Thoughts for Thursday (22) - How I Manage My TBR with Goodreads

Welcome to Thoughts for Thursday! This feature is our outlet to talk with you about whatever we currently have on our minds. It might be bookish, it might not! Now for this week's thought:

How I Manage My TBR with Goodreads

A little while back I took a look at my “to-read” shelf on Goodreads and became overwhelmed by the sheer number of books on it. I am sure I am not the only one who has an endlessly growing TBR pile. I add books to it faster than I can take them off. But after taking a closer look at the books on that list, I realized I didn’t actually want to read all of them. At the time, I would add books to my TBR if they interested me even in the slightest way. And there they sat without a way to distinguish between them. Books I was dying to read were mixed with, overshadowed by and sometimes forgotten about among all the other books I had been curious about. And I had no mechanism for when I gained, or lost, interest in a book. And being one who loves being organized, I decided I needed a new system. Thus, the following shelves were born:

• “to read” 
• “probably read”
• “maybe read” 
• “probably not”

If I am 99.9% certain that I am going to read a book, and only then, it goes on my “to read” shelf. These are typically eagerly awaited sequels to books I love, new books from favorite authors that I will also prioritize, and “oldies-but-goodies” that I have vowed to read. Sometimes recommendations from trusted friends go on this list too. Meanwhile, books that I am only fairly certain I will read, I shelve as “probably read” and are usually books that have received good reviews, I think I will enjoy, and that I hope/plan to read at some point. But my default shelf is “maybe read”. Although I would love to read ALL THE BOOKS, I know that is impossible and so I try to be honest with myself and I do that by placing most books here. And as the reviews start coming in, I may move it up to probably read”, down to “probably not”, or leave it where it is. As you can probably guess, my “probably not” shelf is for books that I have lost interest in. I don’t like to discount anything entirely, so rather than delete it from my shelves I put them here.  In case you are wondering, I have 86 books on my “to-read” shelf, 115 on my “probably read” shelf, 306 books on my “maybe read shelf” and 45 books on my “probably not” shelf. 

Just to clarify, I don't restrict myself to only reading from my "to-read" shelf or anything like that,  but I like having this sense of prioritization in my TBR and an easy way to identify books I might want to read more so than others. 

And something else I do to keep my TBR pile under control is only add one book in a series at a time. In other words, I won't add the next book until I've read the one that proceeds it, even if it has been released. I don't fuss if it is a series that I know I will read to completion - like Throne of Glass - but for most series I don't want the sequels cluttering up my shelves when I haven't even read the first book.

That's it! What do you think of my system? And let me know how you manage your TBR...