I read a lot of books in the tub. Since I only buy clearance books from the used book store, my budget is small. When I’m done, I simply donate them back. I could stand around for an hour and wait for them to ultimately offer me $1.78 for 45 books, but I prefer to just drop the boxes off and leave. The one I finished today was “In Such Good Company” by Carol Burnett. Only $3 and I read it while my husband was at his cardiac therapy. Next up: The Art of Racing in the Rain.
Let’s Make Mary.
Ah, the joy of a pun–from “making merry” and having fun, to “Let’s Make Mary” have non-consensual sex! Who wouldn’t enjoy a book about how to pressure a woman into intimacy?
Amazon still sells the book of eight easy lessons with various covers (unexpurgated, which means offensive). I’m a pretty anti-PC dame myself, but that first cover is horrendous. I can’t imagine what’s inside.
P.S. They really don’t use books any more. At least not here. Our school district leases Lenovo laptops to students once they enter middle school and they can continue with the same one for years. Families pay for them yearly. Back in my day, we were issued used textbooks and we covered them with paper ads, such as Mrs. Baird’s bakery or Big Red. We had to fold them just right at the corners to keep them in place.
This is one I’ve actually kept for 40 years. Any of you recall doing this with paper bags?
As many of you know, I judge all my books by their covers. The only books I purchase are in the clearance $1-$3 section at Half Price Books, chosen firstly by their spines, then their covers, and then the summaries on the inside cover. I read them in a matter of weeks and donate them back to the store when I’m done. I haven’t bought a retail book from Barnes & Noble in over a decade. Why pay $25 for a book when you could eat enchiladas and have a frosty Coke?
So today, as I perused the clearance section, this little book caught my eye with its bright colors, still vivid since 1933. Isn’t it scandalous? I didn’t buy it because it’s not my fictional cup of tea, but I thought I should share its fun cover. Evidently, the author enjoyed the desert. And whoever does buy it will snag it for only three bucks!
before tablets
before Kindle
before Barnes & Noble and the now-defunct Borders
there were libraries
and corner bookstores
and meg ryan did not work in them but that was okay
there was no coffee, no chai, no biscotti
no wi-fi
but boys and girls could meet there and look at each other when they spoke
and touch globes and point to countries they would visit
one day
and grab a paperback and get lost in it so that they forgot all sense of time.
I Don't Get It 