Last Monday my mother-in-law and I made the trek to her favorite used bookstore, Paperbacks Unlimited. She had two bags of books for credit, I had three. She hadn’t been there in a while, and went wild–I think she got over 20 books. Definitely the kid-in-a-candy-store vibe going on. I got 8 books; not because I didn’t want more but because I was trying to hold back. If I don’t want to reverse the flow of incoming/outgoing books completely, but I do want to slow the rate.
After I used part of my $63 in store credit, I paid $18 for what I got. Two of them were in the science fiction section and I didn’t bring my little card with my sci-fi credit on it, so I paid full used price for those. Still a deal.
Here’s what I got:
- A Michael Swanwick: Bones of the Earth
- A Paul Preuss: Secret Passages. I read this when it came out. In fact I think I have a signed first edition, but it was an impulse buy.
- A Lee Child Jack Reacher thriller
- Two John Connolly Charlie Parker thrillers
- Two PC Tracy Monkeewrench mysteries (another author that Terry Weyna introduced me to. Thanks, Terry!)
- Lily Dale; a nonfiction book about a small town in upstate New York that is populated by spiritualists. Every summer they have Camp Days, and thousands of tourists come to town for seances. My friend L saw a documentary about this town a few months ago. When I saw the book, it seemed like an omen.
Eight books, eighteen dollars. I can’t think of a much better deal unless it involved free chocolate.
I’d say that’s a nice haul. I have the Swanwick, though I haven’t read it yet. I love his short stories but the only novel I’ve read of his didn’t thrill me.
I think free chocolate only happens on your birthday.
The documentary is called “No One Dies in Lily Dale.” I highly recommend it. No I’ll go check out abebooks and amazon for a copy of “Lily Dale.”
It’s always nice to know that I’ve convinced someone else to read a book I loved!