While bored in the midst of the corona pandemic last year, I decided to publish a series of bookshelf tour posts. I combed through the two large bookcases and the one small one in my room to feature all the physical books I own and mention which ones I’ve read.
I had a lot of fun doing this; plus, it helped me to organize and catalog my books. I hope you all liked the posts too — it certainly seems as if you all did. But it was quite a feat. I began the tour in early May and published a post once each week until early November, which was surprising to me because I didn’t expect to complete the tour in 2020. I really thought it would extend to 2021. I was getting so overwhelmed by all my books!
But I completed it and then spent the time since November finishing up my cataloging, finalizing my decisions on what to unhaul, and actually unhauling the books, which is a difficult thing for me to do. I can easily let go of clothes but books (and shoes) are hard to part with.
Now that I’m done with all the prepping, I want to share my final stats with you all. In each bookshelf tour post, I included at the end the amount of bookshelves toured as well as how many books were mentioned, read, and will be unhauled. I’ll share those numbers below as well as the total number of books I have according to my Excel spreadsheet and the Book Collectorz app I also use to keep track of them.
Fair warning — these numbers are all skewed. I’m horrible at counting, it seems, so the total from my tour posts and my Excel file and my Book Collectorz app are all different 🤣. Really, it makes one wonder what’s the point of this post. And my answer is that I’m using it as an excuse to indulge in a bibliophile fancy — to chat about how many books I own. Obviously a future me will want to know.
Well, then. To the numbers!
I published 26 bookshelf tour posts. That’s a lot more than I expected when I started this thing. (I’ll list them all at the end.)
Final numbers from the tour posts
Total rows of bookshelves toured = 14
Total books shown on those shelves = 987
Total books shown that I read = 430
Total books shown that I planned to unhaul = 35
As I went along with my bookshelf tour posts, I used an Excel file to keep track of the books I mentioned because I realized that the collection I had in my Book Collectorz app was a bit off. I’d done an unhaul a year or so ago and didn’t accurately record which books I unhauled, so this exercise was intended to make my digital record of my collection as accurate as possible. Sadly, this did not happen.
Numbers from my Excel File (these are the number of books I own to date; they do not include the unhauled books numbers mentioned below)
Nonfiction = 187
Fiction = 570
Comics & Graphic Novels (physical) = 171
Comics & Graphic Novels (digital) = 36
Poems & Plays = 27
Picture Books (physical) = 39
Picture Books (digital) = 1
Others (coloring, hobby, coffee table books, etc.) = 11
E-books = 122
Audiobooks = 45
Total = 1,209
According to the Excel file, I own about 1,005 physical books, which means I gained about 18 new physical books since completing the bookshelf tour back in November. No wonder I ran out of space!
I had nowhere on my shelves to place books, so I gave in and unhauled many of the ones I considered getting rid of when doing the tour posts.
Total unhauled
E-books unhauled = 34
Physical books unhauled = 53
Yep, I got rid of e-books too. Many of them were free or were ARCs I read and won’t want to read again. Some of them I hadn’t read but since they were free, I didn’t feel bad about deleting them from my devices.
As for the physical books, I ended up getting rid of 18 more books than I intended when I did the bookshelf tour posts. The books were either free, bought for college classes years ago, or were bought on discount, which is a big deal for me because I don’t get rid of expensive books because it feels too much like losing out on money, lol. The books were either ones I know I won’t read or will not want to read again.
So my Excel file tells me that I own a total of 1,209 physical and digital books. My Book Collectorz app tells me the following:
Numbers from Book Collectorz app
Physical books = 829
E-books = 123
Audiobooks = 10
Comics & Graphic Novels = 203
Total books = 1,165
Total read = 442
These numbers are skewed, unfortunately. And since I confused myself AGAIN when recording which books I unhauled, I don’t even know if I removed all the books from the app that I ended up unhauling. Smh.
I believe my Excel file has the most accurate stats, but one of these days this year when I’m stuck home and am MAJORLY bored, I’ll have to go through my shelves and my e-reader one more time to get these numbers right. Hopefully, I’ll learn how to count better by then.
But despite the skewed numbers, I do have a pretty good idea of what physical books I own. I’ll know if something is missing.
My plan moving forward is to cut down even more on the amount of books I buy, so I’ve adopted a friend’s reward system.
Reward system for purchasing books
After reading 5 books from my physical TBR, I can purchase 1 new book.
After reading 6 comics (digital or physical), I can purchase 2 comics (digital or physical).
After reading 5 picture books, I can purchase 1 picture book.
After reading 1 book from my digital TBR, I can purchase 1 e-book.
If I do not like a book and know that I will NEVER reread it, I must unhaul it.
Exceptions: my birthday; books for buddy-reads (because I WILL read those); Discworld books
Well, this post was longer than expected too. If you read it all, thank you. I appreciate you. If you ever do a bookshelf tour, please let me know. I love those sorts of posts.
Zezee with Books 
I thought this project of yours was quite cool! And it even allowed you to update everything and, henceforth, keep everything updated! I giggled at the fact that you have ghost books. 😉 I don’t know if you’ll ever find out what they are but maybe by sorting them in alphabetical order and scrolling through all your databases might help find the culprits hahaha Thanks for sharing! 😀
LikeLike
Ah! Ghost books! I like that label for them. Thanks for the suggestion. Lol! I’m pretty sure I’ll get bored enough one day to reorganize the shelves and figure it out since there’s no where to go.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Congrats on all of this, I went through and did something similar all year last year. Even though I still have my TBR shelf cleanup posts going I’ve actually already did the unhauling (something to do while I was stuck at home last year). I don’t have the number off the top of my head but I unhauled over 100 books. It just had to be done, so I feel ya on this. 🙂
LikeLike
Thanks!
But wow! Congrats to you for unhauling that much, which is probably what I need to do too. It’s just so hard.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yeah, it’s why I had so many to begin with–never wanted to part with them. Then I was like ‘this is getting ridiculous’ and unhauled a bunch and now I think I have a TBR pile that I’m happy with and looking forward to. I still have a lot of regular fiction and romances to go through and unhaul but that’s a project for another day haha. 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
This is a fun post – I always enjoy reading about other people unhauling books, ha ha! I live vicariously through you, LOL. Great job, though! And I know what you mean about trying to accurately count your books – I always have trouble with that!
LikeLike
Glad you liked it! 🙂
I intend to get the count right this year. If not, then I’ll just have to accept that I’m REALLY bad with numbers.
LikeLiked by 1 person
After reading 5 books from my TBR, I could purchase 1! I love love love this, it will really help, I don’t know how but my TBR list keeps getting longer and longer and I keep purchasing more books, maybe for 2021 I should try something like this. I need to read more of the books that I excitedly purchased in the past and have not read as yet. Great post.
LikeLiked by 1 person
That was my dilemma too, Celly! Hopefully this plan works out for us both.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Yes. Fingers crossed 🙂
LikeLike
I’m impressed with the effort you put into this! I feel like my shelves (physical and digital) have become completely unmanagable. I double stack books, putting ones I’ve read behind the others, but I still don’t have enough shelf space so I have stacks of books in front of the shelves and on various little tables and in stacks on the floor. There was once a time when I think I had a somewhat accurate count/list. I was using an app that let you photograph a shelf and it would decode what was on the shelf, saving you the time of typing it all in. I had almost everything in there. But that service is no more and I never tried to gather a list myself. I keep thinking one day I’ll try but haven’t felt a strong enough inspiration yet. And I completely understand the difficulty getting rid of a book. I do have a couple bags of books I hope to unload, but it’s tough.
I’ve never done a bookshelf tour, but I did put out one post that showed a small corner of my collection while talking about how books are a source of inspiration. If you’re interested: https://toddhensonphotography.com/blog/the-inspiration-of-books
LikeLiked by 1 person
Organizing one’s bookshelves can feel therapeutic and calming if you’re in the mood for doing it, but it can also quickly get overwhelming as well depending on how many books you have. I love organizing things (although my room always looks disorderly, lol), so it’s a great exercise for me. I suggest giving it a try one day if you are in the mood and have the time for it. You’ll feel great afterwards.
Bookshelf tours are a lot of fun. The creator sometimes find gems they forgot they had and viewers find something new to add to their TBR 🙂
LikeLiked by 1 person
I know what you mean about the therapeutic and calming aspects. I haven’t done it often but I have really enjoyed the times I’ve pulled entire shevles worth of books down and went through them. And as you mentioned with the bookshelf tours, you can find those gems you’ve been wanting to read, or reread, but forgotten about. And I love handling the books, just moving them around, flipping through them again, rereading their back covers or dust jacket ends. I probably should make some time to do it again soon. 🙂 Another thing I love about seeing others bookshelf tours is learning how they organize their shelves. Sometimes it gives me ideas, and sometimes it’s just fun seeing how other folks think about their books and organizing them.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Oh yes! Totally agree about just touching the books. I actually think that (tactile memory, I guess) helps me to remember what books I own. I know what physical books I own but have a hard time remembering the digital ones.
LikeLiked by 1 person
Wow that is dedication! I do love stats though!
LikeLike
Lol! The numbers help to put things in perspective.
LikeLike
That is true!!!!
LikeLike