Patricia Stoltey

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More About My Addiction to Books

July 11, 2011 By: Patricia

My husband looked around the living room Sunday morning and said, “It looks like you’ve once again accumulated more books than you have room for in the bookcases.”

What? Just because I have books stacked on top of the bookcases and on the coffee table? Just because I brought home five more books last week from the sale at one of the local bookstores? Just because I picked up five additional books at the library on Friday and received another e-mail notice Saturday to pick up a book on hold? Just because I’ve loaded 15 novels onto my Kindle?

You’d think after being married to me more than 25 years, he’d understand my addiction. I need books, lots of books. That will never change.

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Comments

  1. C.C. Harrison says

    July 16, 2011 at 9:13 pm

    My daughter threatens to send me to BA – Books Anonymous!!

  2. Grammy says

    July 12, 2011 at 5:17 pm

    Hi Patricia, I have a Sony E-reader, but still go to the library and check out four books a week and read them voraciously. No wonder I don’t get much housework done. Ha ha. I’m addicted to reading, too.
    Ruby

  3. Diane Marie Shaw says

    July 12, 2011 at 12:46 pm

    Patricia, I am so glad my husband and I share the same addiction. We keep adding book shelves to our home. We picked up three more at a garage sale recently. We catalogue our books and we each have over 2,000, that’s over 4,000 between us. Many are in boxes, but we know which box they are in. We could open our own bookstore.

  4. djskrimiblog says

    July 12, 2011 at 11:51 am

    I can see how privileged I am. No matter how many cheap crime novels I bring home, my husband always admits he spends more money on his volumes of theology & philosophy πŸ˜€

    So I´ve had to pull MYSELF together without the help of anyone else, and I mainly did it because it is so hard for me to decide which book to read if I have too many on the shelf.

    Dorte H.

  5. irishoma says

    July 11, 2011 at 11:39 pm

    What a wonderful addiction–I share it with you.

  6. Patricia Stoltey says

    July 11, 2011 at 10:44 pm

    Hi Cat — A house of books. That would be heavenly.

  7. catwoods says

    July 11, 2011 at 7:49 pm

    I’m a book addict, as well. My dear hubby likes bigger things that take up stalls in the garage!

    LOL, yet it’s my books he notices more than his toys as being space hogs. Go figure.

    Look at it this way, if he kicks you out after your 25 years of bliss, you’ll have enough books to build yourself a house. Then you really would live in the stacks!

  8. Patricia Stoltey says

    July 11, 2011 at 1:04 pm

    I’d thought of just buying more bookcases…

  9. L. Diane Wolfe says

    July 11, 2011 at 12:27 pm

    We thinned out our library recently and still have eight bookshelves full of books.

  10. Patricia Stoltey says

    July 11, 2011 at 11:22 am

    Talli — I’m loving mine more and more. The Kindle makes book additions almost guilt-free, especially since I’ve been downloading a lot of the free mysteries when they show up in the daily Omnimystery newsletter.

  11. Talli Roland says

    July 11, 2011 at 11:15 am

    I’m with you! It’s actually way out of control now – books are peeping out from beneath every surface. That’s why I now really love my Kindle.

  12. Patricia Stoltey says

    July 11, 2011 at 10:38 am

    Eric, that’s an incredible horror story. To work that hard and long on those shelves and then have the whole thing gone in a day–I would have cried for days. I guess you do need to get creative about your book stash. Hiding them around the digs like Easter eggs creates a wonderful picture in my mind, and I wonder if that would work for my overflow…if I put a couple of books under the garbage can, maybe a few in my dresser drawers, hubby would never notice them. πŸ™‚

    Marlena, I always feel better when I post about my book problem because I find so many others who share this affliction. Maybe there should be support group for us: BBA — Book Buyers Anonymous.

  13. Marlena Cassidy says

    July 11, 2011 at 10:25 am

    Floor to ceiling bookshelves in every room. That will solve the problem.

    I’m the same way. When I had my apartment in college, I had a tiny bookcase that was double stacked with books plus about five piles of books next to it with more books crammed underneath the coffee table. I just recently went on a rampage to find my BN gift card so I could buy some used books. It was not pretty.

  14. Eric W. Trant says

    July 11, 2011 at 9:52 am

    There are far worse addictions!

    I have no bookshelves in my current home. In my first home, I blocked off an entire wall and built a library-sized bookshelf, built-in with trim and all, and Lord was it beautiful. Took me 7 months of weekends to get it done, built it with nothing but a hand saw and cordless drill.

    My ex-wife this past spring ripped it all out and put in a 70″ television.

    I still have boxes of books in her attic. She’s kind enough not to throw them away, but I have no place to put them either, and her attic is a walk-in, mine is the stair-type.

    I have my own “stacks” in the closet, on the top shelf, and next to the bed on the dresser. Mostly I hide it by planting books like Easter eggs all over the house and inside the cars wedged between the seat and console.

    – Eric

  15. Patricia Stoltey says

    July 11, 2011 at 9:35 am

    Jemi and Alex, I don’t think the Kindle is helping me. I still buy hardcovers and paperbacks.

    Hilary — and I have a lot of varied interests, so my fiction is all genres and my nonfiction everything from politics to the teachings of the Dalai Lama.

    Beth — I forced myself to give away some of my signed copies in my blog giveaways a few months ago. It wasn’t easy.

  16. Patricia Stoltey says

    July 11, 2011 at 9:25 am

    Yvonne — it’s funny that he notices my piles of books but doesn’t see that the trash container is overflowing. πŸ™‚

    Hart — a house with a library is a wonderful dream. I’d love to live in the stacks.

    Karen and Ann — my husband’s addiction is wires. They’re not only attached to his electronic toys, but he has boxes of wires in the closet, just in case.

    Jan — you are lucky! I do box up books and get rid of them once in a while, but just like magic, the space fills up again.

  17. Beth Groundwater says

    July 11, 2011 at 9:04 am

    I never thought I’d resort to this, but I’ve begun double-stacking books on my shelves, where they’re two-deep. I’ve given away a lot of books to my local library, but I can’t give away the signed ones, or the hardcovers, or …

  18. Hilary Melton-Butcher says

    July 11, 2011 at 8:42 am

    Hi Patricia .. books everywhere .. well it shows an interested person .. so often people have come into my home and said – so many pictures, so many books – but I love them both .. and can’t see me stopping buying ..

    As Alex says .. it could be worse .. cheers and enjoy your reading! Hilary

  19. Ann Best says

    July 11, 2011 at 8:33 am

    It’s great now to be able to “load up” on the Kindle. But still, those wonderful printed books….And yes, after 25 years he should definitely understand–I think so anyway. (I notice that you kindly didn’t say what HIS addiction is!)
    Ann Best, Memoir Author

  20. Alex J. Cavanaugh says

    July 11, 2011 at 7:59 am

    There’s worse addictions! Glad I have my iPad now. Those books don’t take up a lot of room.

  21. Jemi Fraser says

    July 11, 2011 at 7:58 am

    I think my family bought me the Kindle last year so we could have fewer piles of books too! πŸ™‚

  22. Jan Morrison says

    July 11, 2011 at 7:58 am

    I’m so lucky. My guy has the same addiction – every once in awhile we have a big shuffle of piles either to a bookcase or to a box in the back of the car to take to the booksellers. I grew up in a home where, if you had a book in your hand, you were free of chores. This continues into my late adulthood. yay.
    Jan Morrison

  23. Karen Walker says

    July 11, 2011 at 7:18 am

    My hubby has stopped commenting on my book addiction, which is good because if he didn’t I’d have to comment on his train addiction.
    Karen

  24. Hart Johnson says

    July 11, 2011 at 7:05 am

    teehee–I share your addiction, I think… and hubby has the nerve to call them STACKS! Can you believe that? I keep thinking someday I’ll be rich and buy a house that has a library. I don’t have many super-luxeries I want, but a designated library is one of them.

  25. welcome to my world of poetry says

    July 11, 2011 at 6:37 am

    Perhaps your husband hasn’t noticed before now your collection og books…..lol. At least you have something on hand to read should the mood take you.

    Have a lovely day,
    Yvonne,

Meet Patricia

I read, I write, I blog, and sometimes I do the laundry and cook. My 2014 novel, Dead Wrong, was a finalist in the thriller category of the 2015 Colorado Book Awards. Wishing Caswell Dead (Five Star/Cengage, December 20, 2017) is a historical mystery set in 1830s Illinois in the fictitious Village of Sangamon. The novel was a finalist for the 2018 Colorado Book Awards for General Fiction. Read More…

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