Curbing The Book Buying Habit – Or Not

Let’s face it, I’m not got stop buying books any time soon. I wish I could say I’m going on a total ban until I’ve gotten through most of my massive stack of books. But, whenever I say that, I don’t keep to it. To be honest, I probably won’t keep to this either. But I’m doing my best.

After last year, I’ve got more books to read than I’ve had for a long time. My spending habits got a little hand and I need to slow down. I don’t have the money to be doing that right now. So what am I planning on doing if not a complete ban?

I’m limiting the number of books I’m allowed to buy each month.

The key number is 4.

I am allowed to buy 4 physical books each month. Ideally, if I buy an e-book, it will be included in this number. But, if I find one I want cheap after I’ve gotten 4; then I am allowed to also buy 1 e-book on top of that.

Within these four I have to count the pre-orders coming out that month. For example, I have four books pre-ordered for February already and one e-book. So that means I can’t buy any books next month. Sad. But sensible because I’ve already got 5 books that are going to be coming into my possession. I don’t really need any more books on top of that. Actually, I probably don’t need those five either, but I want them, so there we go!

There is only one problem I’ve stumbled across so far and that’s I’m not including book box books currently. I’m only subscribed to one box currently and that’s bi-monthly so I didn’t think it would be a problem. But then, in January I’ve got that box coming, plus two books from Book Box Club (the purely books parcel plus the extra book they’re selling for this month) so that’s another three books. Plus I had my FaeCrate from November arrive the day I’m writing it. So that’s another physical book and another e-book. I’ve got ten new books in January. That’s double the number of books I should be getting….

So, I might have to start including book boxes as a buy, but that won’t be until March, so I have some time.

As well as all this, I am adding a reward system in! But it’s a very strict reward system. I’ve decided that for every physical book I pull from my TBR jar and finish, I can add £1 to a fund for a new book that won’t count as one of these five. So that would be amazing. But I’m not counting ARCs, as they don’t go in the jar; e-books from the jar; books I add-in I didn’t pull from the jar or DNFs. Yeah, that doesn’t give me many chances but otherwise, I’d be adding money every few days. And that’s not gonna help me out. So finished TBR Jar books only.

And that’s about it!

Do you guys need to limit or stop book buying? Do you have any strategies for it? Let me know!