This summer a friend of mine who is always reading financial advice books was obsessed with her Latte Factor. Knowing that I want to buy a house next year, she kept telling me that I needed to cut back on mine. While I don’t have an addiction to overpriced beverages, I am rather addicted to the printed word. So I decided that I was going to drastically reduce the number of books I bought.
I started off well. Weeks went by and I didn’t set foot in a bookstore. When I actually did visit a bookstore I would make a list in advance of what I was going to purchase, and I would not deviate from that list no matter what I saw sitting on the shelves. I was strong. I was determined. I was going to eradicate my Latte Factor.
I have a confession to make. Last week I fell off the wagon. Hard.
I won’t tell you all the gory details (I’ll leave those for my next Bookaholics Anonymous meeting), but let’s just say it involved a special promotion for educators/librarians and visits to multiple bookstores over a three day period. I was on a book bender, and no Latte Factor was going to stop me.
When I returned home with my newly acquired booty I felt no remorse. I had books! Lots of books! Shiny, new books! And like a proud new mom I couldn’t help but brag about them to everyone, including my Latte Factor friend. While my friend was happy for me, she couldn’t help but ask “Why did you buy those books? Couldn’t you get them books from the library?”
I get this question a lot. Friends, coworkers, even my mother seem confused by why I would rather buy books instead of check them out for free from the library. After all, I’m a librarian. I work there, so it’s not like it’s an extra trip. Plus I do a good portion of the fiction ordering, so most of the titles I want to buy at the bookstore are already in my library’s collection.
After giving this serious thought, I have three theories as to why I buy rather than borrow books:
THEORY #1: Books are a vice and buying them is an addiction/sickness much like alcoholism. Biblioholism is defined as the “habitual longing to purchase, read, store, admire, and consume books in excess” and those suffering from it should seek immediate medical intervention.
THEORY #2: I’m a bibliophile, a collector of books. Whatever I buy is just an addition to my hoard, I mean collection.
THEORY #3: While I may get a rush from purchasing a new book and while I do have a decent collection going, that’s not the real reason I buy books. For me it’s all about ownership. I like seeing the books on my shelves. I like knowing I can reread a book whenever I want because it is waiting for me on my shelf. When I talk about a particular book or author, I like being able to say to the person, “Here. Borrow my copy and let me know what you think.”
So the next time I am asked why I buy books, I’m going with Theory #3 as my excuse. Why do you buy books?
No related posts.
Kelly I had to laugh when I read your theories because I’ve thought all of those at one time or another. I recently shared that I buy books because what if I want to re-read something and it’s NOT at my library or a bookstore?
My most recent theory is that I’m buying and keeping books so that when I retire and can’t drive and afford to purchase books I’ll have my own personal library to read!
Hi. My name is Gwyneth and I’m a biblioholic! Thanks so much for the great post, Kelly. I identified so much it’s not even funny. I really don’t know what I’d do if I couldn’t buy books. Like you, I need my own copy. Borrowing from the library just won’t do. I need them there for me to reach out and touch and read and re-read at will. It is an addiction, one I don’t want to get rid of! Thanks for the great post!
And, Rosie, I love the theory of building my own personal library for when I retire and can no longer get around. Although, I hope that won’t stop me from adding more books to my collection…:wink:
Gwyneth
Oooh, I like Rosie’s theory, too. I wonder if I can convince my husband that’s the purpose of the Amazon packages that arrive almost daily!
I buy books because I can.
Retail therapy that is educational.
It could be worse, I could buy shoes. Or handbags. Or a thousand other things.
No, I buy books.
And when I have finished with them, I donate them to my very little local library, so someone else can enjoy them.
But I like having them for as long as I need them…without worrying about fines.
I will go without buying shoes, clothes, expensive coffee, but books and being surrounded by books is essential to my well being.
It is helpful that my dh is also a bibliophile…
ROFL.
I buy books because even though I’ve an excellent library system here, I tend to read all the odd stuff, or so people say.
When you get the urge at 11 pm to read your favorite book in the tub, the library isn’t going to be very helpful
(besides, dropping library books in the tub is highly frowned upon by the librarians 
)
Then there’s the extremely annoying wait when you want to read said book NOW, and somebody else has the library’s only copy checked out. Used to be I’d just go to Borders and read it there, but with a toddler in tow, that just doesn’t happen any more. (that’s also why the tub time is now at 11pm)
But we too want to upgrade houses, so that Amazon habit is going to have to be reigned in pretty soon. Wah.
I am a total book addict. I bought two yesterday. And three two days before that, and six all at once last Friday . . . you get the picture.
An author I’ve never read that people I trust are buzzing about? Gotta have it. Interesting research book on a topic I’m trying to learn more about? Gotta have it. A costume book dealing with Georgian/Hanoverian clothing? Soooooooooooo gotta have it.
And I have no shame about my addiction. No remorse. I’m making up for all those cretins who don’t read at all.
Yikes, I’m the same. Buying books is like “comfort” to me. Rather than impulsively buying clothes or shoes or food, I buy books. New books, used books, fiction books, non-fiction books. I buy on line, from major outlets and independents. My husband (just like my dad) is perplexed by my compulsion. That’s why I love sites like this, where I can come to feel “normal” and socialize with other shameless addicts.
I have been all three at one time or another. I told myself that the reason that I bought books instead of buying them from the library is because something always happened to them. (example) One of my labs would pull books off of my bookshelf and rip cover and pages out of them when she was mad. 2nd lab was like a bull in a china shop and was forever knocking hardbacks off coffee table, end table, couch and breaking the spines. Actually I think I a addicted to books. I love old ones and new ones and love to look at them on my shelves. I am hopeless and love it.
See, libraries are wonderful places but they do want you to give the books back. lol So, I have to buy books – or else all those poor bookshelf manufacturors would go out of business.
I’m theory #3 as well. And I like to have them at my disposal when I’m writing. Sometimes I think “I really liked that witty scene in Jennifer Crusie’s Bet Me.” So I’ll reread it trying to get in the flow of witty banter or something. And books are pretty and lots of books make me feel special
I’m too much of an immediate gratification woman to wait patiently for a book that I want to read to be available from my local library. What, the new Nora Roberts/Robert B. Parker/Jenny Crusie book is out but there are 320 people ahead of me on the waiting list? No way. Must. Have. Now.
I’m also a repeat reader. Some nights an instantaneous craving strikes and I absolutely must reread a favorite book, or several books in my collection by a favorite author.
All those reasons
plus
My friends will read a book and they’ll all be talking about it and I can’t NOT read that book. I’ll feel left out.
I hate feeling left out.
Plus I just love seeing them on the bookshelf.
I have a ‘mine mine mine’ issue, I think
Boy, you have my number! I, too, am a biblioholic. I just like books. And I don’t have even a fraction of the time necessary to read them all. But their mine, all mine. Great post, Kelly!
Wow! You guys are giving me even more excuses to use. Keep them coming!
I buy because my library doesn’t catalogue soft cover romances by title or author. I can’t order up a specific romance.
I also buy because its a treat.
Yes, I believe in saving money on unimportant things (my blog touches on that concept). Books, however, are not an unimportant thing to me (neither is travel or good chocolate or…).
Save where it doesn’t matter. Spend where it does.
#3 sounds good to me! I’ll use that as my excuse.
When my bookshelves were overflowing (double stacked front and back, then on the top) I donated a bunch of books (a couple hundred) to my mom’s library and Katrina libraries. I had bare shelves. I was so excited.
I am now back to double stacked shelves, and since I have a lot of hardcovers I don’t want to get rid of them. So I’ve decided I need more bookshelves. Unfortunately, we don’t have the room for more bookshelves, so we’re moving late next year (that’s not the only reason we’re moving, but it’s a good reason!)
I like books. So sue me
Books are how I used to spend my disposable income. My friends were buying HiDef TVs and X-Box 360 and a car. I bought books. I’ve been cured recently by going back to school and having no disposable income.
I think for me books represent dreams of who I could be. I used to buy a lot of non-fiction. I’d buy a book on physics and think of myself as an amateur physicist. I’d buy one about making soap and pretend I was actually going to make my own soap. I’d buy books on Thai food and Japanese food and French food. I’d buy books on how to speak Sanskrit and Norwegian and Mongolian. Every once in a while, I would actually act on my books. I’d bought a book about training to run a marathon, and lo and behold about half a year later there I was crossing the finish line of the Country Music Marathon.
With a personal collection of books then, all those dreams of who I might be were always there waiting for me whenever I was ready. If it was finally time to learn how to make a red curry, the book was there. Books represented my potential.
Of course, then I moved from a house into a one bedroom apartment and took around 20-25 boxes to the local library to donate since I had no space anymore. C’est la vie.
** Lynette stands:
“I confess. I’m also a bookaholic!”
I spend valuable clothes shopping hours, popping into Waterstones and WHSmiths. I have two, maybe three books on the go at the same time, and I find it hard to get through the day without taking a peek at the latest celebrity biography [currently reading Sharon Osbourne's!] or the latest romantic fiction by my favourite author.
I also confess to loving second hand book shops. So as well as enjoying the feel of a brand new virgin book in my hands, I also love the feel and smell of an old book and the wonderment of who might have read the 1960’s Penguin copy I have of ‘Girl With Green Eyes’ by Edna O’Brien.
I haven’t tried to seek any help for my addiction as yet, but at least I am admitting it:
“My name is Lynette Rees and I’m a bookaholic!”
As well as all of the above reasons, I buy books because I hope and intend one day to make a living from other people buying mine! If I didn’t buy them, it would be like a cosmetics company owner not wearing lipstick, or a restaurant owner refusing to buy food. Morally, ethically, sensibly, we must contribute to the ecomony we hope to benefit from.
Also, just as a reader, I buy so that people can continue to write. If we don’t support the little local shop, we can’t complain when it shuts. If we don’t buy what we like, we can’t complain when people stop publishing it. I will never meet most of my favourite authors. I will never write to their publishers. The only way any of them can know that I like their work and want to see more of it is if I buy it!
So buy! It’s a moral imperative!
Here endeth the lesson…
Sniff. I’m a bibliofile. And, yes, I do binge-buy. I have several hundred dollars worth of books in my Amazon cart at any given time. Books-A-Million is a mile from my house. I stop there after a trip to Panera (it’s across the parking lot) and see what they have. Sometimes I have an agenda. Most times, it’s a bonanza of impulse buying.
My TBR pile? I’m not sure I can get through it in this lifetime, so I’ll be checking into reincarnation and the multiple lives of cats. Oh, wait! I don’t have any books about those subjects, let me at that to my list.
I buy books simply because I love to read. Reading is my addiction. Since I was a kid, I enjoyed the pleasure of sitting with a book. When I ran out of books, I’d read encyclopedias.
Reading is a way of learning but it’s also a way of relaxing.
I say that it’s because I like to read books in my own time – getting them from the library forces me to read them on their timeline rather than my own.
Really though, I think I just like to run my hand possesively over the covers and gloat.
Ummmm… all three?
I also work in a library and take part in ordering, but would rather buy books. I like to just be able to browse around a bookstore and I would just rather not have the pressure of a due date. Plus at least I know there’s a good chance books I buy brand spanking new won’t be stained with God knows what or have dead bugs in it. I have tons of books I haven’t read yet, but would have more if I lived in a town with a bookstore. It’s probably a good thing I can’t just go to one anytime. I don’t make much, but being single and childless gives me a little extra disposable income to feed my obsession.
Hi, My name is Beth and i’m a bookaholic. I too work in a library and write up orders for fiction. I tend to buy the paperbacks that I know the head librarian won’t get.
Enuff said. LOL
My blog title used to be Bookaholic and bibliophile but i recently changed it to Bookaholics anonymous.
**RTB staff — you can remove “bookaholic and Bibliophile” off the Reader Blogs list. I added the Bookaholic Anonymous on there a month or so ago***