Making the Internet My Accountability Partner

There are many running themes in this blog. One is that I love books. The other is that I am striving for peace in my life through minimal clutter. Naturally, these two will clash at times. A little over a year ago, I wrote about my book ownership numbers and mentioned that about half of my books are kept at my mom’s house in Maryland. Over various trips back, I have attempted to let go of things that I am objectively not using; some of those attempts have been documented on this blog. This post is the final reckoning.

I have about 100 books that I am sorting through because none of them are staying in Maryland, but not all are being added to my bookshelf in Massachusetts. I think going through each book will make this post entirely too long, so I will try to keep things grouped for convenience. The vast majority of books will be donated/sold to the Used Book Superstore. Of these unhauled books, I’ll break them down by theme/genre to see what I can learn about myself and my history with reading. A much smaller portion of books will be kept; I suspect that they will all be unread books that I’m still very interested in.

To dive into the books I’m donating, I’m going to start with the classics. Most are either unread or partially read. I went through a phase where I was really into reading classic literature, but I’m no longer dying to read War and Peace. I will likely come around at some point to wanting to read some of these stories again, but I’d much rather borrow from the library than have these stories stare at me from the shelves for another few years just because I think they’re pretty. Even the books I’ve read and liked, namely the two Gabriel Garcia Marquez books I own, I’m parting with because I will not re-read them, and I’d prefer they go to someone who will cherish them. The classics section will also get an honorable mention for Harper Lee’s Go Set a Watchman. I adored the storytelling of To Kill A Mockingbird and bought her second book the day it came out. However, I never even fished it because I just didn’t fall in love with it the way I wanted to.

Some of the read books I’m parting with fall into a category I’m realizing I should just never buy. I’m calling it the fun fact non-fiction genre. Even when I have a good time and feel like I’ve learned something from these books, I am never going to reference them when Google is right there. Similarly, I went through a phase where I was convinced I’d find old textbooks to be fascinating reads. I have never read even one of them.

Come to think of it, collecting old textbooks was during a phase where I thought anything old would be interesting. I had a whole shelf of old history books, old poetry books, and more that were all published pre-1960. I did read some of the poems, but I never finished a whole book. I had a set of four books titled “Great Debates in American History.” I absolutely devoured the first one I read, but the subject matter and time period changed for each book; I just was not as interested in the second book I picked up.

Out of the hundred or so books that were in Maryland, I am keeping 3. Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys was a gift from my aunt back in middle school. I have always wanted to read it, but for some reason, something else always jumped to the front of the line. I’m really excited to get to prioritize this book. I’m still deeply curious about The Apparitionists by Peter Manseau; it combines so much of what I love: paranormal beliefs, schemes, and historical turning points. The last book I’m keeping I suspect, was once my brother’s, but he doesn’t read much, so when he decided he wanted to get rid of it, I snapped it up. It’s called Ghosts in the Fog by Samantha Seiple. I suspect it’s more of a middle-grade historical read, but the premise is intriguing, so hopefully I enjoy it.