I get all excited about a book and immediately go to Amazon or Barnes and Noble to buy it. Books are fairly cheap and everybody tells me reading is good for you, so I don’t think twice before pulling the trigger on purchasing a book. However, my actions are starting to catch up with me. On my bookshelf sits many unread books taunting me each time I pass. I always keep telling myself that one day I’ll get to those books. That I will read them and be fascinated by them. It sounds good in theory, but the longer those books sit on my shelf the less likely my eyes will ever grace their parchment pages. I have hundreds of dollars of unread books on the shelf. Not cool. However, there is one bright spot. When I have company over, they see all my books and assume I have read them and have a bunch of smart ideas because of them.

Anyway, it started to bug me that I so many unread books. I try and read as much as I can. I’m definitely not a born reader, but there is so much valuable information in books that I force myself to read. Sometimes that will power fades and the books go unread. If only there was a way to rent books. Oh wait, there is. I’m not sure why it took me 10 years of buying books before I realized that I could just go to the library and rent them. This discovery has saved me a lot of money and space on the book shelf. For instance, I learned about a book that sounded really interesting so I rented it from the library. After about 15 pages I decided I would rather spend my time doing anything else then reading another page from that book. So, I headed to the library and dropped off the book and got myself a new one. I didn’t cost me anything! I didn’t feel pressured to finish the book because I had paid money for it.

So go get your Library card and put it to good use. Plus, the people at the Library were nice and helpful (and won’t make fun of you for trying to scan your gym membership card instead of your library card to checkout a book. Oops! Not sure what book to ready next? The website What Should I Read Next can be a helpful resource. Oh, you could also ask your friends for book suggestions. Some books I do buy because I like to go reference them every so often. I will also purchase my favorite books so I have them around or so I can loan them to a friend.