booktastic

I had a stroke of book-related good luck day before yesterday. On my way down the hallway to my office, I happened to notice signs up in the hallway indicating that there would be a book sale in the building at some point that day. I’m not entirely clear on my way around the building so I thought no more of it until my office mate pointed out that it was at the conference room right across from our office, and would I like to head over there with her during lunch?

I have no objection to book sales (even though money is tight right now) although I had no idea what sort of books they might be; I have wide-ranging inerests, but I do have my limits.  But regardless I headed over with her at noon and we perused the tables.

Well, this is where it took a turn for the delightful. For one thing, the prices were exceedingly reasonable: if the original cover price were up to $10, the price of the book was $1; if the original cover price up to $20 the book was $2 and so on. For another thing - the tables were covered and overflowing with brand new books. Well, perhaps not brand-new - some were a year or two old - but most were within the first year and a half since publication. And for another thing - there was a pretty decent selection!

Turns out that the book critics at the newspaper (I’m purposefully not saying which Chicago newspaper to avoid being stalked - and because they’ve been in the news for other reasons lately and I don’t want to give them any more trouble) receive any number of free books from publishing companies every year for review purposes - but they feel it’s not in their journalistic integrity to actually keep the books (as it smacks a little of bribery in their opinion; not in mine but that’s neither here nor there) so every year they have this big book sale and donate the money to charity. (Let’s not even discuss whether selling books that are labeled “Not To Be Sold” is better than keeping a book that a publisher sent you to keep. I guess since it goes to charity it’s okay.)

Perhaps the best (and worst) thing about the sale was… this sale isn’t  open to the public, not really. It’s on an upper floor of the building and you can’t just walk in here - you need a special pass to get past the security guys. So it was really only employees who got to pick over the tables.

If only I had more time and a bigger budget! I could have spent hours there - and spent considerably more than the $21 dollars I wound up spending. (And I only had $20 in birthday money on me - I had to borrow that last dollar from my office mate.)

It strikes me suddenly that it may seem like I’m gloating - “I got to go to the super secret book sale and you didn’t!” kind of thing. That was not intended: I simply offer this as an interesting book-related story (and let you know so that if you happen to be in the area - and have a pass to get into a certain Chicago newspaper building - at this time next year, you should totally come to this sale). I also did want to share what it was that I picked up - as you are some of the few people who will appreciate my finds, as they are rather eclectic. I found:

Home to Holly Springs by Jan Karon

Genius and Heroin by Michael Largo

Stop Whining and Start Living by Dr. Laura Schlessinger

The Man Who Invented Christmas by Les Sandiford

Foyle’s Philavery by Christopher Foyle

Plato and a Platypus Walk Into a Bar … by Thomas Cathcart

Oscar Wilde and a Game Called Murder by Gyles Brandreth

I also picked up a couple other books, but I’m not talking about them because they are going to be finding their ways under my Christmas tree this year. (No, I’m not giving them to myself, in case you were wondering.) — Mrs. Hall

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