BTT: Format

From Booking Through Thursday:

All other things (like price and storage space) being equal, given a choice in a perfect world, would you rather have paperbacks in your library? Or hardcovers? And why?

Oh, tough one! I'd probably go for nice trade paperbacks, they combine the good looks of hardcovers with lighter weight of paperbacks. Hardcovers are more beautiful items, especially compared to boring mass market paperbacks, but when reading, paperbacks are perhaps better. Trade paperbacks and hardcovers tend to have slightly larger type and more pleasant layout, which I like.

Since the world isn't perfect, my preference is very strongly towards paperbacks. Since I bookmooch, I end up sending plenty of books in mail. Paperbacks save lot of money there. I especially like thinner books, because once a book is thicker than three centimeters, the price to send it jumps up. So, my favourite book format is thin trade paperback. (The difference between trade and mass market paperbacks is something I've learned during my BookMooch years, see Wikipedia entry on paperbacks if you don't know what I'm talking about.)

I've been looking for a nice hardcover copy of Tristram Shandy for my collections, because that's a book I'd like to own and hardcover would be more beautiful. But in general I don't mind, because I'm not a book collector. I read and pass the book on, as I don't see the point in owning tons of novels I've read once and probably won't read again (there are so many books in the world I haven't read, so why read something I already know?). BookMooch has been a real blessing for me, allowing me to replace my library with new books with a rather moderate cost.

Not that I'm not a collector, says the man with 150 or so board games.