Thursday, February 12, 2009

Like Candy & Update on 109

Book advert in a 1952 paperback.
Prices ranging from 25 cents to 75 cents.


Rack of paperbacks today.
Prices ranging from $6.99 to $10.85.


Often as a kid I'd pass up candy for books.

The problem was, you'd have to save your pocket change for awhile and then go to a special store to get a book. Candy was everywhere, and it was cheap. Candy was always available, always sweet, waiting to trip you up and make you spend some of your savings.



What I'm reading now. I love Oliver Sacks, and the blogger known as JGH actually met and spent time with the man. She got this signed copy for me! Thank you JGH!



***Update on the Richard Brautigan pg. 109: it seems the bug up ass reader of the previous post chose to call attention to the almost last page of the book. (there was another half page.) I hate reading towards the end of the book --spoilers may be back there!!! I was a little put out at having to go back there to look at page 109.
And guess what?-- all she did was quote the author, who, being depressed, was calling his own book crap. What do you think of that? I was disappointed, and thought it was kind of mean to use his own words like that. I checked the book out and it's sitting here beside me, waiting to be read and appreciated.

8 comments:

R.L. Bourges said...

oh no. Not Musicophilia. Not Oliver Sacks (that's the sound of distant sobbing you're hearing in the background.)

PLEASE let me know what you think of it (and maybe throw up a couple of pages on your blog? maybe? hum?)

Books for a quarter... But then everything else was a whole lot cheaper, too.

Anonymous said...

Hello Avid- you really are an Avid reader! You would love the Book Barn, a huge barn filled with second hand books- I will try to get a picture for you. Books are so expensive these days which is why I use the library- but sometimes it is just pure luxury to have your own copy of a favourite.

Thanks for dropping by my blog :)

e said...

Hi Avid,

I too found Brautigan in a second-hand store and have his book by my bed. It will be interesting to see how I feel after re-reading TFIA.

Please do tell us your views on Dr. Sacks. Perhaps he could have helped Mr. Brautigan feel better about himself.

The only experience I have with Sacks is the film, Awakenings, based on another book, starring Robert DeNiro. A bittersweet story...

If you like checking out independent bookstores via cyberspace, visithttp://www. haslams.com/history.htm.

Have a great day!

Anonymous said...

Great photo on the cover!

Avid Reader said...

I've read Awakenings, The Man Who Mistook His Wife for a Hat, Uncle Tungsten, and now I have this new book of his.

Strangely enough each of these books was a gift given to me... and each time out of the blue, as they say. No reason, no birthday...

I want to read his other books too. I like him because he's so curious about things and the excitement comes through in his writing, considering the material, it could be written up in a really dull way but sacks seems very sweet and gentle as well as brilliant.

Megan said...

When we were younger we lived a few blocks from a little strip mall that had a 7-11, a hobby shop, and a book shop. The Little Professor book shop was the farthest from the end, so we'd have to walk past all the other stores first to get to it.

We usually made it with most of our money intact, but not always!

I haven't read any of Oliver's books. So there's another name to add to the list.

I agree, that 109 was kind of a let-down...

Oh well, Happy Valentine's Day & have a lovely weekend. Hope you get to read lots & lots!

Barbara said...

Those were the days of penny bubble gum. Sometimes I wonder if the world would be better off if we could just revert back to the pricing of 50 years ago. Not nearly as much money would be needed...

I love it that you chose books over candy!

lettuce said...

i love those ads in old books too

My Classic Fiction Book List -Partial List

  • Austen, Jane: (Complete Works)
  • Balzac: Cousin Bette/ Eugenie Grandet / Cousin Pons
  • Best Russian Short Stories
  • Boyle, TC: Short Works
  • Brennan, Maeve : Short Works, 1 Novella
  • Bronte, Emily, Ann, Jane (Complete Works)
  • Brookner, Anita ( Complete Works)
  • Cather, Willa (Complete Works)
  • Chekov: Short Works
  • David Copperfield (Dickens)
  • Dickens:A Tale of Two Cities
  • Dickens:Great Expectations
  • Dickens:Nicholas Nickelby
  • Dickens:Our Mutual Friend
  • Dickens:The Old Curiosity Shop
  • Doyle, Roddy (some novels, memoir)
  • Drabble, Margaret (4 Novels)
  • Drieser, Theodore (Complete Works)
  • Fitzgerald, F.Scott (Most Novels & short works)
  • Hardy, Thomas (Complete Works)
  • Hemingway, Short stories
  • Hemingway: The Old Man in the Sea
  • Hemingway: The Sun Also Rises
  • Hugo: Les Miserables/Hunchback Of ND
  • James, Henry: Daisy Miller
  • James, Henry: In The Cage
  • James, Henry: Portrait of a Lady
  • James, Henry: The Golden Bowl
  • James, Henry: What Maisy Knew
  • James, Henry: Wings of a Dove
  • James, Henry:The Ambassadors
  • James, Henry; The Bostonians
  • Kerouac: Dharma Bums
  • Kerouac: On The Road
  • Kerouac: The Subterraneans
  • Kerouac: Tristessa
  • Lardner,Ring:Short Works
  • Larsen: Quicksand
  • Lewis, Sinclair: Arrowsmith
  • Lewis, Sinclair: Free Air
  • Lewis, Sinclair: Main Street
  • Lewis, Sinclair: The Job
  • MacGill, Patrick (Complete works)
  • Mackin, Walter (novels)
  • Maupassant: Short Works, novels
  • McGahern, John (novels of)
  • McNulty, John (Short Works)
  • Norris, Frank: McTeague
  • O'Brien, Edna (3 Novels)
  • O'Donnell, Paeder : Novels of
  • O. Henry
  • Potok, Chaim (4 novels/1 non fiction)
  • Salinger, JD : Nine Stories
  • Salinger: Franny & Zooey
  • Salinger: Raise High the Roofbeams
  • Salinger: The Catcher in the Rye
  • Sinclair, Lewis: Dodsworth
  • Sinclair, Lewis: Elmer Gantry
  • Sinclair, Upton: King Coal
  • Sinclair, Upton: The Jungle
  • Steinbeck, John: Sweet Thursday
  • Steinbeck: Winter of our Discontent
  • Steinbeck: Cannery Row
  • Steinbeck: East of Eden
  • Steinbeck: The Grapes of Wrath
  • Theroux, Paul (3 Novels )
  • Toibin, Colm: (Novels of)
  • Tolstoy: Anna Karenina
  • Tolstoy: Short Works
  • Turgenev (2 novels)
  • Twain: T Sawyer, Life on the Mississippi
  • Vonnegut: Early Works (1950s-60s)
  • Wharton, Edith: Novels of/Short Stories
  • Women & Fiction (Edit. Cahill)
  • Zola, Emile ( 10 novels)