Books on the move

Blue Pelican and Orange Penguin paperbacks

I moved some of my bookshelves and books around yesterday - here is most of my Penguin and Pelican collection on my bed awaiting reallocation. Kept the Penguins in the bedroom and moved the Pelican into my newly renamed Work Room.

I have also culled a lot of my non-fiction. I moved a lot of my favourites into the spare room and could see the less interesting books in their own right. And some didn't seem to deserve to be in my flat. So they are in a pile in the hall, awaiting delivery to charity shops.

Owning books, being surrounded by books, having so many books I haven't yet read and probably won't... I crave minimalism but books... books mean so much to me. Their physical presence is comforting, their promise of escape and entertainment and enlightenment is exhilarating.

And I remember my 8 year old self, when told to pack for her summer holidays, packed all of her books on the grounds that she didn't know what she would actually want to read once she got there. There were maybe 30. I think I owned more books than my parents did.

Having all those books now means I am grown up, I am in control, I have arrived!