Alphabetizing your ABCs

A shelfie of our Head Alien’s current collection of alphabet books, organized as listed below!

So the bookish weirdness that we embrace here at the Butterflies & Aliens Library means that, among other things, Recreational Shelf Organizing borders on a competitive sport. It definitely ranks as a beloved pastime. The who, what, and wherefores of how we sort, store, and display our bookish collections provides much fuel for discussion and debate, as well as hours of entertainment.

Overall, my system here at the north branch of Butterflies & Aliens generally defaults to a) genre or topic, then b) alphabetical by author’s last name, and finally c) order of publication, but with series grouped together. For my fiction section, probably my largest overall, this works especially well, for the most part. But as I get into some of my more arcane personal classifications, it can get a bit more complicated. So I recognize that, sometimes, special circumstances require special handling, and that there are no hard and fast rules.

And yet I have had, and will doubtless continue to have, heated debates with friends about whether or not you should ever organize your books by colour. I was horrified to learn of a home decor trend a few years back of shelving books spine in, for “creating a cohesive color (sic) palette on your bookshelf,” but then turned around and suggested it to a friend. And meanwhile, a good portion of my books are still ‘organized’ using the “I’m pretty sure I know which pile on the floor it’s in” method. The fact that I keep accidentally buying second copies of books I already own (as opposed to deliberately buying multiple copies of books that I already own… which is a whole other topic) pretty much tells you how that’s working out.

But through all that, it never occurred to me that my most contentious challenge would be with what, at first blush, seemed like it ought to be the easiest thing of all: alphabetizing my collection of alphabet books.

As mentioned before, Recreational Shelf Organizing brings me joy. So as my collection of alphabet books began pushing its current shelf limits, I figured I’d reorganize them, integrate the ones piled on top, and see if a move to a larger shelfish home would be warranted.

Well didn’t that just open up a can of w is for worms.

Is “ABC” one word? Does “A is” go before “ABC”? Should “Alphabeast” go before or after “Alpha Block”? Is it “Alpha Block” or “Alphablock”? And what the heck even is the proper title for this one?

Turns out, the Wikipedia article for “Alphabetical order” is one of the longer ones I’ve ever read. But on the particularly pertinent topic of the “treatment of multiword strings,” I still had two options:

1. all strings are ordered initially according to their first word, as in the sequence:
   Oak; Oak Hill; Oak Ridge; Oakley Park; Oakley River

2. strings are alphabetized as if they had no spaces, giving the sequence:
   Oak; Oak Hill; Oakley Park; Oakley River; Oak Ridge

Floating this question on social media resulted in a spirited conversation that raised a variety of opinions, not the least of which was why I was even doing this:

The real question is, why would you? I don't think I ever have in my life!

I must be a monster who does not bother alphabetizing my book collection?

Who the pluck alphabetizes books?

Others chimed in with the own tactics, suggestions, and questions:

Topic or genre, author, publication date and/or order in series. By the time I've got all that sorted, there's no room for alphabetizing titles.

I do by author on my shelves, but separate anthologies from novels.

honestly I don't really organize my personal books. Way, way too many in this house for that.

because I have, er, several bookshelves in various rooms, I put favourite authors near me and merely-beloved in other rooms.

Now for the question I've been wondering about: how does one alphabetize a phrase with contractions? "I'll be There", "I Love to Tell", "I Want to Be" OR "I Love to Tell", "I Want to Be", "I'll Be There" ? (Author’s note: Dodged that bullet this time!)

what about organizing by colour? You could have the most beautiful rainbow on your shelves! haha

definitely scenario #1, otherwise your brain will explode.

Then came the pithiest of all the comments: I press the sort button.

Another friend, genius of spreadsheets, provided further advice and guidance which, by all rights as a fifteen-year veteran of corporate IT, I already knew but had apparently compartmentalized — side bonus to this whole discussion: discovering a bit of a personal blind spot about letting my digital and analog worlds interact.

But no more.

So without further ado, the list of my current alphabet books as alphabetized by Excel. My bookish/librarian soul will rest easier this night.

• A is for Activist

• A is for Adultery, Angst, and Adults Only

• A is for Angry: An Animal and Adjective Alphabet

• A is for Asteroids, Z is for Zombies

• A is for Salad

• The A to Z of Lipstick

• abc apple pie

• The ABCs of Adulthood: An Alphabet of Life Lessons

• ABCs of Kindness

• The Absolutely Awful Alphabet

• Alligators All Around: An Alphabet

• Alpha Block

• Alpha Bravo Charlie: A Military Alphabet

• Alphabeasts

• An Alphabet of Hugs

• The Alphabet of the Human Heart

• Alphabet Under Construction

• Alphabetique

• Animalia

• An Annoying ABC

• A Bad Kitty Christmas

• Bob and Larry's ABC's

• Click, Clack, Quackity-Quack

• The Dangerous Alphabet

• Dr. Seuss's ABC

• Eh? To Zed: A Canadian ABeCedarium

• Ella Minnow Pea: A Novel in Letters

• Encyclopedia of a Broken Heart: Poems

• The End of the Alphabet

• The Gashlycrumb Tinies

• Gone Wild: An Endangered Animal Alphabet

• Harold's ABC

• if rocks could sing: a discovered alphabet

• LMNO pea-quel

• M is for Maple: A Canadian Alphabet

• Mrs. Peanuckle's Vegetable Alphabet

• My Feminist ABC

• A Northern Alphabet

• Once Upon an Alphabet: Short Stories for All the Letters

• One Letter Words: A Dictionary

• P is for Pterodactyl: The Worst Alphabet Book Ever

• Portmanteau A–Z: An Alphabet of Portmanteau Words

• Sign Language ABC

• Spirituality from A to Z

• The Steampunk Alphabet

• T is for TARDIS

• The Turn-Around, Upside-Down Alphabet Book

• The Ultimate Alphabet

• Uncle Shelby's ABZ Book: A Primer for Adults Only

• V is for Vegan: The ABCs of Being Kind

• V is for Vulnerable: Life Outside the Comfort Zone, An ABC for Grownups

• What I Hate from A to Z

• What Pete Ate from A–Z (Really!)

• Z is for Moose

Happy Organizing!

– Winston

[ update: if you found this interesting, check out our follow-up post: Starting with our ABCs… ]

[ a further update: a current catalogue of our Alphabet Book Collection can now be found through The Catalogue Projects page. ]