The further and continuing adventures of the girl who sat in the back of your homeroom, reading and daydreaming.
Saturday, November 28, 2009
Dining Library?
Here's where we had Thanksgiving dinner -- the ancient table and behind it: Library, AAA - FAR. I have got a lot more shelves to build; there's one custom and three reused old bookshelves of similar size on the other walls and I'm up to about the letter "R."
I always shelved non-fiction by a rough Tamara Decimal System and shelved fiction by author. Instead of arranging authors alphabetically, however, they were arranged by how likely I was to want to grab one of their books to re-read. Thus, Heinlein took up a couple shelves at eye level, while, say, some Jack L. Chalker books and a Robotech novel I'd somehow picked up but never got around to trading in were down by the floor in the back row.
Tam: I couldn't do that. I have two systems for fiction: books shoved randomly into boxes and books shelved alpha by author. I know which one works when I suddenly want to dig out a (the?) Wilmar H. Shiras novel, or Ward Moore, or Curt Siodimak.* Nonfiction is worse -- "lumped by subject:" Biography, Transportation (subgroups MGB, scooters & cycles and Outer Space), History of Technology (plus some plain ol' history), Guns and Radio.
Nathan, have you seen a copy of the AAA (or is is AAAS?) Guide to the Hidden Frontier? Packed it in a box when I moved and haven't found it yet. ____________________ * Respectively, Children Of The Atom, Bring The Jubilee (because Joyleg is filed under co-author Avram Davidson and I don't own a copy of Greener Than You Think) and...I forget, maybe The Stars Are Too High? No, that's Agnew H. Bahnson, who seems to have practiced what he wrote and dammit, my copy turned up missing when I went to check on spelling just now. None of the Siodimak novel titles Wikipedia lists look familiar, either. I've liked stuff by too many obscure writers, or noted ones who wrote very little; they'd be too easily lost if shelved any way but by author.
There I thought you were going by First then Last, maybe something by A.A. Atanasio.
Good old Forrie Ackerman; wish I'd been paying more attention in my early con-going days, when I met all those folk from First Fandom. Alas, I failed to pick their brains--although tree was a Science Fiction Oral History project going in Ann Arbor back then..
Every attempt to alphabetize my collection has fallen afoul of "What do I feel like reading today?" Right now our combined collections are sitting in storage, waiting for a decision as to moving. (Where, not whether.)
My books are stored (and shipped) in modular bookcases I built from 1x5 and plywood backs.
Each box holds about 4 feet of paperbacks, (24x17x5) and I have 20 or so. When I move, my books arrive in the same order that they left in.
3 modules fill a very heavy standard dish-pack box for moving.
Even though I have only moved twice in the last twenty years, before that they were a lifesaver. Not too pretty, but very functional. I suppose I could paint them, or stain them, or put contact paper on them, but they are fine for me the way they are.
I didn't build them all at once - I keep buying books, and building shelves, and getting books for Xmas, and building more shelves.
Sometimes, I weed the collection.
The Dresden chronicles are my current favorites - kind of like "Spencer For Hire" meets Buffy meets Harry Potter.
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I have got a lot more shelves to build; there's one custom and three reused old bookshelves of similar size on the other walls and I'm up to about the letter "R."
Alas, alphabetizing ,y books cuts into my bookshelf-building time.
ReplyDelete;-)
VERY nice!
ReplyDeleteHey, do I see a pair of tiaras?
Tactical para-tiaras.
ReplyDeleteIf your library starts at "AAA" what is the first title?
ReplyDeleteWV: hessemat. German mercenaries after the Battle of Trenton.
That's just Bobbi's SF books, too. Her non-fiction stuff is elsewhere...
ReplyDeleteD. W.: Reel Future: Ackerman, Forrest J. and Stine, Jean. But there's room for authors earlier in the alphabet.
ReplyDeleteTurk: YEP!
I tried that once. It lasted all of a week. Then I needed something and then something from over there.
ReplyDeleteJust didn't work.
I have seven floor to ceiling bookshelves in my office/family room/ham shack with the overflow stashed in cardboard boxes.
I always shelved non-fiction by a rough Tamara Decimal System and shelved fiction by author. Instead of arranging authors alphabetically, however, they were arranged by how likely I was to want to grab one of their books to re-read. Thus, Heinlein took up a couple shelves at eye level, while, say, some Jack L. Chalker books and a Robotech novel I'd somehow picked up but never got around to trading in were down by the floor in the back row.
ReplyDeleteRoberta -- I figured "AAA Guide to the Far Edge" through "Farnham's Freehold", but then I realized I was sorting by title instead of author :)
ReplyDeleteTam: I couldn't do that. I have two systems for fiction: books shoved randomly into boxes and books shelved alpha by author. I know which one works when I suddenly want to dig out a (the?) Wilmar H. Shiras novel, or Ward Moore, or Curt Siodimak.* Nonfiction is worse -- "lumped by subject:" Biography, Transportation (subgroups MGB, scooters & cycles and Outer Space), History of Technology (plus some plain ol' history), Guns and Radio.
ReplyDeleteNathan, have you seen a copy of the AAA (or is is AAAS?) Guide to the Hidden Frontier? Packed it in a box when I moved and haven't found it yet.
____________________
* Respectively, Children Of The Atom, Bring The Jubilee (because Joyleg is filed under co-author Avram Davidson and I don't own a copy of Greener Than You Think) and...I forget, maybe The Stars Are Too High? No, that's Agnew H. Bahnson, who seems to have practiced what he wrote and dammit, my copy turned up missing when I went to check on spelling just now. None of the Siodimak novel titles Wikipedia lists look familiar, either. I've liked stuff by too many obscure writers, or noted ones who wrote very little; they'd be too easily lost if shelved any way but by author.
I seem to be missing a lot of books since my last move, too...
ReplyDeleteThere I thought you were going by First then Last, maybe something by A.A. Atanasio.
ReplyDeleteGood old Forrie Ackerman; wish I'd been paying more attention in my early con-going days, when I met all those folk from First Fandom. Alas, I failed to pick their brains--although tree was a Science Fiction Oral History project going in Ann Arbor back then..
Every attempt to alphabetize my collection has fallen afoul of "What do I feel like reading today?" Right now our combined collections are sitting in storage, waiting for a decision as to moving. (Where, not whether.)
My books are stored (and shipped) in modular bookcases I built from 1x5 and plywood backs.
ReplyDeleteEach box holds about 4 feet of paperbacks, (24x17x5) and I have 20 or so. When I move, my books arrive in the same order that they left in.
3 modules fill a very heavy standard dish-pack box for moving.
Even though I have only moved twice in the last twenty years, before that they were a lifesaver. Not too pretty, but very functional. I suppose I could paint them, or stain them, or put contact paper on them, but they are fine for me the way they are.
I didn't build them all at once - I keep buying books, and building shelves, and getting books for Xmas, and building more shelves.
Sometimes, I weed the collection.
The Dresden chronicles are my current favorites - kind of like "Spencer For Hire" meets Buffy meets Harry Potter.
And I thought I had a paperback collection (700 plus and counting...)
ReplyDelete