottom). But I totally do use some as decoration. I once read that every room should have something living in it. I have a hard limit on the number of pets I can maintain, and I'm terrible at gardening, so books go in every room! Pretty books and books that mean a lot to me go in places of honor. Books I think guests will like go in the guest room with the extra shampoos and towels and chargers.

I used to keep all my SFF books together in alphabetical order. I've actually culled my fiction books way down now, as I do so much of my reading on my Kindle these days. I now group my books by catagories or author now. So now I have a shelf for Tolkien, a shelf for HP. Another shelf for "classical" books (a lot of these were presents, or inherented from my father). I've recently started a collection of annotated books, that have their own shelf. I've got a lot of history books that I've organized by subject, classical world, middle ages, ACW, WWIII. Other scientific or technical subjects like paleontology, space exportation, photography.

Andrea wrote: ":) My technique is as follows:

1 - Do my best to keep a series all together
2 - But I like my shelves looking nice so I try to also group books by their sizes. This overrides 1 because I sometimes..."

Same here! Only at my place, 1 overrides 2 (so I keep series together, regardless of their size). I think I only have 1 series so far where I have a problem with that, i.e. the Star Wars Bane trilogy.

The size thing drives me crazy. DelRey went back and published a hardcover omnibus of the first three books in The Belgariad. They never released the other HC containing the final two books to match. So I am stuck with the SF Book Club edition containing those two novels on my HC shelves. Looks odd with all the Eddings HC books being one size except that one.

Gary wrote: "The size thing drives me crazy. DelRey went back and published a hardcover omnibus of the first three books in The Belgariad. They never released the other HC containing the final two books to matc..."

I have a matched pair of the Belgariad omnibus from SFBC, then a matched pair of trade paperbacks for the Mallorean, and then three standalone novels in mass market paperbacks. At least each sub-series are grouped together nicely, though the entire series as a whole couldn't look weirder together.

Gary wrote: "The size thing drives me crazy...."

It was messed up when they changed paperback sizes. 'Pocket' books no longer fit many nor the hand as well. I've never cared that much for the trade paperback size.

I was in my local library today renewing my card - the first time I've physically been in there in years since I generally just download books. Most books are hardbacks divided only between Fiction & Nonfiction. They have a small paperback section divided into genres, though.

Genre, then alphabetically by author, then in publication order except series - they go together in reading order, in publication order of the first book. I that makes sense.
I try to buy books that match but as some have pointed out, that often isn't possible, so my shelves to look a little higgeldy-piggeldy. My least favourite is that my Iron Tree by Cecelia Dart-Thornton is the trade edition and all the rest of the Crowthistle Chronicles are normal quarto, But it can't be helped.
Organising by colour is no system at all and makes me angry.

I have a bookcase for my SF lit-crit/history, one for pure science and paranormal (go figure), one for other non-fiction, two for SF hardcover and trade paper and a double-sided shelf for mass market paperback SF. Series with multi authors (like Star Trek and Dr Who) get their own shelf. All my "Best of Year" collections have a single shelf. My Ace Doubles have a shelf they share with the Tor doubles. Doc Savage has a shelf (that would be Dr Carl Savage, not the radio guy) The SF Masterworks Series has its own shelf. These are all sorted by number. Everything that doesn't have its own shelf is aranged by author, I just built one hundred feet of new shelf and it is already full...HELP!!!