Morbid Romantic

Book Review & Personal Blog

Another Sunday barely missed. In defense of my poor posting habits, I have been somewhat sick lately. And, it took me a while to decide what to write about. I settled on a topic: what to do with old books or books that I no longer want.

Space is limited and I don’t have much of it to devote to books. I would love to have an entire room devoted to books and shelves, but that’s just not possible at the present. While I would also love to save every book I read, even the ones I am so-so about, that’s also not very realistic. I have to get rid of some of them. Surely there is someone out there who wants every book I can no longer keep.

That is why I employ a number of different procedures.

First, I’ll choose some to give away to thrift stores or used book stores. I might or might not register them with BookCrossing. As a kid in a family without much money, thrift stores and used book stores were pretty much my only source of purchased books. It was always very disappointing when I could find a good book or a book I really wanted at neither. As an adult with more resources and more money, I always think back to my childhood. There are still plenty of children out there who would love to own books, not just check them out of the library, who cannot afford to. And they deserve quality as well as quantity.

Second, the library. No library in the world can collect every book that there is. If they can get some use out of my books, right on. If they can’t make them part of their collection, they can sell them for a super low price at one of their book sales. That way, someone gets a few books for cheap and the library makes a few cents.

Third, and my new favorite, is PaperBackSwap. I am so in love with this site and this concept that I can’t get enough of it. I only wish I had more books to list right now! I have already sent out three and gotten one in return. Two more are on my pending list. The way I see it, this is a great way for me to keep my books rotating. I’ll certainly not collect more, only keep a static number and at least get to read some of the ones I am desperate to read or own. I can’t wait to get more credits so that I can get more books! My wishlist and reminder lists are growing exponentially.

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Today is Mother’s Day, so I want to talk about mothers. Since this is about books, I want to talk a little bit more about my mother and books and how the two of them are linked together in my life. When I was around 7 or so, my mother got a job working in a small bookstore called Reader’s Market, which was attached to a department store. She was an avid reader and loved her job ordering, arranging, and selling books. She brought home a good number of review copies. The best thing for me, though, was that she would always buy me the newest books by the authors she knew I loved despite us hardly having enough money to pay the bills.

For Christmas, she would put books on layaway, a whole batch of them that numbered into the 30s easily, which she would pay off the months leading to and wrap up one by one for me. The best presents to get were always books and my mother loved to make sure that I had enough books to last me a lifetime. She didn’t judge what I wanted to read, either. If I wanted to read Christopher Pike thrillers at 10, she bought them for me even though my grandmother said they were bad for me. If I wanted to read The Stand by Stephen King when I was 13, she gave me her old copy. When I wanted to read IT by Stephen King at 13 and my sister wouldn’t let me borrow her copy, my mom took me to the store and bought me my own copy. When I saw The Joy Luck Club as a kid and wanted to read the book, my mother took me to a second hand bookstore and bought me a copy for $.25.

No matter how tight money was, we found money for books. Most of the time, second hand books. My mother went to great lengths and spent a lot of money on it, but she always said it was well worth it. If she had to pay for any hobby, she was delighted that my hobby was reading. I give her a lot of credit today for making me so successful in school. If not for her support, I wouldn’t be as advanced as I am, or as intelligent and academic. It all comes from her first getting me into books at 7 by reading me Piers Anthony’s Xanth series. Because of her, I developed a love for books that has never waned.

I got this meme from Tempting Persephone and thought it would be a fun way to spend this Sunday Salon…

1. What author do you own the most books by?
I would say that would be Piers Anthony. I have about 25+ books in his Xanth series, which belonged to my mother long before they belonged to me. I guess you can say that they are family heirlooms being passed down? Or maybe not since they are hardly old or important to anyone other than me. After Piers Anthony would be Anne Rice, which I cherish just as much because most of them too belonged to my mother before they belonged to me.

2. What book do you own the most copies of?
Oh man. My favorite book Blood & Gold: or the Story of Marius by Anne Rice. I have:
Hardback first edition
Hardback first edition signed by Anne Rice
Paperback
Uncorrected proof signed by Anne Rice
Ebook (.pdf)
Audio Book

3. What fictional character are you secretly in love with?
Secretly!? It is no secret at all that I am passionately and insupportably in love with Marius de Romanus from The Vampire Chronicles by Anne Rice.

4. What book have you read more than any other?
Being that this is my favorite book that also stars the character I am in love with, Blood & Gold: or the Story of Marius by Anne Rice.

5. What was your favorite book when you were 10 years old?
When I was 10 years old, I was reading all manner of young adult horror/thriller novels written by the likes of Christopher Pike and R.L. Stine. While I can’t remember what I read when I was 10 and what my favorite book was then, I can say that I very much loved Christopher Pike most of all. Especially Whisper of Death and Road to Nowhere.

6. What is the worst book you’ve ever read?
I have read a great many books that were tedious and difficult, but I can’t say that any of them were so awful that I would label them the ‘worst’ book(s).

7. If you could tell everyone you tagged to read one book, what would it be?
Other than my favorite book? Well, maybe Geek Love by Katherine Dunn if you have a strong stomach.

8. Do you prefer the French or the Russians?
Oh Voltaire! Gustave Flaubert, The Marquis de Sade…. definitely French.

9. Shakespeare, Milton, or Chaucer?
Ooooo, Milton or Chaucer? Paradise Lost or The Canterbury Tales? Such a hard choice! Both are great pieces of literature. I am going to have to go with my beloved Chaucer, though.

10. Austen or Eliot?
To be honest, neither. Though if I had to pick, I would say Austen since I favor her more.

11. What is your favorite novel?
Blood & Gold: or the Story of Marius by Anne Rice

12. What is your favorite play?
Marat/Sade.

13. What is your favorite poem?
Stopping By the Woods on a Snowy Evening by Robert Frost.

14. What is your favorite epic poem?
I am going to go with Odyssey by Homer. Though it’s hard to choose when I have such other greats as Paradise Lost or The Divine Comedy.

15. What is your favorite non-fiction?
History major here! I have read so much non-fiction that the head should spin at the thought. My favorite was a book called Hidden Horrors by Yuki Tanaka about Japanese war crimes during World War II.

16. Who is your favorite writer?
Anne Rice.

17. What are you reading right now?
Right now I am reading Terra Incognita by Ruth Downie and The Wonder Singer by George Rabasa.

I have decided that I no longer want to post generic, “my week in book” posts for my Sunday Salon. Instead, I am choosing to switch focus a bit and start posting about more meaningful things. I want to write more in-depth, meaningful posts about what reading means to me and why it is my ultimate source of pleasure and leisure.

My love for books began early. My mother was an avid reader and had always been as long as I could remember. When I think about being a child, I imagine my mother with her same bun reading a book. She worked two jobs when I was around seven years old, so I barely got to spend time with her. One night as my sister and I were in bed watching some thriller movie on television, my mother came home from work and poked her head into the room. When seeing that we were awake, she asked, “Do you guys want to read?”

Well, we relished any chance to spend time with our mother, so we agreed. The book that she pulled out was called A Spell For Chameleon by Piers Anthony, which is the first book in his Xanth series. It is an adult fantasy novel, but my mother decided to read it to us, aged seven and eight, just the same. I now know as an adult that she skipped over a great many parts, but my sister and I were so young that we never noticed the strange paths of plot. Instead, we just listened to our mother read, now and then being allowed to read a passage or two out loud on our own. Often times, reading was just a prelude to get together, eat snacks, and talk. My mother was always more than happy to set the book down and just talk to us about our day or girly issues, or anything at all.

We did this for years. We got to book 9 in the series, Golem in the Gears. I’m not sure what happened around this time. Well, I do. Live just got too chaotic and complicated, so we stopped reading together.  However, a few years later, I rediscovered the books and began to read them.  I fell in love with them all over again. Being that I was older, on the cusp of becoming a teenager, I got a lot more out of them. I still have the copies my mother read to me. Yes, all the original ones with their wear and tear. The series if very dear to me. I read the books now and each time appreciate them all the more for their humor and creativity, yet perhaps more so because they are linked in with some of my happy times.  Regardless, I was by then a passionate reader who had hundreds of books.  All I would get for Christmas and birthdays were stacks of books.  My mother would buy me TONS of them even though we hardly had that much money to spend.  She’d save, put a batch on layaway, and eventually be able to buy them.  If I wanted to read, my mother was going to make sure that happened.

What my mother did was foster in me a love of books. What she showed me was the pleasure of it, how a book can become real, how a book can be just the right thing to help you settle in to relax after a long day.

I am beginning to question why I don’t finish books as quickly as I would like to. Of course, I work and have a social life, but the bulk of my time is spent alone in my room. It amazes me that I don’t finish more books than I do because I devote a very large portion of my day to reading/relaxing.

Maybe I am a slow reader?

Maybe I spent too much time pouring over words and I linger over them?

So how about all of you tell me your reading habits. Do you set time aside to read each night? A set amount of time or all the time you can spare? Or do you just sit down when you feel like it and read until you decide to get up? I want to know how all of you, dear readers, fit reading into your daily schedule.

Anyway, to cut this short and not spent my entire post complaining… I will show you what I got in the mail this week:

Since I haven’t finished a single book this week (I have a lot on my plate), I am just going to discuss reading again.

As some of you who read my blog regularly know, I have recently been accepted into graduate school.

Wait… let me go a few years back.

When I started college, I was overwhelmed with required reading and paper writing. The only things I had time to read were for classes or for research papers. About six years passed during which I had almost no time for pleasure reading. Of course, a lot of what I was required to read was pleasurable in itself, but it was always with a purpose.

Well now that I am looking at going back to school, this time to get a Master’s Degree, I worry that I will not have any time left for reading and reviewing! I don’t know what I will do without it. Over the past few months it has become my life and the niche of this blog. I don’t think that people want to read about my incessant school and work complaints. I have tried my hardest to keep that away from here, but how will I when that is all my life is?

I will have to try to give some time each night to reading. Even if it is just half an hour, I am going to have to try. It may take me twice as long to finish a book, but it will be worth it to still get to read and review. I enjoy my books in the mail every day, what can I say?

What about books won this week?
Godmother by Carolyn Turgeon
A Lucky Child by Thomas Buergenthal
Afraid by Jack Kilborn
Jantsen’s Gift by Pam Cope

What about books in the mail?