Why am I doing this and what are the ground rules?

I must be crazy because I love books and in particular I love my books. Whether I am an impatient product of my age or just impatient, when I want a book I go out and get it as soon as possible. I spend most of my disposable income on books.

And yet, for multiple reasons, I've decided to try to spend the next year not buying books. This might not seem like a task worth mentioning for many, but I suspect it will fundamentally alter the way I select and obtain my reading materials. It might ultimately change the way I read.

Why I'm doing this

I am a librarian and I love libraries. Though I am very happy with my current job as a special librarian with a private company, most of my customers are in-house and my job is industry specific. I started this blog in large part to create a way to stay connected with the greater library world. Not buying my own books will create a dependence on the public library I have never experienced before.

Other reasons include the simple curiosity of whether I can go an entire year without buying books, an attempt to save money, and to have something to write about that others might find interesting.

For the most part I hope to post shorter length items several times a week rather than sporadic, but longer posts. Though I briefly listed my reasons for starting this blog above, I plan on writing about those reasons in greater detail in future posts.

I do not know if this is an original idea or not, though I am guessing not. Once I decided to go forward with this, though, I decided to not search for other examples.

The ground rules:

For the calendar year 2008 I will try to not buy any books, but rather obtain my reading materials from my local library or other outlets, such as borrowing from friends. I will accept books as gifts, but I will not ask for specific books. If I do buy a book, I'll fess up and report the lurid details of my fall on this site.

In short, I will not buy any books this year, no exceptions.

Exception #1

I have a $25 Barnes & Noble gift card left over from Christmas. This will be my lifeline. In the event that I simply must buy a book, I will use this card. Once it is used up, there is no more.

Exception #2

I have several friends involved in the book arts, be it as a publisher, author or artist. If they roll out new material during the year I am going to purchase copies as I have in the past.


It’s too late to turn back, here I go…