When you realize you have too many books

I’m probably on safe ground here in thinking that many of you have a lot of books at home.

Some of you may keep them on bookshelves where they are easy to locate. Others (Ahem, like me) may also have them stored in a somewhat less organized manner. Scattered about, under the bed, etc.

I’m also pretty confident that many of you – like me – are almost constitutionally incapable of throwing books out. Even if most of them are somewhat aged, worn paperbacks, I’m still not one to throw them away. With the trash? Books? Not gonna happen.

But sometimes to you have to make room for more, if you follow me.

A recent Boston Globe article https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2017/02/16/leaves-anguish-one-family-quest-shows-challenges-finding-new-homes-for-old-books/AMzDRAwIiqDoDr01vG6CaP/story.html got me to thinking about all this. It analyzes how some families, after the death of a loved one, find themselves with a LOT of books. Where to put them?

It’s getting more difficult to find “good homes” for those books. These books may not be collectors’ items or first editions. And not all used bookstores can take them. They, too, can only handle so many.

My neighborhood library here in Boston holds a book sale/flea market each spring. Usually I can round up a bag of paperbacks for them. And a few hardcovers perhaps. Maybe someone buys a few for a buck a book? And the library gets the money. Good enough for me.

So what do some of you do when there are, pardon the expression, too many books?

Any other suggestions?

 
-- Joe Nowlan