Monday, January 26, 2015

Book Hoarding and Priorities

A slew of library requests showed up for me the other day, just in time for the giant snowstorm that's supposed to hit tonight. Not clear yet whether I'll have any time off my planned schedule, but in the meantime...I sped through Hungry yesterday, am most of the way through Leaving Before the Rains Come, and have Jantsen's Gift and A Tale of Two Centuries waiting.

To be honest, the one I expect the most out of is Leaving Before the Rains Come—I absolutely loved Fuller's first book, Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight, although I have not (yet) managed to make my way round to any of her others. I'm reading it before the others because it's due back at the library soonest...puts me in a hurry, but also makes me that much more likely to read it pronto!

It's odd—I do the same sort of thing with books I own. If I own it, urgency diminishes sharply; why read it now, when there are so many books at the library that I won't have access to forever? I suspect that if I didn't have ready library access (and really, the nearby libraries are truly excellent), I'd end up with fewer books: I'd read them, and then I'd get rid of the ones I didn't love. As it is, I can scan my shelves and think, Well, if I just read that one, I could get rid of it... except then I also think, Yes, but library books!

I'll make my way through the pile eventually. (Hopefully before I move again, so that I need to drag fewer books with me...) And then...I suppose I'll very, very quickly acquire another pile, and do the exact same thing with that.

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