I’ve been saving this poem for the first post of my new blog *, for it neatly summarises my book acquisition habits of the last 15 years, and the ongoing, losing battle with the TBR.

I started blogging when the TBR was in the low hundreds. When I retired, it was just over 1800. 5 1/2 years later, it’s about the same. At least it’s stabilised. Can I count that as a win? The mission of volume 2 is to reduce it … somehow. By hook, by crook, by sales, by cull. Perhaps it’s time for The Gentle Art of Swedish Death Cleaning? Not that I’m ill or anything, just that I’m not getting any younger …. and somehow the Library, which was tidy for a wee while this time last year, has now been renamed the Warehouse, and could give Voltaire and Rousseau a run for its money.

Credit: @voltaireandrousseau (Instagram)

I have started gently by allowing myself one purchase per 3 books read or culled during 2022. It’s going well. 83% of my 2022 reading has been from the pre-2022 TBR, and I currently have a purchase allowance of 7 books. While the wishlist is much longer than that, I’m not planning a book buying binge anytime soon. That said, I am attending an event in a bookshop next week. I’d better prep myself by thinking of the forthcoming heating bills. Disposable income? What’s that?

Anyway, as I write on the first page of my new digital notebook, the new me, the one minus the C in CBPS (Compulsive Book Purchasing Syndrome), is here. Everything else stays the same though.

Welcome aboard, if you’re new to my bibliophilia. And welcome back, if you’ve come across from my previous site. It’s good to see you again.

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* Posts appearing below this one have been brought over for ease of reference from Lizzy’s Literary Life (Volume One).