I have a problem. It manifests itself in the form of about 160 books that currently reside at my house that I have not read. (To be fair, some of these are not in physical form- I do own quite  a few e-books.)

My issue is that I cannot stop buying books. And, apparently, despite the fact that I read quite quickly, I buy them either at exactly the rate I read them, or I buy them too fast for me to keep up. This is a problem. Last year, I didn’t even read 160 books altogether. I would have to stop buying them for at least an entire year (the horror!) or read faster. Since I devote about two hours a day to reading as it is, I’m guessing reading faster isn’t going to happen.

One theory that I have come up with is that I treat books like people who lived through the Great Depression treated, well, everything. I wouldn’t say I “hoard” per se, but I definitely cannot pass up buying one if given the opportunity. In college I was perennially broke and had to get books on my limited budget, which generally meant used book sales and the Borders clearance rack. When I would happen along these fortuitous events in my life, I would stock up, because who knew when I was come across more cheap books in the future?

Apparently, three years after graduating from college and one steady salary later, I still can’t shake this mindset. I practically bought out the Borders near my house when they went out of business (they just kept dropping the prices!), I routinely check the clearance section in the Half Priced Books store, and I compulsively browse Amazon’s books under $5 section.

I have been trying to work on it. I manage to stay away from temptation (book stores) because now there are fewer, and I’ve stopped going on Amazon twenty times a day (I’ve cut it down to about ten times). But, as soon as I see a cheap book that I must have, there is no stopping me. And the pile gets a little bit bigger.