Dear Reader,
Strictly speaking, there is a rule that every time you bring a book into your home, you have to donate one somewhere. But that’s not a rule I’m enforcing until I run out of space on my bookshelves and coffee tables and have to pile my books on the floor in huge, wobbly piles.
Granted, I don’t have an errand to go to the library’s twice-yearly book sale often, but I do. (I once volunteered there just to be one of the early shoppers.)
What will you find there? All. A few years ago, I obtained her tattered 1957 manual, Better Homes & Gardens Handyman’s Book, and use it as a reference for basic home repairs. Last year, I bought a gorgeously illustrated little book called The ABCs of Cocktails, published 60 years ago. Among them were Cuban apricots, clover club and many other drinks I had never heard of, and a strange cookbook called Massive Recipes. ‘ was published in 1951 and instructed readers on how to make, say, 50 servings of beetroot cocktails. (Aside: Almost all the cookbooks on sale at these sales are fascinating, especially those self-published by church groups and clubs. I read them all. “Never again!” I scribbled a ranch fridge salad recipe from a crumbling Junior League cookbook.)
But the best finds are tattered paperbacks, novels you never read or knew you needed.
—Tina Jordan
Last year I bought two of Rex Stout’s famous Nero Wolf Mysteries, but I hadn’t read them yet. After that, I learned that there were dozens of them, but the ones I got were the novella No. 13, “And Be a Villain,” and No. 30, “And For To Go.” was. It sucked that I didn’t start from number 1 (I’m the sort of person who reads in order), but I jumped in. I fell in love with Wolf immediately. Wolfe is a grump who hates to leave his plush 35th Street brownstone home, where he feasts on rare orchids while solving crimes with his sidekick Archie Goodwin. , eat a large amount of gourmet food prepared by Chef Fritz. The mysteries in these two books are fairly standard ones, such as cyanide poisoning, but Wolfe is charming, with yellow silk pajamas, a comfy chair, and an unusual fondness for the word “flah hula.” A grand and eccentric detective. Sir Peter Wimsey and Hercule Poirot look pale and dull in comparison.
Kindly read: Dorothy Sayers, Louise Penny, Josephine Tay, James PD
Available from: Libraries and bookstores (but may require ordering). I found the audio version, which is great.
Well this was something I found at a real library sale. It’s a satirical novel skewering the inner workings of a fictional book review that closely resembles a New York Times book review, written by a man who was a New York newspaper editor for many years. Timesbook review. (He took early retirement after his first two chapters were published in The Nation magazine, later stating that he “made up the facts, but not the spirit.”)
An introduction to the stuffy, starchy world of 1980s literary criticism might not sound glamorous, but The Belles Lettres Papers is edgy and fun, with barely-veiled characters and plenty of it. is full of publishing scandals. The Times criticized the book under the headline “Does Anyone Know? There are many references to well-known writers and critics.” To other writers and critics, many sharpened thorns and tinkling clefs. “
Kindly read: Book industry novels such as “The Man on the Third Floor” by Anne Bernays. “Three Martini Ranch” by Suzanne Lindell. And Chris Pavone’s “The Accident”
Available from: library
Why not…
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become More lurkers? London thief Lara Mayclem sifted through the rubble that had piled up on the banks of the Thames when the tide was out, and collected historical items such as Roman brooches, Elizabethan coins, medieval shoe buckles and Tudor shoes. find gems. But you don’t have to live near a river to watch larks, as she explains in her “Lark Field Guide.” kicked out. …the world is full of overlooked wonders, all it takes is slowing down slowly enough to find them. “
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get completely completely lost In The Master Theorem: A Book of Puzzles, Intrigue and Wit, it’s very demonic. largely Cause an escape room panic?
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take a bite From “Philip Sparrow Tells All: Lost Essays by Writer, Professor, Tattoo Artist, Samuel Steward,” published in the Illinois Dental Journal in the 1940s – from cryptography and bodybuilding to Gertrude Stein, Chicago, ballet, and men’s Covering everything down to fashion, these medium, melancholy Sedaris-esque pieces promise to be toothless and toothless.
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