How do you arrange your "to be read" pile?

[Victoria Silverwolf]

Just curious.

My "to be read" pile at home isn't tremendously large. Maybe about twenty books right now, the vast majority skinny old paperbacks.

I generally arrange in in the order purchased, so that the one I've owned the longest time is on top. However, I often group them together by size and type as well, violating the order of purchase to some degree. Right now I've got all the paperbacks together and the hardcovers together, just to make two neat piles more than anything else. I've got SFF anthologies together, and SFF novels together, with a couple of mainstream books sandwiched between.

So what do you do? Is it by whim or mood? Do you keep all books in a series together, or read them between other stuff? (I rarely do series, but if there's one I want to read -- Kim Stanley Robinson's Mars trilogy, for example -- I do them all at once.)

 

[Nick B]

Mine is a list of files rather than a pile of books, so they are all on my phone and tablet. And to be honest, it's whatever takes my fancy next. I have no method, no rhyme or reason.

 

[The Judge]

At present, since I had to tidy up for a weekend guest, all but a handful are dumped in a couple of baskets under and by a nest of tables. I roughly sorted them into SFF and non-SFF, but trying to keep them in the baskets and not overflowing involved putting skinnier books into gaps the big ones wouldn't fit, so the lines are blurred.

I don't read in a specific order, but in a what-grabs-me-next mood, which means taking them out and rooting through them, messing them up again. Usually, newly acquired books get dumped on a table awaiting the baskets. Since they're much easier to access, they often get read first, without ever reaching the official TBR pile.

 

[Brian G Turner]

I have a ton of fiction and non-fiction waiting to be read, from a range of different genres and interests. Usually I'll have an idea of what genre at least I feel like reading, and sometimes even a particular author. Sometimes I'll pick up something on a whim and it'll grab me.

But it's also common for me to pick up a book, try the first sentence, paragraph, page, even chapter, only to put it down because it's just not grabbing me - maybe I'm not in the mood for that story, or even that genre, at the time. I'll usually intend to come back to them at some point.

There are books I feel I should read, and push to read them. I usually intersperse these with favourite authors, to help keep up an enthusiasm for reading and avoid burnout.

 

[Vince W]

I buy far too many books. I get them home and then they tend to form little piles here and there. If I don't read them right away they show their displeasure by finding quiet spots to hide under and behind things. Two or three have managed to elude me several times forcing me to purchase new copies. Then these copies band together and form covens in warm dark spaces only to be discovered by my wife at inopportune moments where they immediately jump out at her so she can demand to know why I have four copies of Mort or such. They're out to get me I'm sure.

 

[Randy M.]

Um ...

Order?

Like Vince I have far too many books. I also had a young daughter who liked shelving books before she knew the alphabet and cats who disrupted piles and sometimes shelves. My daughter is out on her own, the cats aren't allowed near the books anymore, and I'm still trying to create order out of the piles and misshelvings. Also like Vince often when I look for a book I know I have, it has burrowed under something and repays my neglect by not making itself visible. Thus duplicates.


Randy M.

 

[BAYLOR]

I picked books at random, unless I'm reading a series.

 

[Gonk the Insane]

Storage space is my enemy, so nearly all my reading these days is on kindle. After I've read a kindle book, I move it to a category, so the main home screen just has several pages of unread books. I mostly go by whatever takes my fancy. Some books will be read straight away, but sadly others have been there for a while. I think Lauren Beukes' Zoo City has been sitting there the longest (maybe 2 years) because I've just never felt like reading it. One day...
Once I start a trilogy or series though I like to see it through, one volume after another. And once I've started a book, I don't usually have more than one on the go at once (for fiction, at least).

 

[The Bluestocking]

I have over 100 paperbacks in my TBR pile and over 60 on my tablet. This is even with having at least a couple on the go at any one point. GAH!

The paperbacks are stored neatly in storage boxes until I can afford yet another bookcase.

The ebooks are auto-arranged by Google Books (no customisation available).

 

[hitmouse]

It aort of arranges itself tbh.

 

[Bick]

For me, my "TBR pile" is euphemistic. It's not actually a pile and there is no order. When I finish a book, I go to my shelves, scan the various books I've vaguely had in mind for a while, and take down whatever I feel like most at that moment. Sometimes this is planned in advance, and sometimes I've "promised" someone on these boards that I'll read something specific. But my best laid plans tend to awry anyway.

If there was a pile, then my answer would be "from left to right".

 

[kythe]

At some point I started stashing unread books in an old dresser I'm no longer using. They aren't organized, I just dig through the drawers whenever I want to read something new. Now that I'm thinking about it, I don't know why I've never just replaced the dresser with an actual bookshelf. Maybe its my way of staying in denial about how many books I actually have.

 

[Frost Giant]

Bookshelf headboard on the bed, new books arranged from most interesting to least interesting.

 

[HareBrain]

You're all so organised! I don't even have one, which is no doubt why I waste so much time finding new things to read when I finish a book.

 

[Venusian Broon]

...In a haphazard pile by my bed. And other piles at other inappropriate points around my room. Books that I am reading (currently three and one magazine) are allowed to roam free anywhere - floor, desk, on top of the printer...

No rhyme or reason. After reading Nick Hornby's High Fidelity and getting depressed at the depiction of men in it, I decided never to organise anything I collect in any way whatsoever. Thankfully I have a good memory so can remember roughly where I've put everything.

 

[MWagner]

I keep a couple stacks on the corner segment of a bookshelf: one with the unread new books from the last couple purchases (I usually order 4-7 books at a time); the other with several books (either new or old and unread) in whatever genre or subject matter I'm interested in at the moment. While it lacks any other organizing principle, the real utility of the stack is to encourage restraint in buying new books. If I still have 10 books in the new and unread pile, I stop and reconsider that next order. Though sometimes my willpower is weak .

 

[JunkMonkey]

...In a haphazard pile by my bed. And other piles at other inappropriate points around my room. Books that I am reading (currently three and one magazine) are allowed to roam free anywhere - floor, desk, on top of the printer...

No rhyme or reason. After reading Nick Hornby's High Fidelity and getting depressed at the depiction of men in it, I decided never to organise anything I collect in any way whatsoever. Thankfully I have a good memory so can remember roughly where I've put everything.

Almost exactly the same. While I was reading High Fidelity I was convinced that Hornby had been following me around taking notes - some of the names and dates were horribly similar to my own life. Unfortunately I have an execrable memory and need to keep my stuff alphabetised otherwise I would never find anything. Ok... I would never find the thing I was looking for. Saying. 'I would never find anything' makes it sound like I live in some sort of vast, weightless vacuum (like the inside of Donald Trump's head) which is patently not true.

My TBR pile arranges itself so that the most recently bought books are at the top. Occasionally it falls over and gets rearranged. There are books in the lower strata that have been there for at least a decade.

 

[Vince W]

My TBR pile arranges itself so that the most recently bought books are at the top. Occasionally it falls over and gets rearranged. There are books in the lower strata that have been there for at least a decade.

This makes me think it would be an extremely interesting field of study to have a geologically minded librarian to sift through the varying levels of the books that become deposited on the floor of book reader/collectors cupboards.

 

[Ogma]

I don't keep my TBR books in a separate location, but I have kept a list since 2006. Currently, there are 110 books on the list, including ebooks. I am on a book diet until I clear the backlog, adding books to my collection only when absolutely necessary (or can't resist ).

 

[vanye]

I have less than 200 (I hope) books on my TBR piles. One "pile" is a smallish old shelf, wich has all the fiction on it, roughly ordered by genre (fantasy, SF and anything else). The other pile on non fiction, on top of another shelf. Somehow, there is never enough space for my books.