A few weeks ago, I order ordered books from Powell’s.
When the box arrived on Monday, it weighed 14 pounds.
Saul Bellow, D.H. Lawrence, and Joseph Conrad top the list. Some things I’ve read before but had not previously owned, and other things that will be new to me.
Reading as a writer, that is, reading to uncover craft, is a much more pleasurable thing to me than what we sometimes mean when we self-consciously say we’re reading for pleasure.
A side note: My used copy of Sons and Lovers has a gift receipt from a Barnes & Noble in Costa Mesa, California from December 19, 2004 inside the cover and a remnant bit of Christmas paper still Scotch-taped to the back. It was processed into the Powell’s system last January. Where else has it been? How did the receipt and the wrapping paper stay connected to this edition for 14 years? Did someone unwrap it, like it, keep it, and then get rid of it last year? Or has it been in circulation longer? The mind already reels, and we haven’t even made it to the Table of Contents or the Timeline of the World of D.H. Lawrence.
I don’t know if that’s of any help to you this Black Friday, but I do recommend buying books.
Chris Cocca 