DH's books in our small flat

[wiredandtired]

Me and DH have a large collection of books between us - I wouldn't be surprised if we own 500+ books if we counted them. We are both quite attached to certain books we've read.

Only problem is, we live in a small flat and we now have a toddler.

The books are on shelves all around our living room. I've wittled down quite a lot of mine, I probably have about 50 of my books left on the shelves, the rest have gone to charity or storage.

Problem is that DH is being really stubborn - saying he likes having them there, he wants our son to grow up around books etc - which I do get and agree with - but I think when he's 1 year old they are just basically decoration and taking up loads of storage space in our living room that could be for toys!

AIBU to ask him to put the majority in storage (we already have a storage unit and space under the bed!)? How would you compromise?

I do think he's a bit neurodivergent and also doesn't like the thought of making changes to the space.. but we are going to have to!

That's during adolescence. So they can be packed up for eight years and put in storage. Some of the research says 80, good books is enough to get the same results. It's more important that one person in the home doesn't see himself as lord and master and other family members get to use and enjoy their space.

in a small flat, @MeowDoku, it sounds as though the OP has already employed all of your creative skills, and more.

I don’t see the point in hoarding books, once they’ve been read they just become clutter.
If he must keep hold of them put them in storage (and after being in storage for 12 months he’ll probably realise he hasn’t missed them!)

This - in our first small one-bedroom flat where my daughter was born we had well over 500 books. It’s the one thing I don’t cull mercilessly. Toys come and go and as others have said a few at a time works best.

Is Maria Kondos life-changing magic of tidying one of those books? If not get him to read it. I ditched most of mine when I realised that they didn't actually bring me joy but were rather me trying to project and image of being well educated.

Those who are aghast at the idea of getting rid of books… do you even keep ones you didn’t actively enjoy? I’m genuinely curious! I have quite a few books I wouldn’t part with but unless I found a book meaningful I wouldn’t particularly care to hang on to it

I have over 500 cookery books alone. I also have all of my foreign language dictionaries, reference books and novels. DH is similar. I do cull novels regularly and get rid of books that I won’t read again. Shelving helps. We have Vitsoe and Ladderax, which absorb a huge number of books.

The child can do without toys so the uncompromising DH can fill the flat with his books?

I love reading but he's being selfish. Put them in storage for a few years.

Bookshelves are for books! Books make lovely ornaments too and are much more aesthetically pleasing than shelves crammed with toys.

I have had to be stricter with mine as accumulated so many (I keep classics, reference books and books I might read again but pass on/charity bin the others ... admit I have a lot of books I haven't read yet!) But that's only because I ran out of shelf space.

I like the idea that kids should grow up around books. When I was a child we were friends with a pair of brothers and there wasn't a single book in their house. It seemed so weird and sterile.

This is an odd response.
Most books don't smell - I have just a few older ones which give a faint, rather lovely smell when you open them.
I like to read on paper as does OP's partner clearly.
I've kept some books for 50 years - not because I think I will necessarily read them again, but because I like the memories and the sense of well-being they bring.

To answer OP's question, I didn't store toys on wall shelves anyway, they were in blanket boxes. Maybe have one in DC's bedroom and one downstairs and rotate the toys in them. That should be plenty enough toys.

Same here. I find the attitude that books should be kept forever weird.

No. Anything not enjoyed goes because they don’t have good memories.

Do you use the cookery books? I just go on the internet for recipes nowadays. Charity shops can't sell them either.

Have you got any evidence whatsoever that he is neurodivergent? I love books and have hundreds around the house. That doesnt make me neurodivergent. You can love books, it is allowed. It does royally piss me off when every single perceived character flaw is put down to autism, ADHD all undiagnosed by a specialist. Absurd.

Do you love books to the extent you have to keep regardless of whether you are going to read them again? What is the point? They just clutter up the place.

Me and dh have this discussion.
He says we have too many books.
I say we have too few bookshelves.

I am right.

I was amused a couple of years ago when there was a book sale being advertised that was saying it was amazing because they had 3k books.
We have upwards of 5k. They vary between picture books that the dc loved so I have kept through to dh's Phd books. Every now and then I do do a sort out and remove some, but most will stay. I've even told the dc which ones need to be sorted carefully and homes found when I die.
My books are a part of me and I love them. dh doesn't really mind too much because I've told him his 1980s chess books are the first to go

I love the smell of old books. The smell of a bookshop, whether new or secondhand, is heavenly to me.

That's your viewpoint. You don't have to be neurodivergent to hold the opposite viewpoint.

"My books are a part of me and I love them. "

This ❤️

This. Couldn’t be with anyone who regarded books as clutter.

Glad you said this; 500 books is really not a lot, in terms of wall space.
In a small room, OP could consider running a long shelf right up near the ceiling (about a paperback’s height from it) right around the room, even on all four walls.
It lifts hundreds of volumes up and away/or considerably extends shelving for a compulsive book buyer
It’d retain the books where they are enjoyed (and release space she wants in order to cram it with ghastly toys!)
Seriously though, this really works very well: I did it myself to add space for a very much larger collection which I, like this DH here in the small flat, like to have around me in the living room.

Of course not. I haven't said anything about anyone being neurodivergent.

I am afraid I am also team you can never have too many books and they are the best kind of decoration.

You don’t always know what you’re going to want to reread in future, I have found myself going back more and more to books I loved when I was young - it’s like time travelling back to an older version of yourself, and seeing the ways you feel the same.

I wonder if there’s a compromise between into storage and out on shelves… Maybe storage trunks that can double as useful surfaces in the flat? I do think it’d also be fair enough to discourage buying too many new books, and move to kindle instead, until you have more space.

They are clutter as much as anything is if there are too many and there is no intention to read them. They take up space and gather dust.

Why though? No one in my family (including my husband) is going to get up on a stool to get an old book off a shelf above the door.

We don't read them, they just sit there.

I'm not talking about the sentimental ones - obviously we keep those - I'm talking about ones that no one is attached to.

They're just ornaments. Honestly, it almost feels like virtue signalling in a way and it's not how I want to decorate the living room.

I am one of the biggest book lovers I know and I am very attached to my books... but I really don't see the point in keeping ones that you're not sentimentally attached to and will never read again, just taking up space in a room, when they're no longer functional at all in our lives.

I also do understand that it's nice to be surrounded by books - I'd love to have a big house with a whole library full of books AND room for my son to live and grow - but the fact is we have one small living room which is busting at the seams.