I've got an illness, folks...

[Violet]

*sighs* OK, OK, you got me. So if I absolutely *have* to choose some books (on the asumption that, having been shipwreched and marooned, I would have the time and wherewithal to make such selections ) i would probably go with

1. The complete Wheel of Time series by Robert Jordan, including the upcoming posthumous release of the series' concluding work, A Memory of Light. The #1 best high fantasy novels I have ever read, bar none.

2. Agrees with the complete works of Terry Pratchett.

3. Agrees with the complete works of William Shakespeare.

4. The complete Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice (Interview with the Vampire, et al)

5. As many H. P. Lovecraft novels as I can stuff into a skirt

6. The complete Dune chronicles by Frank Herbert.

7. The complete Robots/Terran Empire/Foundation novels by Isaac Asimov (yes, the 3 series were eventually folded into one continuous chronicle so it still counts!)

8. As many Robert Heinlein novels as I can stuff into a blouse

9. As many Stephen King novels as I can fit into a corset

10. A complete manual on how to build a working laptop, satellite uplink, and solar/wind generator out of coconuts.

[Kay]

10. A complete manual on how to build a working laptop, satellite uplink, and solar/wind generator out of coconuts.

Kay

[CJ]

Hi all,

Well, here I go again.

We recently had to move to a temporary pad elsewhere in the building so that renovations could be done to our apartment. As they had to redo the floors, we had to take everything down from the fifth floor to the third floor and then, two weeks later, bring everything back up to the fifth floor. Including the friggin' books and bookshelves.

Yep, the ton o' books became an issue again. I just have too damn many of those critters. Those and the DVDs, too (about 650 titles, which fit neatly into five huge boxes).

I very nearly broke my back lugging my fine paper friends from floor to floor. Fine paper friends? More like balls and chains. And more balls and chains.

Well, at the very least I got another six or seven boxes of throwaways/giveaways/sell-offs out of the move. Not bad.

I looked over my list of desert island tomes; I don't think it'd change all that much. I might consider bringing along The Lord of the Rings, Jordan's Wheel of Time and Tad Williams's Otherland series with me. Those, and the Everyman's Library hardcover edition of The Stories of Ray Bradbury (a book that "weighs in" at a healthy 1,059 pages). Oh, and I'd cart along Clive Barker's Imajica, too.

Latest purchase: Darwin's Bastards: Astounding Tales from Tomorrow, edited by Zsuzsi Gartner. This is a science-fiction anthology exhibiting the talent of such speculative fiction luminaries as Douglas Coupland, William Gibson, and Yann Martel, amongst others. You'll get a taste from the description on the back cover: "Twenty-three dazzling stories take us on a twisted, wild ride into some future times and parallel universes where characters as diverse as an ethnomusicologist searching for Feist in a post-celebrity world; a one-legged, international actuarial forensics specialist; a pharmaceutical guinea pig; and a far-sighted fetus play for keeps in their own games of the survival of the fittest." So far (about halfway into it), a good read.

As an aside: if I were a character in Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 (say, Montag), which book would I "be"? Easy: Fahrenheit 451, of course!

Read on, folks! Don't let the reading of actual books become a lost art!

Love,
CJ

[Paula G]

Well how did I miss this before. I'm far too lazy to count but I just messured 5 meters of cookery books in my study, and they are nearly all mine, the "Boss's" are down stairs in the kitchen on top of the fridge, since she actually cooks from them. On dessert island disks they get to the complete works of Shakespear and the Bible, and then have to choose ONE book. How can you choose? I have often thought about The Lord of the Rings because it's so long, but I havn't read that for years. These days I mostly just read for entertainment so a lot of Terry Pratchet, and anything by Unberto Echo, but just 12!
1 The Bible, can I have the NIV Study Bible with all the articles and Concordance please.
2 Larosse Gastronomique (first or second English edition, before it got silly)
3 The Lord of the Rings
4 the Complete H G Wells short stories
5 The Mayor of Casterbridge I would have to have at least one Hardy
6 The Narnia Tales
7 The Complete Narbonic set by Shaenon Garrity - which reminds me I need to get the latest Skin Horse book.
8 The Don Camillo Omnibus by Giovanni Guareschi (This is getting realy hard!)
9 Captain Hornblower
10 Barchester Towers
11 The Mort Trilogy (Terry Pratchet)
12 and finaly - erm - I think I would like the RHS enciclopedia of Gardening

Mind you it would be a differnt 12 on another day

[Kyra]

Book-worms Unite!

First, you must know that I'm an avid reader as well, and Science fiction (IMO) is the absolute best type of material with which to nourish the mind.

Many many moons ago, when I was in my teens, I happened across a nice little book by a mostly unknown auther, Paul O. Williams. The book was titled "The Breaking of Northwall" and I enjoyed reading it. It wasn't Hugo or Nebula material, but I enjoyed the story nonetheless. It was the first in a series (or so it stated on the back cover). So when I finished, I went back to the bookstore and inquired about the next in the series. The shopkeeper looked on her trusty Microfiche machine and didn't find any continuation. Furthermore, she found no other novels by said author. I was disappointed, but figured maybe he just hadn't finished book #2. I waited a month or two and then inquired again. Sadly, no, she didn't see anything new. Again, I waited...and again I was told "nothing new". This went on for probably a year or so. After a while, I quit asking and wondered what happened to the author and/or the continuation of the story. (Nowadays, we have Google and Wikipedia! Back then...nada.) I was a bit disappointed, but oh well, that's life.
So the one book I had was stuffed into a box with many other books I read and kept. Through the years, the box was pushed further and further into the "mountain of clutter" (a.k.a. - basement or attic storage). A few years ago, I was rummaging through the clutter and found my old box of books. I decided to give quite a few to a second hand book store. I looked at "The Breaking of Northwall" with a final sigh and hoped some young mind would find it as enjoyable as I did.
Then, last November, while looking through another second hand book store, I saw, staring me in the face like a big huge neon sign...not one or two, but SIX (!) volumes of the series all sitting near the checkout counter. I looked them over counting again: books 2 through 7! I scooped them up, enthusiastically paid the cashier (a whopping 6 dollars) and practically flew home, eager to dive in!
I thought to myself as I drove home, "I should re-read the first novel before moving on to book 2" as it has been many years since I first read it.
Then it dawned on me. I donated it. In rapid succession, I went through denial, heartache, anger and disappointment. How could I have been so foolish! By the time I arrived home, I was visibly upset. I went through the motions of checking the storage boxes, not at all surprised when I didn't find it there. I was totally bummed. Over the next few weeks I started scouring used bookstores, goodwill, even the local library with no luck.
Late January, I went back to the bookstore I originally donated the book to and guess what I found sitting on the shelf. There, sitting in all its glory was the original book. (I honestly don't know if it was my copy or not.)
I was elated! I paid the $1.25 and bounced out of the store. Well, I've re-read the first one and I'm now up to the third volume.

I just felt like sharing my little story with you. Oddly enough, I checked Amazon earlier today and sure enough, they have all seven books available. LOL!


(Live and learn, Kyra...live and learn!)

[Susan]

Kyra

A great little story that echoes one on my authors. Sterling Lanier wrote Hiero's Journey and followed that with Unforsaken Hiero. The second book ended in such a way that we knew a third book was coming. Alas, Mr Lanier suffered a stroke which wiped the third book from his mind and it is never to be. If you haven't read these books please do. Set over 5000 years in the future in a post holocaust world. They are a very enjoyable read. The lost third book as been lamented by more than just me.


best wishes

[Lydia]

I suffer from the same bookophilia illness. A few years ago when I moved I had to get rid of some books. Believe me, it was a tough choice - even copies of 1950's biology textbooks.
I had a huge science fiction collection - Amazing Stories, Wonder Stories, etc. Recently I located (via Amazon) a copy of stories by Hugo Gernsbach (Sci-Fi pioneer): Adventures of Baron Munchausen : on the Moon, on Mars, etc. Still a delightful read.
As for Sterling Lanier, I liked his tales of Brigadier Ffellows - but then I found they were a direct descendant of Wodehouse's Mr. Mulliner stories. Even to naming the inhabitants of a bar by the drinks they drank.
Now I read books on my Kindle, but I am already accumulating an unmanageable plethora of titles electronically. Virtual bookshelves abhor a vacuum.

Hugs,
Lydia

[Davita]

Even though I can't read, I can squirrel away books and stuff. I can certainly sympathize with you, CJ. So you have no off-site storage? No one to share theirs with you?

Good luck, sorry for your loss.

[CJ]

Hi all,

Davita,

The problem isn't really storage, it's that I have to stop buying books at some point so that I can increase my bought-to-read ratio as it'll soon be dipping below 50%.

Well, that, and the fact that my SO, Roxanne, has been trying to put a moratorium on book purchasing for a while now. I have about fifteen boxes of pop fiction (mostly sceince-fiction classics) sitting in our locker downstairs. Haven't looked at those in quite a while. I'd trade them all against a single copy of Charles Beaumont's The Howling Man. This book is an anthology of Beaumont's short stories, that is now, sadly, out of print. (Beaumont was, along with Rod Serling, one of the original writers on the 1960s The Twilight Zone television series.) I used to own the book but, like Kyra, sold it for a pittance to a used book shop oh, about fifteen or twenty years ago. I still see paperback copies of it (in tattered, dog-eared, crappy condition) on eBay, selling for over $100. No, thanks.

Anyway, I've started selling off the books in my "get-rid-of" pile, as well as some of my DVDs (about a hundred films, so far). Lightening the load, lightening the load!

Love,
CJ

[Anthony Simon]

Hi all,

Davita,

The problem isn't really storage, it's that I have to stop buying books at some point so that I can increase my bought-to-read ratio as it'll soon be dipping below 50%.

That's just such a world of difference to where I am. I love buying books and dipping(different sense). I have loads and loads of non-fiction books (essentially a library I have built up over a couple of decades) and sort of go backwards and forwards between them trying to frame my ideas on whatever seems important to me at the time.

I also have quite a lot of the stuff that seems important to people here (e.g. Lord of the Rings and C.S. Lewis), which are also important to me. But it would be a lie not to say that my main engagement with books is this researching, dipping thing.

[Eloise Goth]

I too read alot - especially autobiographies of ordinary people. ( they dont have the ego's of celebrities.) I've read one's written about life in the mid 17th century and others written upto the 1980's.
Spike Milligans war diaries are also a good read, esp. for those of us with an interest in WW2.