How much do you estimate that you spend on books in a year?

by Adrian Sroka
25th March 2013

I do not possess a Kindle, yet, but I do buy books online.

Where I live there are three charity shops in close proximity. I visit them every Saturday. I buy adult and children’s literature. Novels, historical books, books of poetry, plays, and biographies of interesting people throughout history. Eg. Abraham Lincoln.

I give the books that I have read to my nieces.

What types of books do you buy, and what percentage were Kindle purchases?

Replies

I tend to go through spurts of reading rather read consistently. At the moment, I've been on a free reading spree via Amazon's Free Classics range on Kindle. Right now, I'm working through The Phantom of the Opera. I also have The Hundred Year Old Man Who Climbed Out Of The Window and Disappeared (a very funny and novel story so far) in progress too.

When I'm working, I spend most of my commuting time with my nose in one book or another and burn through them very quickly. When I'm not, they get read at a snail's pace. I would guess I spend about £50 - 100 on books every year, depending on how voraciously I'm devouring them. Mind you, even at this pace, some (Shakespeare, Tolkien and Conan Doyle especially) take me forever to finish.

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Robert
Gill
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Robert Gill
26/03/2013

I tend to use the library and then buy the ones I really like. If the library doesn't stock what I have chosen to read, then I order from amazon. I spend over £200 in the last 12 months and only 2 books were kindle (actually iPad) purchases. It's useful having the latter especially if you want to refer to the book for research, it makes much easier to search using keywords rather than flicking through a paper version for a section you want to refer to again.

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Sonya
Kar
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Film, Music, Theatre, TV and Radio
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Sonya Kar
26/03/2013

Louise - I'm impressed you can remember the exact number!

I confess I've tended to buy secondhand lately, mainly because much historical NF is difficult to find locally and at £25 plus (usually) for each new volume it's difficult to justify, never mind afford at the mo. The last cavalry treatise I bought (currently out of print) was £9 on Ebay, compared to rare unused copies at around £40.

I confess to feeling guilty about buying used - the author makes nothing. And I don't own a Kindle but use the wife's. That means I only buy 'freebies', usually historical fiction, and offer a review in return. Only fair, IMO :)

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Jonathan
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Jonathan Hopkins
25/03/2013