Hunting and Gathering

I took a page out of Lesa's book (I'm so corny, how can you stand it?) and went Goodwill hunting today. Wait, I mean yesterday. I didn't fare quite as well as she did (I paid nearly twice as much for the same number of books) but since we're talking $8 for seven books, I'd say I still had a pretty good haul! I might have been able to find free Kindle versions for some of these, but please bear in mind I'm trying to ignore that possibility.

From top to bottom, here are the seven:

1. The Jungle by Upton Sinclair. I think this is a book that my 8th grade class read without me. (My parents so conveniently managed to ban me from half my life.) It doesn't sound especially fun, but there must be something interesting about it if my parents wouldn't let me read it.

2. The World According to Mister Rogers by Fred Rogers. Because I don't believe all of the awful rumors about him, and I have fond memories of his neighborhood.

3. Invisible Man by Ralph Ellison. This one is kind of like The Jungle (except for the part about my parents): not fun, but good for me.

4. Tom Jones by Henry Fielding. One from my wish list! I hadn't realized what a fatty it is . . .

5. The Reader by Bernhard Schlink. I watched the first half of this movie at the end of a three-and-a-half-movie airplane flight. (I was on my way home and I'd already used up all of the books I'd brought with me.) The movie looked pretty intriguing. I'm not sure why I've never tried to watch the rest of it.

6. Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann. Some (like Brenna) say this book is amazing, and others (like Leah) say it's a little tedious, but for a dollar I can afford to decide for myself. Not surprisingly, I'm a little bit afraid to read it (what if I agree with Leah?) but when I conquer my fear it will be waiting for me.

7. The Water Babies by Charles Kingsley. Another wish-lister! I may read this to my kids, once I finish one or two of the three books we have going currently. The cover of the copy I bought isn't quite as charming as the one pictured here, but I hope the inside is.

If I had to pick my next read from this stack, I would probably start with #5. But between book club books and my mental (in more ways than one) list of "I want to read that next" books, it's just going to have to get in line and wait its turn. If it were British it would know how to queue, but as it is I'll just have to keep my fingers crossed and hope for the best.

Which of these have you read? Which did you love? If you feel I should move one of these right up to the teetering tippy-top of my TBR pile, persuade away.

As if I need any more books to read . . .

I have ordered two new books from Paperbackswap. And when I say new books, I mean new books! Hardcovers, even! Paperbackswap occasionally buys overstocks of a certain title and then makes them available to members at a great price. These are two books that were on my wish list but, had I waited for a swap, it would very likely have taken years to get a copy of each.

First up is The Melting Season by Jami Attenberg. I heard of this book from a reviewlet I saw in one of those fluffy brainless magazines nearly a year ago. I have no recollection of the review's content, but something in it must have caught my interest. And since I am never immune to book recommendations, regardless of the source, it went on my list. I don't know what the book is about and I kind of like it that way.

Just now I ordered a copy of The Distant Hours by Kate Morton. I am not quite sure how it is that Paperbackswap is able to mail out copies of this one when it's scheduled for release on November 9th of this year, but shhhh, please don't tell anyone. If it's a mistake, I don't want them to figure it out until they've already shipped my copy.

The Distant Hours was quite a bit more expensive than other new books I've ordered from Paperbackswap, but at only 10 cents more than the Kindle version (which I couldn't get for nearly two more months anyway) I went ahead and ponied up. I don't have any idea what this one is about either, but after how much I enjoyed The House at Riverton (and how much I expect to enjoy The Forgotten Garden), I figured there was a pretty good chance this would be a good one too.

Is it as clear to you as it is to me that I am collecting books at a far faster rate than I am reading them? Thoreau is reported to have said, "Read the best books first, or you may not have a chance to read them all." I'm beginning to fear that will be true for me, even if I manage to stick with only the best.

Topping Off the Leaning Tower of Books

This week I have been given two more books to add to my dangerous stack of TBR.

First, From Dawn to Decadence: 500 Years of Cultural Life by Jacques Barzun. This book was given to me as a thank-you gift for reading Tom Wright's manuscripts. At 802 great big pages jam-packed with information, this is a book I'm going to have to put myself on a schedule to read (for instance, ten minutes a day for the next THREE YEARS). It looks a whole lot like a textbook. I expect to learn quite a bit from it.

Inside the Third Reich: Memoirs by Albert Speer. My mom bought this book for a quarter during her trip to Maine last month. She finished reading it on the way here for her Labor Day visit, and asked if I wanted to read it. This was just after I was told that Sam Taylor was reading The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich by William L. Shirer. (I almost put that book on my TBR list, more because I thought it was something I ought to read than because it sounded like fun . . . but I didn't.) However, apparently the universe is conspiring against me and wants me to read about Hitler's Germany. Fortunately this book is "only" 619 pages.

These two great big doorstops are both the sort of book that I would love to just rest on my forehead and absorb by osmosis. I don't expect to enjoy reading them, but I want to know all of the information they contain. Perhaps someday I will. Meanwhile, I may need to put them at the bottom of the Tower, if only for safety reasons.

Meanwhile, there is one more book that I have added to my wish list, but it is not a part of my Leaning Tower because I haven't gotten a copy yet. The Tower will need to shrink some first, which will definitely include the reading of something Fun and maybe even Light (both in subject matter and in physical mass) as soon as Anna Karenina will let me.

Anyway, the newest book on my list is The Canon: The Beautiful Basics of Science by Natalie Angier. I heard about it when Nymeth reviewed it here. I have my BS in a science, but if there were anyone in charge of gauging information retention, I'm afraid they would take my degree away from me. Anything I don't use on a regular basis has completely flown out of my head. Not only that, but we have already established that physics makes no sense to me. This book sounds like a great way to review what I should know and learn things I never did grasp.

Added to my wish list

Inspired by Allie's retrospective on the books she has marked off her list over the past year, I thought I might flip that idea on its head and tell you about the books I've recently added to my Leaning Tower of TBR. I have not yet acquired copies of the first four, but they're the most recent titles I've added to my List of Books I Want to Read.

The Vanishing by Tim Krabbe. I think what sold me on this one is the way Chris described it as "terrifying" with a "masterful use of suspense." I must admit that hearing it is short was also quite appealing to one who is STILL floundering in the middle of Anna Karenina.

My Name is Memory by Ann Brashares. I've avoided other titles by Brashares ever since The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants (not that it was a horrible book; it just was not quite my type, though it might have been if I were twelve), but when Zara said Memory was even better than The Time Traveler's Wife, I changed my mind.

The Book of Lost Things by John Connellly. We have already established that I love fairy tale retellings.  As if that weren't enough, Jess's description of the story as "far freakier" than Pan's Labyrinth really caught my attention.

Rock Island Line by David Rhodes. The tipping point with this one was probably when Lisa said it was "dark and brilliant at the same time." The story she relates of the author is also pretty compelling.

The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton. Renae chose this for our Book Club meeting in October. Unless it's just my literary amnesia getting in the way, I don't recall that I've ever read anything by Wharton, although I've had this one and Ethan Frome on my TBR list for ages. Not only that, but I actually own a 1907 edition of Madame de Treymes which I've not read. Shame on me! I'll need to do something about that soon.