Queereaders discussion

I finally got some book shelves up in the new house. These are simple (and cheap) cinder-blocks and 1 x 10"s, 16 feet long, 5.5 shelves. I looked at commercial and custom builtins, but didn't want to spend $5K-10K. Now the problem is organizing the books. I do have most of the unpacked ones in a local database and on Goodreads. Of course all this needs double checking. But have 20 boxes I have not seen in 20+ years, many unread.

1. My first thought was to put them all into alphabetical order by author. This keeps series and such together and making finding a book easy if I know what I'm looking for.

2. Then I wondered if I should keep non-fiction separately. EG, I've a lot of Celtic studies books and LGBT non-fiction. Do I want these mixed with fiction?

3. Would it be better to organize by genre and then author?

4. I've some long series, eg 300+ Star Wars books; 900+ Star Trek books. I'm leaning to keeping these separately and organized by timeline.

5. What to do with books I've read and don't think I'll reread for a long time. I've thought about boxing them up, but if I decide to re-read something, how will I find them? Still I like books in view. I don't have enough shelve space yet for everything.

7. What about reference books? Things like dictionaries, thesauri, atlases etc, I do these online. But, I also have specialized ref books, eg historical atlases.

8. What do I do with books I no longer want to keep. I hate to throw books away. Most of my books are Hardcover if they came in hardcover.

Any advice, experience, criticisms etc will be greatly appreciated!

I keep them in alphabetical order in three separate sections: non-fiction, poetry, and everything else.

As far as getting rid of books, it's tough. I gave away quite a few (some fairly rare) books to the library, but they aren't really equipped to know what to do with them non-bestsellers; so they throw them on a table for 25 cents. If no one buys them in a time, they throw them out. That's a shame for books that not many people would want but that certain people would desperately want! The last time I dumped some, I put them up for sale on half.com. That way at least I knew they were ending up in the hands of someone who wanted them. A big nuisance to ship them one by one like that though.

Thanks Don and Greg. I've already decided I need more shelves ;-) Ive already got 60 feet of shelves at my work all with unread books. I've a large attic, but don't like the idea of humidity (and mice). Libraries around here are small and rural and don't really have much room. They would not appreciate LGBT books >:-(

I think I will separate out non-fiction and go thru boxes to pick out those I hope to re-read and favorites. There are 6 decades of books. I dont think I ever got rid of one.

Is Half.com much different from selling on eBay or Amazon? I've done a lot of eBay selling. It is a pain to mail things, esp if one is doing it by oneself.

I have a large numismatic library I'm going to sell, but that will go thru a numismatic book-dealer I think.

We have a lot of books also. I started three years ago buying digital copies of the books I would want to read again and then donating the hard copy to local libraries or second hand book stores. Here in the DC Metro area we have several. Rare books or ones I couldn't part with I placed in Plastic bins for storing in the attic. They are air tight and keep moisture and beasties away. It is more expensive to purchase them but, cheaper than replacing rare books. Amazon is a great place to look for selling books. They do buy copies of books with Amazon credit / gift cards instead of cash.

Kernos wrote: "Thanks Don and Greg. I've already decided I need more shelves ;-) Ive already got 60 feet of shelves at my work all with unread books. I've a large attic, but don't like the idea of humidity (and m..."

I'm not sure if Half.com is still around - I think it might have been bought out by Amazon? The main difference between Half.com and ebay is that Half.com allowed you to set your prive and list indefinitely for free. They justvtake a cut when you sell. I liked that better than ebay because there weren't any artificial deadlines. If things didn't sell fir a while, I'd just reduce the price.

Not sure how selling on Amazon works. Is there a charge for listing?

There are several ways to sell items like books on Amazon. You can look through the list of BuyBack books and see if any of the books you are wanting to sell is listed there. The other is by signing up for Fulfilled by Amazon or as an Amazon Seller. The difference is either letting Amazon handle everything (Last I checked, it was $39 a month if you use the Fulfilled by Amazon program) Or, You can take care of the listing your items, sales, shipping and service yourself and then Amazon takes a cut of the sale. I think letting Amazon handle everything is the better route and worth $39 a month if you have a lot to sell.

Coty wrote: "There are several ways to sell items like books on Amazon. You can look through the list of BuyBack books and see if any of the books you are wanting to sell is listed there. The other is by signin..."

Thanks Coty! I am goimg to have to whittle down my books a little sometime soon; so this is good info for me!

Indeed thats, Coty and Greg

This is such an issue for me too. I recently moved and all my books are in complete disorder. A couple things though... I do have my graphic novels all together though not currently organized within that genre.

I like to keep things separated. All my fiction goes together and I don't bother with distinctions like fiction genres...they all go together and I will organize them by author.

Non-fiction I treat kind of like a library would. Most of my non-fiction is religion-oriented. I am a religion junkie...my favorite non-fiction topic. So I separate them all *by* religion...Hinduism, Buddhism, Christianity, etc. Religion and Graphic Novels are the biggest portions of my library.

Fiction, I tend to read then pass on. I will give it to the library, or to the book exchange at the trailer park where I live. Fiction doesn't really sell for much online unless you really know what you're doing, and I don't. I only keep something that I adore.

I would like to start building the library again, but only selectively keeping the fiction books I read. I'll keep building the religion library certainly, and the graphic novels.

All this said, I've regrettably gotten rid of a lot of books I wish I still had, due to many moves. I don't plan to move again (of course, do we ever?, but really this time!), so I feel better about going for the library building.

All THAT said, my library is nowhere near the size of the one described in the original post here!

I also see the wisdom in your approach with the large "series" you speak of. In fact, I think that would be a very nice way to do it.

When I sell books, I only use Half.com. It's easier, you set the price, and leave it there. When it sells, you're notified. Half does keep a commission, and they tell you how much you will charge for shipping (they keep a commission on that too, for some reason), so keep that in mind when pricing things. They tell you how much the average sell price is, and what the last sell price was. It's an easy-to-use system. Another service I've purchased from but haven't sold on is Abebooks.com. You get to set your shipping price there, but I don't know how the commissions work.

Andrew wrote: "When I sell books, I only use Half.com. It's easier, you set the price, and leave it there. When it sells, you're notified. Half does keep a commission, and they tell you how much you will charge f..."

My experience with Half.com was good too Andrew, aside from the slight nuisance of all the post office trips. Glad to hear it's still around! Thanks for the tip on Abebooks.com too!

Speaking of websites, I assume you all know about Bookfinder, a meta-search engine which includes Amazons, Abebooks, B&N, Half.com and other stores. The link to their advanced search is

http://www.bookfinder.com/?mode=advan...

for $US

Very helpful Kernos, thanks!

I like to check for things like a 1st UK edition of The Hobbit, signed - just so I can dream ;-)

I stack my books up, usually randomly, or put them into the shelves under my bed. They aren't in order, but I have catalogued them.

I donated books I don't read anymore to the local clubhouse small library. They take some of the gen manga I have.