The Confessions of a Serial Book Buyer: The Sequel

Will she conquer her biggest adversary this time? Probably not.

As it appears, I have been unable to cure my addiction to the purchasing of books. Foolishly, I believed that leaning into using my Kindle would lessen my desire to buy pretty books, or at the least introduce a new way of managing it. I could not have been more wrong.

While creating my new site, I had a look over my previous posts, and one that caught my eye was The Confessions of a Serial Book Buyer. I discussed how books (especially pretty ones) always have and always will own my heart, but that the constant need to buy them despite already having so many to read, was an unhelpful—and expensive—habit. My primary issue with this before was the money I spent and the space I was losing by buying books so often. And I thought that relying more on eBooks, which don’t have as much of the physical allure factor that print books do, would lead to a healthier relationship between my book-buying hobby and my book-reading hobby.

Unfortunately, the Kindle has exacerbated my issue with buying far more books than I’ll be able to read rather than helped it. With constant deals and no immediate impact of how many books I’ve purchased, it’s a lot easier to forget how many I’ve amassed and not read over the two years I’ve been actively using it again – which at my last check, happens to be over 60. I don’t know whether to be embarrassed or impressed, but clearly, nothing can quell my urge to own more books than I could ever read.

But you may be wondering, why is this book-buying thing a problem to you, especially if you’re able to allow it to persist? Occasionally, it’s a financial issue: why buy books when they are not a necessity? But for me, this is not the case. A lot of books I get are either gifts or so discounted that they’re barely noticeable when I only buy a couple a month, but they do add up.

My ever-increasing problem is that the mere existence of so many books in my presence often leads to a reading slump. With so much to choose from, I’m torn between what I want to read and what I feel I must read, and my inability to decide usually results in no choice being made. I read less because of my indecisiveness, because of my worry that inanimate objects might feel slighted if I pick one that’s been in my possession for days over another that has collected dust for years.

How strange that I’m directed by phantom guilt to choose between reading nothing or slogging through a book I did not want to read. On the flip side, if I ignore the guilt and pick up a book I’ve been dying to get to, I might just finish it in a couple of days and then find myself upset that it’s over and unable to enjoy anything new.

To harmonise my book-buying with my reading (once again, these are two separate hobbies), I think I need a new approach. This month, if I ever finish the book I’m currently reading, I’ve already chosen what I’ll read next in the hopes that having some direction will help me out. If that fails, I’ve made a TBR jar (which I might talk about in a future post) to allow my choice of book to remain somewhat random but also trick my brain into thinking it’s a fixed idea by seeing it written down. In this jar are colourful pieces of paper with the titles of every book in my possession. You might argue that the time it took to create this jar would have been better spent reading… and you would be right, but it also looks cute, and I enjoyed putting it together.

Truthfully, I could just enforce a book-buying ban on myself to relieve the pressure of adding new books to my TBR and be on my way. But that would be too easy and would not warrant an entire blog post. Instead, I’ll constantly remind myself of the things I already have to read because of my pitiful addiction to buying books in the hopes it will force me to read them.

If you have any suggestions on how to avoid being made to feel guilty by your TBR, I would greatly appreciate them, because they might just change my life. Thanks for reading!