Sunday afternoon I boxed up a shelf's worth of books (which books and why –the subject of an upcoming post) and this morning I decided what to do with that expanse of free space—fill it with all the books I buy this year.

I've never had a shelf strictly for new purchases before. My m.o. has always been to sneak them in and make them look as if they've been here for awhile. Who me? Buy books? Yeah, I used to do that. If you think there're new books in this house, let's see you find 'em. But this year I'm limiting myself to gift card purchases and inexpensive used books—no need to hide these, right?

After pulling all newcomers and placing them together, filling up more than three quarters of the shelf only a quarter of the way into the year, I'm already questioning the wisdom of this approach. The books I've read off of my official reading shelf don't even fill the amount of available space left on the new book shelf. (Memo to self: lay off the library books for awhile.) And with the books recently ordered but not yet delivered. . . Oh my. I'll have resorted to doublestacking on this shelf before the end of the month.

On the positive side, this shelf should make an interesting photo-op come the end of December!