S/O of 'Clean Your House' books, Books, Books!

[KenveeB]

I sort by size. All the little books are on the little bookselves, all the big books on the tall shelves. Then by colour. You don't?

I think your plan is good, but don't sort fiction into his and hers. Only you two can make that distinction, it wouldn't make sense to anyone else. If you or your DH want to reread something you can find it alphabetically, if someone else wants a book they won't have to search two times.

But it's their library in their home. Why shouldn't they sort it in the way that makes the most sense to them?

I have stuff divided into broad genres/categories, then sub-categories within that. Within the sub-categories, it's divided alphabetically by author, then alphabetically by title. If an author has a series, that's put alphabetically by the series name and then sorted chronologically within the series. (So John Smith writes the Apples series, the Bananas series, and stand-alones Apricot and Pear. His stuff would be Apples1, Apples 2, Apricot, Bananas1, Bananas2, Pear.) If a series is written by more than one author, I alphabetize it by the series name instead of author name.

[pinkiu]

For fiction I sorted by author. I know the authors of all of my books and know which one I want. However, I don't know everything in my non-fiction. I sort them by genre. I always know at least one book well in a genre on my shelf and can almost immediately find what I'm looking for this way. Then I can sort by size within genre. I go through my books annually and donate or sell on Amazon those that I've read once and not attached to.

[TheWeirdOne]

I organise in a combination of use and available space: poetry all together, art reference all together, 'how to' books, history, science, textbooks etc. I keep things by the same author together (and even have a separate bookcase for Pratchett books). Sometimes something doesn't fit, which is incredibly annoying but I usually manage to shelve it with a similar theme.

It may seem a bit disorganised, but as I can find the exact shelf where any one of my books lives (and lord help you if you mis-shelved it  ) after not looking at it for over a year it's working so far.

[mmswm]

I sort by genre.  I have textbooks, fiction, non-fiction (that aren't textbooks), "how-to", and religion. Each category is divided into sub-categories.  Math is the trickiest, since I have at least 150 math books. My oldest ran afoul of my system by shelving an Analysis book with the combinatorics books.  Yes, I'm that picky. I find that by the time I get to the sub-categories, most of the problems work themselves out, since the number of books I'm dealing with is far smaller.

[Thipu1]

I sort by size. All the little books are on the little bookselves, all the big books on the tall shelves. Then by colour. You don't?

I think your plan is good, but don't sort fiction into his and hers. Only you two can make that distinction, it wouldn't make sense to anyone else. If you or your DH want to reread something you can find it alphabetically, if someone else wants a book they won't have to search two times.

We can make a pretty good distinction between his fiction and my fiction.  He's heavily into writers like Tom Clancy and Greg Bear while I'm more interested in things like classics and 'soft' mysteries.  Since Mr. Thipu's legally blind, having all his fiction together makes sense.  He doesn't have to plow through the whole herd to find things he likes. Now, if I can only get him to start weeding.   

Also, there are financial advantages to getting the books in order.  We have an 1867 edition of Darwin's 'Origin of Species'.  The binding is shot but the text block is solid and in excellent condition.  I did a little checking around and found that, in it's current condition, it may be worth as much as 500 USD. It's been put into the barrister's book case with the book from 1621. 

Thanks again for all the excellent suggestions.  I hope my plea for help has helped others get books in a row.       

[Winterlight]

I sort everything by genre, then by alphabetical order within that. Fiction is broken down to SF/Fantasy, mysteries and general fiction. Non-fiction gets a little more broken down with things like cookbooks, survival, WWII espionage, green books and pagan books, among others.

Of course, I'm still running out of shelf space. *g*

[demarco]

DH and I have many, many books spread out all over the house.  They are minimally accessible because they are so poorly arranged.  I am a former librarian and my private fantasy, my dream,  is to arrange all of them roughly into the ten Dewey classes with the literature, history  and geography, and, possibly, the social sciences divided up into sections.  I will never do this, alas, because DH would not  like it if I started rearranging his books and mine are intermingled with his.  If I tried to separate mine and arrange those it would involve moving a lot of shelves and moving furniture to fit the shelves and so on and so on.  In other words, it's not worth the effort. 

[camlan]

I try to sort by genre, but I have ended up mixing them a little.

As the result of being an English major, I have a lot of fiction. I also have a lot of books about authors, and history, where knowing about the history of the time makes a difference. So I shelve all these books together--the books by a given author, the literary criticism about the author, the history books about the time period. It's a logical grouping for me, but the occasional visitor is stumped by this, because I also have a separate section for history books in general.

Cookbooks go in the kitchen, but books about eating and cooking are in the living room, that sort of thing. Because they are my books, I put them where I can find them. Visitors can browse, but they may have to ask where certain books are, i.e. the sci fi books are in the study, hidden by the open door. The etiquette books are in the same bookcase, because that's where they fit, not because I think there is some odd connection between rocket ships and addressing thank you notes correctly.

IMO, the chief thing is to put the books in groups that will help you to remember where they are--if you think of that Brooklyn cookbook as a cookbook, it belongs with the other cookbooks. If you think of it primarily as a history book, then put it with the history books.

(Sadly, my first thought on reading the OP was "Windowsills! Why haven't I thought of windowsills!" This is not going to help my determination to keep the books inside the bookcases and not spilling over onto the floor, the desk, the tables, the attic stairs. . . . )

[CakeBeret]

We do it this way, too. We have somewhere over 2,000 books, sorted by genre/subject and then partly by size. The idea is to put things where they make sense to *you*. For instance, my husband has several shelves of "Fiction I Studied in College." He keeps those books all together because it's a meaningful category for him. I used to keep a history of the Donner Party with the cookbooks. (It amused me, if no one else.)

Just so you know, I'm sitting here giggling maniacally at my desk.

[Sophia]

I am about ready to put all our books into readerware software.  You buy a USB barcode scanner from ebay or amazon for between $15 - $40.  Buy the software.  Then you scan in the book and it searches several databases for information on your book, and auto-populates as much as possible.  You can include custom fields like "Location."  Then, later, you can search your database like a library database, and go right to where the book is. 

I will be doing it because we will be moving soon, and until we build the addition to the house, we won't have room for most of our books in the house.  We do have two outbuildings, though.  So, I am planning on putting the books in boxes, and labeling the boxes.  Then using that in the Location field.  I might even print out little labels for the books to put on the spine, so that they go back to the correct box. 

Plus, I figure if the house ever burns down it will be nice to have proof of what we actually have in books.  Otherwise, no one would believe it.  Two people that really really like books, married.  We have a great many books.  And, we will be home-schooling so an excuse for more more more books.  (maniacal laugh)

[KenveeB]

I use an app called MyStuff2 for cataloging my books and movies. It has the barcode scanner, and you can label them by genre and series, plus label their location as well.

[demarco]

After reading KenveeB's and Sophia's posts I did a quick sampling of our collection.  It looks like  half of our books don't have barcodes.  Too bad because I like the idea of organization through scanning.

[Thipu1]

We do it this way, too. We have somewhere over 2,000 books, sorted by genre/subject and then partly by size. The idea is to put things where they make sense to *you*. For instance, my husband has several shelves of "Fiction I Studied in College." He keeps those books all together because it's a meaningful category for him. I used to keep a history of the Donner Party with the cookbooks. (It amused me, if no one else.)

Just so you know, I'm sitting here giggling maniacally at my desk.

Back in the 1980s, a friend and I wrote about a dozen interactive murder mysteries.  To help us, I bought several books in the 'How Done It' series.  'Deadly Doses', the book about poisons, still sits on the shelf with our cookbooks.  Guests who knew about the mysteries enjoyed the joke.  Those who didn't, did not eat very much when they visited.

Wonder why. 

[KenveeB]

After reading KenveeB's and Sophia's posts I did a quick sampling of our collection.  It looks like  half of our books don't have barcodes.  Too bad because I like the idea of organization through scanning.

I had quite a few books I had to enter by hand. It takes a little more time, but you get a rhthym going and move pretty quickly.

[AmethystAnne]

Thipu...thank you for posting your query! I don't think I've got as many books as you do.(envious!)  But I have a similar problem. Books and movies everywhere! Thank you everyone, the suggestions are great!