<p>Anyways, after all is done and the room looks perfect we will be moving the books back where they belong. I have big plans to organize the library in the way that books will be easily accessible, easy to find. But have no idea how to even begin. And it has to look nice, too
We are a bilingual family, so the books are in two languages. Lots of hard covers and lots of paperbacks. Childrens and young adults classics as well. Tons of them. We probably have close to two thousand volumes.
Any help would be appreciated. Have you ever organized your library? Did it work?
Occasionally I have people coming over to borrow a book and it is always a nuisance to find the title we are looking for, even though we know we have it. Also, I have found out (why moving the books out of the room) that we have several double copies - so cataloging them would be a nice idea, but who has time?</p>
<p>If I had that many books (jealous face :() I would probably go with one of the library structures and mark them with tags. Otherwise, I would separate them by Juvenile, Adult Fiction, Non-fiction, and then break them out by topic (psychology, philosophy, history, science) and try to get a handle on sorting them that way.</p>
<p>Go to your local public library and see how it is set up. I use librarything to keep a listing of books that I read at home. You could use it to keep a listing of your titles. You can tag them and even organize them by Dewey numbers and collections. Then you can search the collections using your free program. By visiting the library and perhaps a local book shop you can decide on which organization style you would like to use. Dewey is compatible with multiple languages and various alphabets since it is numerical. In my library, I have pulled out all the English fiction into three levels of Easy, Middle Fiction and Fiction. It is the only part of my library that does not use the Dewey. Other languages are still in the literature section of the Dewey. Anyway, you can use librarything and have a super home library that can be searched. </p>
<p>I am getting rid of my books right now since I am moving. Some I am keeping and shipping but many are going into my work library or they are being given away.</p>
<p>I would set the books up like they do at the library, fiction, non-fiction, foreign language in fiction, non-fiction, children’s fiction and non-fiction. Then, inside those, hard cover alphabetical by author’s last name, paperback alphabetical by last name. One trick libraries use to make it easier to keep books in order is to only use about 2/3rds of a shelf or so. Books can be added, moved around, etc. easier if each shelf has some room to accommodate more books.</p>
<p>Filing fiction is easy – you just do it alphabetically. Non-fiction is harder, but one tip you can use is to check the verso of the title page. Many books published in the last 25 years will have CIP (Cataloging in Publication) data printed here. At the vey bottom will be three numbers, the one that begins with Letter is an LC Catalog number ( this is what most academic libraries use to arrange non-fiction), the one that starts with a number is the Dewey number ( this is what most public and school libraries use to arrange non-fiction) and then the number that starts with the year of publication. That is LC Card number – a control number assigned by the Library of Congress (LC) to that title/volume to identify the cataloging information. </p>
<p>If all your books have these information, it is fairly easy to just sort them by number. This saves hugh amounts of time since the numbers are assigned by trained catalogers – it is this info that makes it possible for small (and big) libraries to quickly process large amounts of material. </p>
<p>Be aware that not all books will have this printed in them. Older books, books published by very small presses, books published outside the US, etc. often do not have the info, but it is a great tool to use if it available.</p>
<p>Fiction books will have an LC number and a Dewey number as well and you can certainly file them by Dewey number, but most people prefer to file them alpha. The other piece that often gets pulled out of the numbering system are biographies. File these alpha by subject. (who it is about)</p>
<p>If you want to file everything by Dewey number, and have a number of books without the CIP, you can go online to a public library (New York Public Library is good if you have a lot of esoteric books), look the title up in their online catalog and just copy the Dewey number from there.</p>
<p>I have a lot of books as well. I organize the fiction alphabetically by author, and then chronologically if I have many titles by one writer. The foreign-language fiction is mixed in there, although the children’s books are elsewhere. My non-fiction is sorted by topic, and then by different methods depending on the topic. History is by region, and then chronologically, theology is by topic and alphabetical, etc.</p>
<p>The Turbo STEM library is grouped by subject much like a college bookstore… One side is mine (engineering, comp sci, and psych) and the other side is Mrs. Turbo’s (math, statistics, information tech). There’s also a library branch in our downstairs office (the house has 3 offices :)).</p>
<p>The kids have their own books downstairs in their study room, and it’s organized by subject.</p>
<p>In our house we have fiction by author and non-fiction by subject. Poetry is together. It’s not as formal as the library systems, but I have so many architecture books that they are separated a bit - those devoted to a single architect are separated out. I also have architecture books I use frequently in my office, and ones I use less often in another room. (If I had a bigger office I’d keep them together.) For books in a foreign language you can either segregate them or integrate them. I mostly have separate shelves of German and French, but some of the novels are just shelved with the other fiction. One of our big questions is whether genre fiction should be separated out. Mostly it isn’t, but there is a bookcase in the bedroom which houses most of our mysteries, all the Georgette Heyers, and the picture books I wanted to save, but my kids didn’t want in their rooms anymore. Good luck! We have a couple thousand books too!</p>
<p>I can’t imagine filing a home library by Dewey decimal system, unless you want to look up a book on your computer each time you’re trying to find it. There is nothing intuitive about how those numbers work. The system you choose depends on your collection and what makes sense to you. My library is sorted by literary fiction, genre fiction, primary sources in classical and medieval texts, secondary sources for classical and medieval texts, poetry, drama, philosophy, linguistics, literary criticism and theory, art and architecture, history, religion, reference works, etc. Foreign language books are side by side with English, though I suppose if I had a large enough collection of novels in Portuguese or French, say, I would probably break those out for ease of use. Each area is then alphabetical by author, and then alphabetical by title in the case of multiple works by the same author. But that’s what works for me.</p>
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