New Arrivals in the Bookshop

Despite my entreaties over the phone and cyberspace to the many who contact us each day about wanting to donate or sell us books, ("We're REALLY quite full right now, so we're not buying all that much" is my usual refrain), there are boxes of books that arrive daily at Old Saratoga Books and Dan and I find that we can't resist a fresh batch of interesting books.

Sometimes it's a pile of orphaned books left on our doorstep when we open up and often it's a mound of garage sale leftovers, festooned with colorful price stickers. Most of these volumes end up in our to-be-donated-to-whatever-library-is-next-in-line-for-a-fundraiser-book-sale. Then there are those folks who show up with really lovely, unusual books that we've never seen before, and though the shelves are groaning from all the New Year declutterers that have brought us books, we simply pull out the check book and sigh.

In recent weeks we've bought many, many baking cookbooks from a former culinary student, boatloads of fishing and gardening books, a spate of books about film history and biographies about Hollywood's Golden Age, interesting pop-ups and books about paper art and origami, some antiquarian art and history titles, scads of classic science fiction paperbacks, and quite a nice pile of literary biographies. I've only put a handful of these titles online, so if you are interested in any of these areas, feel free to inquire about what's on the shelves.

Here's a little sampling of what these new collections contain:

 Ritz, Charles; Piper, John A Fly Fisher's Life NY Crown Publishers 1973. Reprint Hardcover Very Good in Very Good dust jacket.Foreword by Ernest Hemingway, introduction by Arnold Gingrich. Large octavo. Green cloth binding. Many photos and illustrations. Jacket lightly tattered. In jacket protector. ; Large 8vo 9" - 10" tall; 285 pages.

 Lewis, C. S.; Como, James T. C. S. Lewis at the Breakfast Table and Other Reminiscences
NY Macmillan Company 1979. First Printing Hardcover Very Good in Very Good dust jacket. n jacket protector. Index, alphabetical index to the writings of C. S. Lewis, bibliography. A compilation of memories about C. S. Lewis from 22 of his friends. ; 8vo 8" - 9" tall; 299 pages.

Reichert, Mickey Zucker; Nye, Jody Lynn Nye; Ranieri, Roman A. Anne Mccaffrey's the Unicorn Girl: The Illustrated Adventures. NY HarperPrism 1997. First Printing Hardcover Very Good in Very Good dust jacket.  collection of short stories based on McCaffrey's character by Jody Nye, Mickey Zucker Reichert and Roman A. Ranieri and illustrated by various artists. ; 8vo 8" - 9" tall; 136 pages.

 Mesnier, Roland; Malard, Christian All the Presidents' Pastries: Twenty-Five Years in the White House. Paris Flammarion 2004.First English Language Edition Hardcover Very Good in Very Good dust jacket. irst printing of first English Language edition. Several pages of photographs. "This extraordinary success story-told by the hero himself-of a young French pastry chef who climbed his way to the top, embodies the great American dream. After working at the Savoy in London, the George V in Paris, the Princess in Bermuda, and the Homestead in Virginia, Roland Mesnier took on the job of a lifetime as pastry chef to the White House. He provides behind-the-scenes insight into the characters, tastes, and obsessions of the five presidents and first ladies he served during his 25 years in Washington. Seventeen easy-to-follow recipes include the favorite desserts of all five presidents and their families. " (rear cover blurb) ; 8vo - over 7¾" - 9¾" tall; 344 pages

 
 Haddon, Kathleen Cat's Cradles from Many Lands Longmans, Green and Company 1911 First Edition Hardcover Very Good.live green cloth binding with cat's cradle figure and lettering stamped in white on front boards. Index, bibliography, many illustrations. Gift inscription penciled on front free endpaper, boards lightly rubbed. Many examples of string figures, or cat's cradles from cultures around the world, including Alaskan Inuit, the Torres Straits, Andaman Islands, Yoruba tribes, Navaho Indian tribes and others. ; 8vo 8" - 9" tall; 95 pages.

Palestrant, S. Practical Papercraft: Over 400 Useful and Decorative Projects for Fun and Profit
NY Homecrafts 1950 Hardcover Good in Good dust jacket. any photos and illustrations. Jacket flaps glued to endpapers and endpapers darkened from the adhesive, usual library stamps and markings. Learn how to make toys, costumes, flowers, lampshades, masks, boxes, stage scenery, puppets and party decorations out of paper. ; Ex-Library; 8vo 8" - 9" tall; 119 pages.

Kendall, Elizabeth The Runaway Bride: Hollywood Romantic Comedy of the 1930s
NY Knopf 1990. First Edition Hardcover Very Good in Good dust jacket
Jacket price-clipped and curled at edges, foxing to page tops and bottoms. Index, bibliography, notes, photos. A look at the changing role of women, romantic love and how films mirrored these changes. ; 8vo 8" - 9" tall; 285 pages.

Gorling, A. ; Meyer, Bl; Woltmann, A. Art Treasures of Germany: A Collection of the Most Important Pictures of the Galleries of Dresden, Cassel, Brunswick, Berlin, Munich and Vienna. with Portraits of the Most Celebrated Masters and Explanatory and Biographical Notices
Boston Samuel Walker and Company 1873 Hardcover Good. Half-bound in morocco with title and owner name stamped in gilt on spine. Contains 120 engravings after paintings by various European masters, including Velasquez, Rubens, Rembrandt, Raphael, Titian, Murillo, Holbein, Caravaggio and many, many lesser known Dutch and German artists.

 
 Stevens, C. F. ; Ryskind, Morrie; Englander, James The Home Movie Scenario Book
NY Richard Manson 1927 First Edition Hardcover Very Good in Fair dust jacket
Gray boards with black cloth backstrip. Pages toned, jacket soiled and tattered. In jacket protector. Several pages of advertisements for camera stores and movie theatres. A collection of twenty plots for home movies in a silent film format, as well as chapters on how to produce, direct, act in, provide makeup, sets, lighting, and editing these home productions. Ryskind was wrote and helped produce Broadway musicals (he got a Pulitzer for "Of Thee I Sing", written in collaboration with George Gershwin) , an award-winning Hollywood screenplay author and "friendly witness" for the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1947.; 8vo 8" - 9" tall; 169 pages.

 Thomas, Graham Stuart The Graham Stuart Thomas Rose Book:
Sagaponack, NY Sagapress 2004 0711223971 / 9780711223974 Revised Edition Hardcover Very Good in Very Good dust jacket.  revised, one volume edition of Thomas' trilogy of rose reference books: The Old Shrub Roses, Shrub Roses of Today and Climbing Roses Old and New. 158 color plates. Index, bibliography, line illustrations. ; 4to 11" - 13" tall; 359 pages.
 

New Arrivals at Old Saratoga Books

Though our shop is closed during the month of February (and the store thermostat is set low, low, low much to store cat Sam's consternation) Dan and I are back and forth filling Internet orders, cleaning, moving sections around and generally doing all those biblio-maintenance tasks that cant' be done when the shop is open. We are also going through many boxes of books that we have bought over the last year and stashed in the basement, so when we open, there will lots of new (used) titles for our customers to peruse. 

 In the meantime, here's some of the newest and most interesting books we've catalogued: The Irish Beauties, by E. Barrington, [Beck, L. Adams]Garden City, NY Doubleday, Doran 1931 First Edition Hardcover Very Good in Good dust jacket. Decorative black cloth binding. Corners bumped, jacket dampstained and chipped, pages toned. In jacket protector. Historical fiction based on the lives of two penniless Irish sisters, Elizabeth and Maria Gunning, who were the belles of mid-18th century London. Elizabeth married the Duke of Hamilton and became the first Baroness Hamilton of Hameldon, and sister Maria married the 6th Earl of Coventry, though her continued use of arsenic and lead in various cosmetic preparations led to her death at aged 27 in 1760. 310 pages Price: 15.00.

 


The Wood-Peasant's Grandchild, by Marg. Lenk. Johannes Herrmann 1924 Hardcover Very Good. Green boards. Many illustrations by Ant. Baworowski. A tale about an old man and his orphaned grandson, Fridolin, called Friedel, who are evicted from their Salzburg home by an evil Archbishop. The tale takes place in 1730. Covers lightly worn, else a clean, tight copy. 168 pages. Price: 15.00

 
Toadstools, Mushrooms, Fungi: Edible and Poisonous; One Thousand American Fungi; How to Select and Cook the Edible; How to Distinguish and Avoid the Poisonous, with Full Botanic Descriptions, by Charles McIlvaine and Robert K. MacAdam, West Glover, VT: Something Else Press 1973 0871100932 / 9780871100931 Reprint Hardcover Very Good in Very Good dust jacket. A facsimile reprint of the 1902 revised edition. White cloth binding. Jacket lightly soiled and price-clipped, fly specks on page tops. In jacket protector. Photos. "How to select and cook the edible. How to distinguish and avoid the poisonous". 729 pages. Price: 25.00

 

1940s Book Rental Jacket

It was the era of the book rental library during the 1940s. We often see books come into the shop bearing the stamps and desecrations of the rental librarian. The poor dust jackets arrive with lots of sticky black residue along the margins from old-fashioned jacket protectors, ripped-out flyleaves and multiple bold stampings of rental library addresses and announcements of daily overdue fines all over the endpapers.

Not so with this natty arrival. This copy of John Hersey's "A Bell for Adano", though shaken from many readings, is sporting a rather smart jacket protector featuring a pipe-smoking, elegantly-attired gent. Our man peers far-sightedly at his novel, imagining romance, swashbuckling adventure, historical journeys and intrigue on the high seas. A dashing jacket and one that I think I will hang on to for my museum of interesting books.

The How To Section in the Bookshop

One of the bookstore ideas Dan and I kicked around when planning for our open shop was to specialize in How To books, those books that explain how to fix things, renovate buildings, plant gardens, learn how to play a harmonica, etc. We were basing this rather limited business scheme on ourselves. We have many linear shelf feet of books about historic home repair, furniture refinishing, plumbing, gardening, and way too many cookbooks, and we figured everyone out there was just like us.

In our home library, I count no less than six books on how to make rustic Adirondack furniture, seven on how to make your own fishing lures and equipment and a staggering number of back-to-the-land type books which, if all projects contained in these pages were implemented, would turn our 2-acre "estate" in a checkerboard of mini-garden plots and wind turbine engines. While Dan and I would need several lifetimes to read them all and build the strip canoes, the handmade paper journals, the artisan cheeses and the double-dug garden plots of our dreams, it is precisely the lure of these fantasies that keeps them on our shelves. They represent the things we want to do with the luxury of time and occasionally, woefully all too occasionally, they are opened like presents and a project actually gets explored.

One of the best series of How To books, and a wonderful shelf full of dreams it is, is the 12-volume Foxfire series published in the 1970s and much sought after by our bookstore customers and by ourselves, naturally. The original editions of the later books in the series are scarcer and very difficult to find, particularly Volume 5, which contains chapters on blacksmithing and flintlock rifles. The series is still in-print and can be purchased at the non-profit Foxfire website. Part Appalachian folklore, part country living bible, this series was originally written by Georgia high school students and makes for interesting reading, even if you have no intention of ever starting a quilt or handling a snake.

After the success of the Foxfire books, Pamela Wood captured New England folkways in her book, The Salt Book: Lobstering, Sea Moss Pudding, Stone Walls, Rum Running, Maple Syrup, Snowshoes, and Other Yankee Doings (NY: Anchor Press, 1977), which is also a great country living resource. A second Salt book followed in 1980, which covered more maritime pursuits.

Also highly recommended in the How To section are the three Tightwad Gazette books written and engagingly illustrated by Amy Dacyczyn (Villard Books, 1990s). Dacyczyn consolidated a compendium of frugal living advice, recipes, how-to instructions and philosophical essays in these books, suited for any lifestyle, and particularly relevant in these hard economic times.

I did want to point out that specializing in How-To books, while not necessarily a practical idea for an open shop, can work quite successfully as an online business. Witness our bookseller colleague Charmaine Taylor's great site, Dirt Cheap Building.
Charmaine stocks new and used books, DVDs and other materials on alternative, economical home building, and she generously offers many links to free articles and sites on these topics as well. You'll learn a lot about straw bale homes, papercrete, cordwood building and many other really cool, low-cost building techniques. Check it out.

Here's to having loads more free time to pore over our How To bookshelves....

Entomophagy 101

I guess I have never outgrown my juvenile gross-out fascination phase, because the moment I spied it, I had to buy "The Eat-A-Bug Cookbook: 33 Ways to Cook Grasshoppers, Ants, Water Bugs, Spiders, Centipedes, and Their Kin" (by David George Gordon, Berkeley, CA: Ten Speed Press, 1988). I'm not soon planning to cook up any Scorpion Scalloppine, Cream of Katydid Soup, Pest-O (groan), Alpha-Bait Soup or any other entomological delights, (I'll leave that up to the pros) but it is really a great read.

Gordon has a breezy, funny writing style and his food stylist makes the leggiest, spiniest, most horrifying accompanying photographs. I found myself riveted to my reading with facial rictus (I know, because my muscles ached afterwards). I (and Gordon apparently) have also never lost our delight in puns, which pungently spice up this creepy, crawly smorgasbord.

If you are tempted by this paean to insectivore cuisine you'll have to procure your own copy, because I'm not selling mine. It's too much fun. You can sample one of Gordon's recipes for Sheesh! Kabobs here, with humorous cooking tips such as "Assemble each kabob, alternately skewering the insects, red pepper, and onion wedges to create a visually interesting lineup." It is just a scream.

Gordon has his own engaging website where you can read about his other science books, (now I have to buy his slug book), check out his author appearances and lectures and follow him on his travel blog, "Travels with my Ant", where you can find out how the Boston Health Inspectors wouldn't issue a permit for his bug cookery, while their Seattle counterparts mandated a cooking canopy to prevent raw insects from falling down on their brethren en flambe.

If you do want to add some insect protein to your diet and your backyard lacks biodiversity, then you might also want to check out this mail order house of horrors where you can order Antlix Lollipops (ants add a chili kick to these peppermint pops), Worm Crisps, Thai Curry Crickets, and big, juicy Mopani worms from South Africa.

If you prefer your insects alive, unchewed and behind glass, I and my family can heartily recommend a visit to Montreal's Insectarium. Several years ago this was one of the highlights of our trip North, where we were fascinated by roomfuls of shiny beetles, foot-long walking sticks and a see-through beehive. The building itself is shaped like a giant ladybug for extra child-fascination points. Here's one of the photos we took when we there. See if you can find the bug in this photo:

So, saddle up to the bug buffet...it's good for you.

The Young Book Trout

My mom sent me this old prophetic photo from my pre-glasses era, so I must've been seven or eight years old. I was staged by my photojournalist stepfather into this readerly pose, ostensibly reading Trotsky's "History of the Russian Revolution" and squinting off into the ether.

I don't remember this photo shoot, but he was forever getting my brother and sister into all kinds of crazy situations, wearing worcestershire sauce on our faces to simulate dirt for evocative shots of rural, poor youth; leaping off garden walls in our pajamas for seasonal photoessays on spring exuberance; behind oversized dark glasses and wigs posing as local residents and answering the newspaper's question of the week. The purpose of this Trotskyite photo is unclear, but it did portend my future career. Still haven't read that book though.

Shelf Switcharoos

In an effort to incorporate a little more cardiovascular exercise at the book shop, we've switched around a bunch of the sections. Women's Studies now resides upstairs next to the big green armchair, shunting the Crafts section downstairs so that many more older ladies with bad knees can take a peek at our quilting, knitting, (but mostly) needlepointing titles.

Crafts then evicted Philosophy over to the shelves where Women's Studies used to be, and Parenting was lowered down several shelves to make room for all those Big Brain books, on the theory that parents are used to stooping down for their toddlers.

Lots of dusting ensued on Saturday, when my daughter was in to help with this Big Dig project, which was kind of poor planning, as we had to sidestep many customers on this busiest day in the shop, but I take my help when I can get it.

Aptronym Destiny

An aptronym refers to someone's name that is reflective of their occupation. Some notable examples include Judge Learned Hand, Astronaut Sally Ride, Poet William Wordsworth, and Presidential Press Secretaries Larry Speakes (Reagan) and Tony Snow (Dubya). It is with bookseller's remorse that I let go of my favorite aptronymical book: Russell Brain's Some Reflections on Genius and Other Essays (Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Company, 1960). Here's my description of this classic title in remembrance:

"There was nothing else for it; poor little Russell Brain was fated by the Aptronym Gods to become a neurologist and to author this preordained book. A collection of essays about the relationship between genius and madness, the genetics of genius, and discussions of some superintelligent folk such as Samuel Johnson, Jonathan Swift, Charles (smart as the) Dickens, Lord Monboddo and Christopher Smart (naturally)."

Shakespeare, Hold the Bacon

Everybody's got their favorite Shakespeare conspiracy theory. It seems astounding that only one person, and someone of such humble beginnings could have created the greatest works of art in Western Literature's canon, and such a passel of them to boot. There are the theorists that insist that the more educated and gentlemanly Francis Bacon produced most of the plays and sonnets commonly attributed to the Bard of Avon. Others have argued that contemporary Elizabethan dramatist Christopher Marlowe penned many of the Shakespeare plays.

There have also been many researchers who have filled in the gaping holes in the Shakespearean biographical corpus with speculations that William was a bisexual, was a Catholic in overwhelmingly Protestant times, and/or had many extramarital affairs.

Today I catalogued a book that theorizes that William was not Francis Bacon, and moreover, would never have gotten near any bacon, as Shakespeare was a proud Jew (Shylock, notwithstanding). David Basch's The Hidden Shakespeare: A Rosetta Stone, (West Hartford, CT: 1994) postulates that there are many hidden clues throughout the Shakespearean oeuvre, particularly in the seeming anti-Semitic "Merchant of Venice" that point to to the Bard being a proud, if closeted, Son of Israel. I prowled a little bit through this thin volume, but the argument was as cleverly hidden in its pages as Willy's Hebraic lineage. Shakespeare, this author is not. Oy!

The 100th Post Milestone - Celebrating with Judy Chicago

Amazingly, this is the Book Trout's 100th post. Seems like I just started this crazy blog thing. To celebrate this milestone, I introduce you to an interesting book:

Embroidering our Heritage: The Dinner Party Needlework, by Judy Chicago and Susan Hill, Garden City, NY: Anchor Books, 1980, first paperback edition. ISBN: 0385145691. 287 pages. Many illustrations and photographs, includes several pages of color plates. 4to in VG condition (covers rubbed). ($20.00 plus shipping available through our bookstore website.)



The Dinner Party art installation is now permanently part of the collection at the Brooklyn Museum in New York and is worth a visit if you have an interest in women's history and modern art. Judy Chicago is a feminist artist who envisioned The Dinner Party as a way of honoring women's contributions to history and art by having a large triangular table set with richly-worked textiles and vagina-motif china plates. Each of the 39 settings honors a different woman (from Boadaceia to Eleanor of Acquitaine to Georgia O'Keeffe) and incorporates symbols of their historical importance and arts/crafts techniques from their era. Georgia O'Keeffe would probably be comfortable with her peony-like vulva plate but no doubt Emily Dickinson would retreat to her bedroom with apoplexy upon seeing her privates done up in ruched lace and satin.

As an aside, I had the chance to see the work as a teenager (very interesting!) and it inspired my mother to sign up with Chicago as one of her needlework minions for The Birth Project, a subsequent celebration of images of women in the throes of childbirth.

R.I.P. George MacDonald Fraser

It is with great sadness that I report the death of a cherished author, George MacDonald Fraser, on January 2nd, aged 82. His Flashman series features the cravenly, yet absurdly lucky, bounder and "hero", Harry Paget Flashman. The twelve titles are a wonderful way to soak up Victorian military history. Like Thomas Berger's Little Big Man, the Flashman books insert our military man and sometime spy in the middle of actual historical events with over-the-top results (i.e., gastric disturbance impels him to unwittingly lead the Charge of the Light Brigade at the Battle of Balaclava).

"Flashy" rogers his way around the globe, collecting medals for unintentional bravery and generally blundering his way to a brigadiered generalhood. I feel the series just got better over time with greater nuances to Flashman's character and to that of his wife, Elspeth. I have read through the Flashman series once and daydream about digesting it again in the future during a long, lazy stretch of reading.

Flashman is responsible for a bit of family legend at Dan's expense. Two years ago, my loving spouse went to the local big box bookstore to pick up a copy of "Flashman on the March" (sadly, perhaps the last Flashman book ever, although there is some possibility of an Australian adventure) to surprise me as a gift. He was wearing his woodcutting outfit (large tuke on his head, several days worth of beard scruff, Army surplus coat, big mud boots) and waited politely in line for an available cashier. He then asked if the store had the latest "Flashman". There was a pause from the female employee, who then asked him to repeat his query. He said "Flashman" again a little more loudly. And repeated it. She then got very wide-eyed and backed away from the counter. I guess she thought he was wearing nothing under his funky outfit, so poor Dan just slunk away, rather humiliated. But I think George MacDonald Fraser would've gotten a kick out of that scene.

Most of my Books are Gluten-Free......

Here I am innocently cataloguing books at the old bookstore, when this wild example of medical hucksterism jumps out at me. Tucked at the rear of a seemingly upstanding book, "Dick Cheveley", by the staid historical novelist, W.H. D. Kingston, are several advertisements, a common enough practice with nineteenth century publishers looking for extra simoleons. There is an ad for Sohmer pianos, and one for Sapolio soap, but then my gluten-sensitive peepers (husband Dan can't eat wheat)lighted on an advertisement for the Health Food Company of New York City and their marvelous GLUTEN SUPPOSITORIES!

E.L. Ripley of Burlington, Vermont, no shy hemorrhoidal victim he, notes "As Sancho Panza said of sleep, so say I of your Gluten Suppositories: God bless the man who invented them!". And the Rev. John H. Paton of Michigan, a chronic, constipated dypeptic, heaps accolades on the mighty tablets, stating "I believe their food-remedies to be worthy of the high praise which they are receiving on all sides". These gluteal gluten poppers are billed to relieve intestinal torpor and kindred evils, but pity the poor celiac or wheat-sensitive soul who popped them in seeking relief.

Giving thanks for modern medicine.....

Book Number 20,000

In between snacking on chocolate eyeballs intended for trick-or-treaters that never arrived at our rural home, I managed to catalogue our 20,000th Internet book title. I started Internet sales when my youngest daughter entered full-day kindergarten and now that she is in the seventh grade, I've accomplished this book listing milestone. Book number 20000 is a Dalziel/Pascoe mystery, "Recalled to Life" by the ever-wonderful Reginald Hill.

In celebration of this eight-year-long achievement, Old Saratoga Books will be having a 20% discount on all Internet books throughout the month of November. You can go to our website,
www.oldsaratogabooks.com and enter the coupon code "Hooray" and your purchase will be discounted by 20%. All books are included and you can use the coupon code repeatedly.

Doris Lessing, Nobel Laureate

Congratulations from the Book Trout to the newest winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature, the prolific, Persian/Iranian-Rhodesian/Zimbabwan-English writer Doris Lessing. I cannot comment on Ms. Lessing's works as a whole, having read only The Golden Notebook, but she certainly seems to have been an innovator and progressive thinker. Her life has certainly been long and interesting and I think I will pick up one of her books of memoir before another work of fiction. I am intrigued by someone who when told by the journalist crowd at her door that she had won the Nobel Prize answered "Oh Christ..I couldn't care less". Perhaps she curmudgeoningly overlooked the million dollar attachment.

As a used book seller, I was selfishly happy to see this honor bestowed as I actually have a large number of her works in stock. Previous Nobel Laureates, such as Hungarian writer Imre Kertesz, Turkish writer Orhan Pamuk, Austrian novelist/playwright Elfriede Jelinek and Franco-Sino writer Gao Xingjian were maddeningly underrepresented on our bookstore shelves. We do currently have a hardcover set of the five novels in Lessing's science fiction/Sufist master work The Canopus in Argos: Archives Series, as well as many other novels by Ms. Lessing in stock, so feel free to contact us at Old Saratoga Books if you would like some Nobel quality reading matter.

For more information about this interesting author, here's a great site to check out a biography of Ms. Lessing, bibliographies, and other links.

Some of the Best Novels You've Never Read?

New York magazine has an interesting article in which sixty-one literary critics discuss their favorite underrated contemporary novels (and several short story collections and memoirs). There are some authors on the exalted list who do seem to have garnered their share of attention (John Lanchester, Carol Shields, Norman Rush, Martin Amis, for examples); after all, winning the Pulitzer Prize guarantees a bit of press and book sales, but I suppose when compared to being anointed by Oprah it is small potatoes. I can heartily agree with Ron Rosenbaum's choice of John Lanchester's "The Debt to Pleasure" as a wondrously wicked novel, and I am putting several other contenders on my Christmas wish list: Russell Banks' "The Darling"; David Fulmer's jazz mystery "Rampart Street"; and "The Extra Man" by Jonathan Ames. Hopefully some of my loved ones are reading this blog.

The Book Trout swam about Old Saratoga Books and rounded up eight of the Best Novels You've Never Read as noted in the New York article and we offer them for your consideration below. You can click on the photos of each book if you are interested in purchasing a copy from our secure website.

• Nunn, Kem, Tapping the Source, NY The Delacorte Press 1984. "What Hemingway's Nick Adams did for fishing, Kem Nunn does for surfing".
  

• Harrison, Jim, The Road Home, NY: Atlantic Monthly Press, 1998. The sequel to Harrison's novel "Dalva".

• Sapolsky, Robert M., A Primate's Memoir, NY: Scribner, 2001. A memoir of two decades in Kenya studying baboons.

• Epstein, Leslie, San Remo Drive, NY: Handsel Books, 2003. "It is a large, public book that explores the glamorous life of Hollywood and evokes the landscape of Southern California both as it is now and as it appeared before the migration to it of millions" (from front jacket flap).

• DeWitt, Helen, The Last Samurai, NY: Hyperion, 2001. The author's first novel, nominated in New York Magazine by Sven Birkets for exalted literary status "for its playful, steady, angst-attuned intelligence and its utter conceptual exceptionality".

• Rush, Norman, Mortals, NY: Alfred A. Knopf, 2003. A doorstop of a novel set in Botswana.
  

• Hellenga, Robert R. The Fall of a Sparrow, NY: Simon & Schuster, 1998. The author's second novel, in which classics professor "Woody" Woodhull goes to Italy to attend the trial of the terrorists who killed his daughter in a bombing.
  

• Shields, Carol, Unless, NY: Fourth Estate, 2003. The late author's last novel, shortlisted for theOrange Prize, the Man Booker Prize, The Giller Prize and the Governor General's Award.
  

Droolworthy Home Libraries

Dutch book lover Kim over at the fun book blog Kimbooktu has an ongoing project, Yourshelves, in which she's trying to collect images of home libraries of bibliophiles around the globe. After many years of having piles of books around, books in milk crates, bedside book ziggurats and precarious book stacks on every horizontal surface in the house, Dan crafted a beautiful library for us in our old house with warm wooden shelves along every wall. It's everyone's favorite room now and with lots of window light during the day and strategically-placed overhead lights for our aging eyes at night, it's a perfect reading room. We snuggle up on the couch with our two cats and enjoy many a good book.

If you would like to contribute a picture of your home library you can click on the leatherbound book logo above and send Kim an email.

Further Adventures in BiblioArchaeology

Last month we reported on our excavations regarding the biblio-mounds in our bookshop basement, the result of over-exuberant buying over the last several years. It has been entertaining and exciting going through these boxes and remembering the in-shop exchanges, library sales and other book purchases which ended up in these boxes. And it has been a good idea to take a breather from buying and trading books in the shop to catch up on these previous acquisitions.

Going through a pile of children's books gleaned from a library book during its last hour, I was delighted to come across a lucrative find: "Jellybeans for Breakfast" by Miriam Young. I had originally picked up the book because it was in good shape and was a cute story about two little girls with unflattering 60's short hairdos who imagine a time when they can get together without parents constantly telling them what to do. They can slop water out of the bathtub, ride their bikes up to the moon, stay up all night, keep as many pets as they want, and most importantly, eat jellybeans for breakfast. Since buying this book I had become more familiar with its desirability among nostalgic baby boomers from the great book blog Book Ride, driven by the good folk at London's Any Amount of Books bookstore. I felt that this would be a good candidate to put up for auction on eBay and it netted a respectable $52.01.

Deeper into the heart of the book pile I hit a vein of mysteries from an estate purchase. I had immediate customers for some British mystery authors, including Jonathan Gash (author of the the Lovejoy series featuring the roguish antique dealer and sleuth) and Margaret Yorke (an amazingly prolific writer of psychological suspense novels, in the same vein as the divine (or rather B. Vine) Ruth Rendell). Other mysteries have gone onto our Mystery and Mayhem catalogue on www.oldsaratogabooks.com, including some lovely jacketed vintage mysteries, so be sure to check our website if you are interested in this genre.

I've also put lots of jazz books in our music section. I uncovered a box of great books about Billie Holiday, Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Charles Mingus, Dinah Washington, Woody Herman and jazz of the early 20th century, and these are all on the bookshop shelves. Some have even made it to our online jazz catalogue, but I find that they sell well in the shop, so most are in residence there. A few boxes of art books were also unearthed from this same purchase and are renewed with jacket protectors and a good dusting and cleaning.

I can never turn down a good history collection and so a box of Russian history reared its head out of the book mine. Russian and Soviet material seems to have reached its English language publishing apex during the Cold War years, but there is always room on the shelves in the second floor World History section for some new comrades.

Dan and I can't recall where we picked up a batch of earth science books, but we are happy to have an interesting compendium of photographs of various parts of the earth seen from space in "Geomorphology from Space: A Global Overview of Regional Landforms", published by NASA in 1986. This hefty volume has beautifully detailed remote sensing photographs of all kinds of mountains, geological formations, volcanoes and other natural wonders, and while I did enjoy perusing it over several nights, I am willing to consign it to the bookstore shelves.

Another day's excavation uncovered a long-forgotten batch of literary criticism and biographies from a retiring college professor. While these are not hot sellers, I find I always have room for them at Old Saratoga Books. It is always rewarding to place these books in the hands of an avid T.S. Eliot fan or graduate student studying Melville's poetry or Renaissance drama.

Dan and I are making good progress gleaning through the book mounds (nipping downstairs in between customers, and sometimes on our days off) and hope to make some more progress before the basement gets too chilly. It has been refreshing to be subterranean during the summer months, but soon our benumbed fingers will not stand hour after hour of sorting through the book piles, so it's back to the basement for these two biblioarchaeologists. Heigh ho!

Woodrow Wilson on Books

On Being Human, by Woodrow Wilson (NY: Harper and Brothers, 1916)


The 28th President of the United States published this lovely little volume, a rumination on those qualities which mark us as distinct from the other members of the animal kingdom. The first chapters of this extended essay are a paean to books and how reading and sharing information are important components of our humanity. Here is passion indeed from this preacher's son:

You devour a book meant to be read, not because you would fill yourself or have an anxious care to be nourished, but because it contains such stuff as it makes the mind hungry to look upon. Neither do you read it to kill time, but to lengthen time, rather, adding to it its natural usury by living the more abundantly while it lasts, joining another's life and thought to your own.

President Wilson's tenure in office and his advocacy of the League of Nations were hampered by his many health problems, sadly, and one can only wonder what world events might have been altered if this stalwart humanitarian had been well. If only more book lovers ruled the world.

Biblioarchaeology

We've put a hold on book buying in the shop for the last year so we could catch up on the amassed boxes of books in our store basement. Then we got an offer we couldn't refuse: bookseller colleagues retiring and paring down an fantastic collection of books about history, fashion, biography, art, music, Western Americana, etc. More boxes were added to the piles and then of course, Dan and I can't help ourselves when we're out running errands. We must stop at our favorite thrift shops, church sales, library sales, and other secret troves of bibliobsession.

Last month we got another fabulous biblio-offer, so six van trips ensued and our basement book mastaba only has grown. Then, the local librarian called and asked if we'd cart away their library sale dregs last week. We gave them a donation and hauled away another van load. Now things cellarwise are at a crazy state and we have to get the piles down to keep the books on the bottom from becoming damaged and to avoid squashing Sam the Cat. We certainly don't want to take over the title of World's Most Dangerous Bookstore.

Stay tuned, as we continue to unearth various treasures and post some Internet specials.

From a Bibliophile's Library

It always interesting to see what books end up in a bibliophile's library and the following details a book on the shelves at Old Saratoga Books owned by William Lyons Phelps:

The Cure of Souls: Lyman Beecher Lectures on Preaching at Yale University, by Ian MacLaren, NY: Dodd, Mead and Company, 1895, first edition. Good condition.
Green cloth boards with gold-stamped lettering on front boards and spine. Top edges gilt. 301 pages.

This volume belonged to Phelps, and contains lectures given at Yale University in 1895 through the annual Lyman Beecher lectureship on Preaching, where Phelps was on the Faculty of Theology, in addition to being a literary critic, ordained minister, and bibliophile. He was also the author of many books, including "Autobiography with Letters", "The Advance of the English Novel", "Essays on Modern Novelists", "Memory", and "Browning: Now to Know Him".

My favorite Phelps quote is "A bibliophile of little means is likely to suffer often. Books don’t slip from his hands but fly past him through the air, high as birds, high as prices."

Phelps' elegant bookplate adorns the front pastedown and is an engraving by W. F. Hopson with William Shakespeare at the top crest, an open book with what appears to be the likeness of Alfred Lord Tennyson and a middle library scene replete with blazing fireplace, books aplenty and a contemplative cat. Graced with the quotation "Here are God’s Conduits". Phelps’ foot appears poking out from a wing chair to complete this paradise.