A little late now, but have I told you about the wonders of PDF books? Searchable, fit thousands of them on a hard drive, and cheaper, too! I am a recovering book addict, but between the Kindle app and various PDF options, I'm getting the help I need. If there was a good way to move my paperback novels to PDF, I'd be set.
I treat my hardcopy books very well, but even I had this problem from time to time. I usually ended up getting the disintegrating book coil bound at FedExOffice (formerly Kinkos). It preserves the book and allows you to open it flat on a table or even to open it all the way around for halved tablespace, which is nice.