In my library system I'm allowed 15 reserves, and normally I keep that list very close to the maximum. (It was 10 for a while before the NY Public Library smiled upon me once more.) Sometimes, this resulted in my having 5-6 books to pick up in one trip, all non-renewable, all things I really wanted to read. Bad news! Poor unbookening!
Enter the freeze button.
(Hey Elizabeth! This is next month's book club book. I wish I had remembered to grab my copy when I was at home.)
Freeze allows you to add books to your hold list without getting closer to the top of the pile -- essentially a "not right now" feature. In the NYPL system, you hit the freeze check mark and then "Modify Selected" to confirm your choice. You can 'unfreeze' at any time by reversing the process. So what you can do, which is to say what I do, is unfreeze some books you want right away, then unfreeze a few more. I don't know how this works exactly; it's just one of life's great mysteries.
Granted, as long as you have 15 books listed you aren't able to add any more, and the odd book slips through the cracks still, like Dan Barry's BOTTOM OF THE 33RD, which I just had to return without rereading because I didn't get to it before it was due. Still, it's a huge help and you should go play with your local library's web interface (If your library still doesn't do online requests or renewals, I sympathize. In the last place I lived before NYC I had online requests at my local library, but when the book came in a librarian would call me on the phone. Every time. For added funtimes the librarians would call me at work, because they didn't want to spend the long-distance dollars to call my cell phone. I must have sounded So Busy And Important. All of which is to say, I believe you will get there.)
