to give all my books to the charity shop?

[Boomba]

I'm fed up with all my clutter. I'm not really a hoarder, but very short on time and want to streamline so I can keep clean and tidy.

Ove got loads of books. In the sitting room 2 bookcases stacked 4 deep on each shelf.

I don't have time for reading anyway ant more. I've got a kindle

I feel strangely attached though. And a bit sad, that I don't have time for reading

Do you keep your books??

MsAverage thank you so much for the green time/brown time phrases.
I always had that distinction in my head between time spent active( get things done) or passive ( stuck in the mud) but never could quite coin a term. this is Mumsnet at it's best for me!

thank you so much and if you don't mind Ill spread the word!

What is this "getting rid of books" of which people are speaking?

I have a Kindle for when travelling-but I prefer books, I think.

I put my faves on the kindle plus a couple of hundred more that I fancied.

I'm wondering if I'll ever get them all read!

No time to read-thought everyone read for half an hour or so when they first got into bed.

Diddl, at the moment I take the laptop to bed and finish off my work for the day. When I'm less busy at work I either read or crochet and watch a box set. I'm making a blanket for DC2 and it needs to be finished before they arrive in August. I sadly can't crochet and read at the same time!

I re read all mine too- they are a barometer of how I feel at the time, or need cheering up, calming down. I re read cs Lewis as my dc are too young to read at the mo, and regale them with the magicians nephew in the car. They love it:)

I don't see reading as wasting time or passive. It's either mind expanding or recharging time for me. Nothing better than curling up with a good book. But then I live with a family of gamers, so we quite often companionably slope off into our different worlds for a few hours of an evening. And then come back together to discuss, rant etc. I do plenty of active things too (usually with a stand by book just in case!) but reading is my major hobby, and has been since I was quite small.

A lot of the books I am sentimental about from my teens and early twenties are in my bedroom the guestroom at my mother's house.

If I had a different sort of home, I would love wall to wall beautiful books, but I live in a 2-bed ex-council where space is at an absolute premium and excessive books really add clutter and dust. My dream would be a beautiful old Grade-listed building with a room entirely for reading but right now, that's not achievable. There are three book areas in the kids' room and two other book cases in the house but really any more and we wouldn't have space for things that we need on a daily basis.

Soulless? Pah. I have three Kindles, so lack of reading material is never an issue and the children are well aware they are books. It's just a shift to a different world I think.

I re-read Eve's Daughters every January. I need the hope and push it gives me in the beginning of a New Year when I tend to feel a bit low.

I could not get rid of it and just get it on a Kindle.

But I can't fault people if they get rid of some of their book - bought 3 books yesterday from a charity shop about cupcakes, macaroons and beading. thanks!

Get. Rid. Of. Books.

Does not compute.

Nope. I could build myself SN extension from the books we all own. Literally!!

I can't get my head round disposing of books even though I'm in the process of cursing how many we have whilst trying to pack to move house. I have removed a few shite ones -reluctantly- to the charity shop this week.
I have a kindle but it's supplemental not a replacement, it could never replace the beautiful books.

Most likely every edition of Catherine Cookson and Danielle Steele LaQ.

Most old books are not beautiful, the are dusty with yellow pages. Books are just a medium for a story. I understand that people can be attached to a 'story' but not to a scruffy old book.

My relationship with my books is emotional. My life is marked out in books and as such I have a (probably unhealthy) attachment to them.
My childhood was a very lonely isolated one and books were my window on the world I used to read with a dictionary on one side and a world map on the other. Books gave me an escape from the wretched loneliness of a bullied child and fired my imagination. I used to dream of going to the places in my books as a way of escape and as an adult I have been to many of the places I read and dreamed about as a child..
I look upon them as my friends. And as such I have always really struggled to get rid of them.
However I have come to the realisation that I am no longer a lonely child and have been slowly culling my collection, it takes ages because I consider each one individually and sometimes discovery long forgotten joys and have to re-read them. I feels great to see the piles of boxes getting smaller and I love each and every one of my edited collection on the shelves.

I have bookshelves in my loft for the books I don't have space downstairs for. My own personal library.

But by all means, drive to my local town, give them to the Charity shops, and then I can buy them...

Same as Cory way back when, I could never get rid of my books until at least DC old enough to leave home, I too have many happy memories of looking at book spines and wondering what stories were in there when younger, we had book cases everywhere so whilst eating my eye would fall on a title, or watching tv, etc.

I have pruned out those lighter novels, all except Sophie Kinsella whom I love.

not to a scruffy old book.

Oh no, I love dog eared pages and know that someone else read the book I abhore people who are anal about their book pages being turned....I love the look of a loved and lived in book.

Oh yes, I love holiday cottages with left behind books and I always edge over to people's bookshelves when at their house.

I was once at an all day party, needed a break from it all, escaped to the book room, got very engrossed in a room with a view as I hadn't read it for years, and was rather short with a man who came and interrupted me. He retired gracefully. Didn't realise it was Lenny Kravitz:) never saw him again to apologise either.

"I don't see reading as wasting time or passive."

Couldn't agree more. Doesn't mean I want to hang on to all of the books that I have read. They are two completely different issues.

I have a rather intense emotional relationship with my kindle. A whole library in my pocket, one that will never run out. I feel very reassured by that.

I used to get quite anxious about running out of books on holidays and journeys, pre-kindle.

I don't have a kindle but I have some books on my iPhone for when I have to wait for the dc.

I think I'd miss perusing my shelves, plus when the dc get older, we might fight over it.

Might be good for travel though. Hmmm...