HOW I ORGANISE MY BOOKSHELVES

Organising my books is a task I both love and loathe. I have acute OCD and whilst I like things such as DVDs in alphabetical order, when it comes to books nothing placates me. There are a multitude of ways books can be arranged on the shelf and nothing stresses me out more than wanting to do it one way but also having another way and aghhhh!!
 
You could arrange by genre or size, colour, alphabetical by author, title? What about grouping the publishers together or having them in publication date order? There are just too many ways to organise books and no way to use every single system at once. I have, however found a way to display my books that utilises a couple of the above options and that, so far, works for me.

We’ll start of by addressing the fact that I do not have enough bookshelves. I have one large IKEA Billy bookcase and one small one. Above my small bookcase I have a wall shelf and on the other side of the room I have another wall shelf.
I have two massive bags of books on the floor beside my bed and I have a collection in my wardrobe also. Obviously, we’ll be focusing on the books on the shelves and ignoring the few that are currently just sat randomly in front of others whilst I figure out where to put them!
 
We’ll start at the very top of the large bookcase. No, not the top shelf - the top: as in, the bit that isn’t actually a shelf. This is where I keep my ‘dimily’ collection. I have four copies of Did I Mention I Love You? by Estelle Maskame and three of books two and three. I didn’t intend to gather a collection of these books; it just sort of happened. As a blogger, I recived ARCs of the books as they came out; and as a good friend, I bought a copy also. The third of each book in the series was obtained at the last book’s launch party and the fourth copy of dimily is the first US Edition, which I purchased in New York back in March.
Also up there are two copies of The Fox and The Star by Coralie Bickford-Smith. I have the hardback and the paperback because I adore foxes and I adore the author’s art.
Finally, we have a teeny little copy of The Tale of Mrs. Tiggy-Winkle by Beatrix Potter. My mum adores Beatrix Potter, and when I saw her favourite character in a second-hand and antique bookshop I frequent for £6 I HAD to buy it for her. Now, you may be wondering why it lives in my room… My mum isn’t the most… caring of her books. She loves her kindle and doesn’t store her books well. This is an old edition, which someone received in 1940 as a gift going by the inscription. It is also a 1905 first edition.
There is NO WAY I am letting such a precious book be lost in a pile of random stuff and probably get damaged so it’s staying right where I can see it!
 
I used to separate my TBR from my read books but I have since scrapped this and keep all my books together and focus on how they fit with each other on the shelf.
 
Moving down I have three shelves of series. The first is fantasy/thriller type books, featuring Shadowhunters and Miss Peregrine. The next is a mixture of the above and other YA series that I own all/most of but is mostly contemporary, and finally we have an abundance of first books in a series that I don’t own the rest of with a side of ‘I somehow have book one and five?’ This shelf is organised alphabetically by title.
 
We then have my random af shelf which was supposed to be for books adapted into musical theatre but right now it’s my Gregory Maguire collection – minus Wicked… you know, the book that was adapted. Then we have the US and UK editions of Ron Chernow’s Hamilton biography, along with the Hamiltome and beside that are a few copies of Les Miserables by Victor Hugo. Somewhere I have Gaston Leroux’s The Phantom of the Opera also.
 
Moving on we’ve got my signed book collection along with my four copies of On the Other Side my Carrie Hope Fletcher (unsigned but I had nowhere else for them!) and on the shelf below we have non-fiction with a teeny tiny poetry section. My Non-Fic is arranged as biography/memoir, mental health/sexuality and then feminism.
 
The last shelf is one I can barely see but I’m sure it’s mostly hardback but also features some books that I don’t really care for that much so are just thrown down there – whoops.
 
Moving UP now. The wall shelf above the little bookcase is my Harry Potter shelf, which I’m quite proud of! I have my original copies of the series, plus Fantastic Beasts and Cursed Child and also a special edition Philosopher’s Stone that I won in a give away. I have a copy of Tales of Beedle the Bard and lying on top of my books is the gorgeous illustration I received in an OwlCrate. Of course, I own a bunch of Pop! Figures that I adore along with a Slytherin Badge (house pride!!), a snitch bracelet and a lightning scar necklace that I adore.
 
Below, I store my OwlCrate books on the top of the small bookcase in the order I received them (although I’m running out of room so will need to figure out what to do in a month or two!) and then we move on to my standalone paperbacks! These three shelves are colour coordinated with no other organisation at all. It kills me a little but I’m more bothered by how things look at the moment so the fact they have no reason to be in the spot they are is fine by me (for now!), and the final shelf is full of adult fiction and YA standalone paperbacks that are too tall for the other shelves.
 
To end, we have my other wall shelf, which may just be my favourite. This is the shelf where I keep my Wicked collection. As of this post going live I have seven copies of Maguire’s version of the Wicked Witch of the West’s story! I’m by no means a high fantasy fan, and the politics involved often bore me, but for some reason Maguire is one of my favourite authors and although I’ve only read the first two books in the series, The Wicked Years series will always be my most treasured in my collection.
 
And that’s that! How do you guys store your books? I’m planning a “ways to organise your bookshelves” post so if you have any creative/unique ways you think I should mention do let me know down in the comments!

P.S Sorry the post is late!! I did plan to add pictures but I was home later than anticipated and they just didn't work out how I wanted to *sigh* - soon I'll get some visual content back in my posts!!