Pinthetic? Bookends as floating bookshelves

I recently switched bedrooms with my children and so I've been spending some time redecorating it with Pinterest inspired projects.  One of these projects was this floating book, bookshelf idea.

Here's the original pin:

 

Now the original pin didn't have any instructions, but it seemed simple enough.  Get a metal bookend, screw it to the wall, add books and Bob's your uncle you're rocking out some sweet floating bookshelves right?  Well not quite.  But I got it accomplished:

 

 When I started planning on actually putting it together I asked myself, "How the hell is the bottom cover of that book attached to the bookend Also, as a sad consequence of the current state of our economy, the local Bookends R Us store went out of business so I couldn't even find a bookend that would work for this project.

I'm sure maybe I could have found something online but I have no patience so I just went to my local hardware store and found the thinnest metal brace I could find.  This was from the decking section and is intended to secure the posts to the frame or something along those lines.  It was around $4.

 

 I also got some small screws (about 1/2 inch long) and a lovely hard cover book from the dollar store. I had come up with several scenarios as to how to possibly attach the book to the bracket so that it wouldn't be permanent, but they all just seemed too complex.  I also contemplated just using some double sided tape or other semi-removable adhesive so that the bottom book could be removed, but since I knew I'd have other books stacked on top of it, I really wanted that bottom book securely fastened to the brace. 

 So if you attempt this project just bite the bullet and find some cheap book you don't care about, but like the cover of.  I removed the dust jacket, marked the center of the cover and just screwed the bracket directly into the book.  My screws went through the cover and a little bit into the pages to make it nice and secure. 

 Now all you need to do is slip the dust jacket back on to your book.  Mark and cut out a section from the back flap and then pry up the edges of the pages and slide it back in. This covers up your bracket and screws.

Then it's just a matter of screwing your bracket to the wall, adding your books and topping it with a gnome or two.  It's a requirement people, everything is better with gnomes!

Not bad eh?