The other day, my wife showed me this picture from The Magnolia Journal, a magazine “containing inspiration for life and home”:

Huh, looks like having huge piles of books on your stairs is cool now.

That’s funny – BECAUSE I BASICALLY INVENTED THIS IDEA. You might remember this from my post The Top 10 Piles of Books at My House back in 2015.

See?

I took the fact that a popular lifestyle journal completely stole my idea the only way one could – that I am an interior design visionary. Simply put, I see trends in home decor before non-visionaries (everyone else).

So now that I’m walking around with a (completely deserved) puffed-out chest, rightfully thinking Martha Steward ain’t got nothin’ on me, allow me to show you a few of my other book decorating tips. Look for them in national lifestyle magazines soon – but never forget who was one step ahead of the game.

For summer, I like this playful stack of picture books. The trick is to put it somewhere that other members of the house find very inconvenient. Move it when you get complaints, then let it pile back up by early fall, incorporating orange, brown, and red-covered books.

Or you could slowly add to a number of piles all around a chair until you are encased in them and unable to escape. I call this stacking technique the Edgar Allen Poe, so named because of his short story The Cask of Amontillado, where a man buries his enemy alive with bricks and mortar.

If you really want to push the envelope, try this edgy pile in the middle of an otherwise clean, typical room. Guests will be delighted and confused.

What are your book decorating secrets?