A Little Bookshelf Tour

I've been wanting to show you guys my overall book collection for quite some time, but I kept putting it off. I needed to dust both of the bookcases before I could take photos, and guys, I'm too lazy for that! I took my chance the other day because I went on a cleaning spree in the living room, that is if wiping down the coffee table and dusting the TV unit qualifies as a cleaning spree. And because I already had a duster in hand, I went and attacked the bookshelves until not a speck of dust was in sight.

Dusting done, I took the photos as soon as the sun hit the windows at just the right angle so I had the best lighting possible. My place isn't very well lit, to be honest, even with the skylight, mainly because we have a dark-coloured brick wall along one side of the lounge. So, the subliminal lighting results in photos that are rather grainy, and there's only so much I can do with my, just as subliminal, camera. I made do with what I could on Photoshop to get rid of the noise, but I'm no wizard.

At least the lighting in my bedroom is the brightest and easiest to work with!

We have two bookshelves in this humble abode. We would have kept just the wooden one Sean's grandmother gave him, but then we kept on buying books, and we realised we didn't have room for them. We also had a bunch of collectable statues and figures that needed a home, so we ended up getting a bookshelf much like the IKEA Billy bookcase, though this one was from Officeworks.

The white bookcase contains the more special/expensive books, as they're mostly hardcovers. I have a box set of what is probably my ultimate favourite edition of the Harry Potter books because the artwork is simply gorgeous. I'm aware that books two and three have been switched around, I didn't realise it until after I took the photos. And then we have one-half of our Tolkien collection, all hardcovers. The other books are all Sean's, and the bookshelf resides in the office.

I've yet to properly collect the rest of the Game of Thrones books, but I'm waiting for the series to end so I can get a nice box set to add to my collection. My sister gave me the paperback for my birthday last year, though I haven't finished it. She also gave me a Harry Potter stationary set for Christmas last year, which is what the purple box is - it came with a Hogwarts crest seal, envelopes, papers, a paperweight and some wax. I got The Creature Vault for myself early last year, as the artwork and concept art were just beautiful.

We keep our main bookcase in the living room, as it has a collection of recipe books, how-to books, comics, and so on. Here goes;

It's quite the mess if I may say so myself, but I honestly cannot see it in any other way. And that's okay. In the top left section, we've got all of the cookbooks - vegetarian, Italian, Japanese, cake decorating, and Jamie Oliver (all Sean's). On the right, we have more of Sean's books, the most notable of which would be the Ultimate X-Men series that he collected over a few years. He's also quite fond of Russell Brand's books. See how he has another copy of Watchmen in there?

In the middle shelf I've got a few copies of Harry Potter, but again, they're all Sean's. I gave my sister my set after I bought the box set, as I didn't see the point in keeping them. We've also got what I call the coffee table books, and the one titled "How To Be A Man" amuses me so. I've got a graphic novel version of the Hobbit, as well as two movie guides, from the Hobbit and The Lord of the Rings.

And now you can see the rest of my Tolkien collection, and yes, I do have duplicates of the Hobbit, as well as The Children of Hurin and the Silmarillion. I bought the pocket edition of the Hobbit for myself at first, and then Sean gave me the Alan Lee illustrated paperback. The little book has been autographed by several of the cast of the Hobbit movies, though I've yet to get Ian McKellan, Martin Freeman, Jim Nesbit, Aiden Turner etc. I do have Benedict Cumberbatch's autograph, though. I'm still after The Book Of Lost Tales 2 in the same edition, but it's been a little difficult to find in local second-hand bookstores.

So, here you go, guys! A sneak peak into our book collection, as small as it may be. As much as I love reading, we tend to limit our book purchases to those that we really want, as books tend to take up quite a bit of space, and they're quite heavy to move when moving house. They are all rather geeky of sorts, but that's exactly who we are. I don't have any makeup or fashion books, but I don't mind that one bit.

I'm off to do some more blog writing now, as I've decided to Blogmas and I'm hoping to get at least half the posts written before December comes around. I'm also excited to get started on a bunch of projects for the blog and Christmas, so I'm going to be keeping myself quite busy for the next few weeks. Yay to productivity! (says the lazy sh*t.)

What books do you collect? Do you have a favourite author? Everyone thinks mine is JK Rowling, but it's actually J.R.R Tolkien!