Real Gem

Friends,

Tell you what, I about lost my mind yesterday with the book buying that I did. I have no idea how much money I spent, but I feel as if it was worth whatever cost I paid. I blame Seth, who was in town and shopping for his PhD book list. So we scoured the city's used joints for books.

Here's the pile I acquired yesterday and this is not including the two most recent gets, Julie & Julia (what, the movie is cute) and Not That Kind of Girl.
A lot of them I only paid a dollar for, like that Best American 1996 at the bottom there, which was purchased to replace my current copy that happens to have a ripped back cover. But there's a lot of awesome in there, I think. Like the hardcover In Persuasion Nation by George Saunders that has that awesome story Adams in it. Sure, my copy has a bit of a busted spine, but that's okay with me.

You probably also noticed the three Harry Crews books on there. Two of them, Florida Frenzy & Blood and Grits are works of non-fiction. The real surprise find is The Gospel Singer. The version I found is a British reprinting of it from 1995, I believe. And it includes this strange rare story of Crews called Where Does One Go When There's No Place Left to Go? that's a kind of metafiction that stars a writer named Harry Crews being kidnapped by characters of his stories (according to HarryCrews.com). I don't know what this Gospel Singer edition I have is worth to collectors, but I paid 6 bucks. Even if it is only worth 6 bucks, or less, I'm pleased as a pig in shit about finding it. God bless Madison's used bookstores.

But really, the real gem was finding a copy of Roger Sheffer's Borrowed Voices. I hadn't expected to find it, but I did so I had to pick it up. Here's a picture I scanned from the book of our man Roger taken I would assume 1988 since that is when Borrowed Voices was released, according to the front of the book that I bought (though Amazon says a much later date). Look how young he is in this picture.


viva used bookstores