Ask Lemmy

I love the aesthetics of hardback books, a beautiful Victorian-era library looks (and smells!) great but my own library is all ebooks. I don't have the space for over 2k physical books and as I get older and my eyesight worsens, the ability to adjust font size, line-height, borders, contrast etc becomes invaluable.

I won't buy from Amazon at all, ever. I prefer to buy DRM free but if its not possible to buy DRM free then I buy a paperback copy from a local indie bookstore if possible which I immediately donate to a library or hospital or prison or whatever and, ahem, 'source' a DRM-free version from elsewhere. I do it this way because DRM is cancer but I also want to support small and/or new authors so buying and passing on a print copy is good for everyone and having a DRM free copy is good for me.

As for subject matter, both fiction and non-fiction but more fiction than non. I like historical novels like the Aubrey/Maturin series, or the Shardlake series, Madeline Miller's greek retellings, Hilary Mantel's stuff, fantasy/sci-f- like Ursula K Leguinn, NK Jemisin, Margaret Attwood, Robin Hobb, Lois McMaster Bujold, Susannah Clarke, Adrian Tchaikovsky. Horror/Thrillers by writers like Peter Straub, Catriona Ward, Shirley Jackson. Non-fiction books tend to be popular science that are 'popular' enough I can grasp what they're on about but 'science' enough they're not just dumbed down crap.

"What the size of your book collection says about you" - I feel like there's gotta be a bell curve here, with "you don't read enough" on both sides.

I've got a bunch of books, but it's faster and easier to buy them than read them.

All non-fiction how to books in print. The only novels I own are on ebook, via PDF on my phone. No number but just a few gigs worth. I can only consume novels in an audio book (narrated via app rather than an audio file). Chump change. Could estimate only about a couple hundred.....You need about 5K according to ALA to be a library.

Around 55 cubic feet, or 2 cubic meters. That's about 20% over the capacity of our bookshelves, so we weed regularly but we also keep getting more books. On top of that I read about six full-length ebooks a month and another physical book from the library.

We buy some new but also swap books via the local mutual aid networks. All the ebooks I get from my friend Roger, he's very jolly. And Dolly Parton sends my youngest child a book every month because she's cool like that.

0 Print

0 eBooks

1 Wikipedia.zim to rule them all

Honestly my attention span is too fucked to read books but history is interesting to read tho, I'd just have to hope the wikipedia editors didn't put anything false in there (I mean, if there are ridiculous events, I'll double check it)

Not that many, bacause I don't have a lot of space. I borrow from the library occasionally, which is brilliant, because it's cheap and doesn't take up space.

And yes, I weed my collection and keep only books that I really enjoyed or know that I'll reread. Sometimes I try to sell them 2nd hand, others that are lesser value I leave at these public book cabinets.

I hardly ever give away educational books though. I feel like I could come back at them anytime and they'll still provide information and usefullness.