Putting the fizz back in

In a way the mundanity of trailing book shops for titles I would like to read has gotten a bit much. I go out with a mental note of what I would like to find, authors or titles and when I go out I search in the relevant sections. Previously I've been very focussed towards novels translated from Chinese and more recently I've been looking for any Christopher Hitchens or a decent Dawkins or Steve Jones that I haven't already read. Dawkins and Jones' works have not been at all forthcoming but now I am drowning in Hitchens. I found Hitchen's Thomas Paine's "Rights of Man" and snapped that up. I don't know how I've not seen any second hand Hitchens in the last year but two in close succession.  I also found a copy of The War of The Worlds by H.G. Wells that I was scammed into paying for when I see that it was a free copy given out and "not for resale". Damn it.

H.G. Wells is on my list of "interested in" titles. I read The Invisible Man about 10 years ago when I moved to London. Reading about the streets of London, in particular Gower Street, was pretty exciting not only because of the pace of Wells but because knowing the actual geography of the novel felt good. I recommend The Invisible Man - thrilling and short, even better if you can get an old copy with a good cover. I do judge a book by its cover.

Currently I have a mission. My mission is to hunt down and complete my paperback set of Harry Potter novels, Bloomsbury children's editions. I have been generally looking but I am now actively hunting. I *need* to find the full set in paperback and finish reading by the end of September. I *need* to finish reading the set so that I can watch all 8 films back to back and go on the Harry Potter Studio Tour (again). And I do *need* to, that is not an exaggeration.

I have been looking and asking in every secondhand book shop and charity shop I pass - do you have any paperback Harry Potter? And apparently, this is almost impossible.

I have seen about 10 copies of the Deathly Hallows in hardback. On asking about what is in store cupboards I have been told that they get copies in every day, which is clearly not true or... other people have the exact same plan as me and are buying up all the paperbacks. I've averaged about 5 shops over the last 10 days. I have bought one book that I wanted and another that I was guilted into buying. I was guilted into a hardback of the Deathly Hallows after seeing 2 copies on the shelf, I asked a lady to check to store for me and after a good while she came back with a third but cheaper copy. So I bought it. It is for charity.

In a scene of comedy that I really should have photographed, I did find a pristine paperback of The Order of the Phoenix. The book was clearly visible (it is pretty huge) at an Oxfam books in the childrens section. The entire area was cordoned off with yellow and black tape in a crime-scene-esque fashion and I was just 3 meters away from a paperback I have literally trekked all over north London to find. I could see the book but was unable to reach it. Thankfully a bit of explaining about my desperation to buy that book and the lady behind the desk risked life and limb to grab it from the building works/wall repairs that were going on. Thank Dog.

47. Thomas Paine's "Rights of Man" - Christopher Hitchens - £2.50 British Heart Foundation
48. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (hardback) - J.K. Rowling - £2.00 British Heart Foundation
49. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (paperback) - J.K. Rowling - £2.50 Oxfam

Oh. Also found a great-filled-to-the-brim-buy-your-books-here-we-pay-our-taxes bookshop and saw a big pile of NME, reminding me that my sister collected these for years and must have this copy at home. 1997 I think this was?

Drowning

I used to sit and revel in the sight of piles and piles of books. I had an idealistic hope about reading them and had some kind of mental list of the books that I would read, when and where. I now feel overwhelmed. I am drowning in books. I am still reading at a steady and slow pace but now when I sit in front of my bookshelf of "to read" I feel I am drowning.

This week I bought books. I don't know what or where but I know I did. And I feel silly. Oh, I can remember now. It seems ages ago but it was actually 3 days ago. I found a Jonathan Spence book on Matteo Ricci. Jonathan Spence is an author that if I ever see a book relating to him, I snap up without much consideration. He is the godfather of Chinese history and I spent the majority of my spare time in 2010 sitting on the patio in my bikini reading his Modern History of China drinking black cafetier coffee. As a result I was extremely tanned with this tome being 1000 odd pages long. The book is called the Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci and the idea of this intrigues me, in particular after watching (not fully read all the Sherlock stories yet) Sherlock on the BBC and seeing Cumberbatch portray his memory palace - the place in his mind where he files his vast knowledge. It's likely that Matteo Ricci's will be less exciting than the BBC1 version.

I also bought a Salman Rushdie novel for some other reason. I felt that at some point I should read the Satanic Verses but I've always felt the reviews of all his work were pretty unexciting. I suppose I am more recently being influenced by Hitchens who was a good friend of Rushdies. Oh well, I've bought it now, it sounds interesting. Maybe the furore just made everything sound a bit crapper in comparison to the reactions. In any case, I didn't get the Satanic Verses but Midnight's Children.

45. The Memory Palace of Matteo Ricci - Jonathan Spence - £1.99 Oxfam

46. Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie - £1.99 Oxfam

More books bought with only a 10-30% chance of being read any time soon. That's probably too high, more like 5-10%. Need a new bookcase. Need a new flat. Need a library.

Been reading though. Got Filth by Irvine Welsh, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets on the go. Some nice contrast there.

Ticking over

In an attempt to stop sitting at home and eating all weekend long, I went out to look round the shops. On the Saturday I looked round and bought some sale shoes and quite a lot of toiletries that were on offer from the chemist. On Sunday I walked to a nice Oxfam books and… bought 2 books. Again, the books I bought, I couldn't let anyone else buy them. I had to have them.

The first I spotted was in a card case and caught my eye. It wasn't grossly expensive (as I suspected it might be) and was on a little display stand. It was The Scholars by Wu Jingzi, a satiric novel set in the Ming and written in the 18th century. 

Also, having been searching for any Christopher Hitchens books at all for the last year I am suddenly finding them everywhere. Saw one and bought it. So price of getting out of the house is two books.

43. The Scholars - Wu Jingzi - £2.49 Oxfam

44. The Trial of Henry Kissinger - Christopher Hitchens - £3.49 Oxfam

Interested to read the Hitchens more so because I mindlessly bought On China by Kissinger last year. I waited for it to come out in paperback and have started it but it's pretty dry as a read and it's in my pile of "in progress" books. Now I have the dilemma of reading the "devastating indictment of a man whose ambition and ruthlessness have directly resulted in both individual murders and widespread, indiscriminate slaughter" first or the "modern history as told by someone who was actually in the room". The indictment is shorter so I think I'll probably go with that.

When your actions hurt others

I bought 3 books last week when it was really hot. The hottest August day since 2003 or something similar. On my lunch break i went to enjoy the sun and UV rays by walking down past the shops to get a well known brand's ice blended coffee. I stopped by the Cancer Research UK which was having a close/refurb sale and saw books 1, 2 and 3 of the Harry Potter series. Having seen all the films and been to the Warner Brothers Studios, it occured to me that I could read the books and fill in some of the character and plot gaps that had often left me puzzled when watching the films. For a quid each, as you know, I couldn't say no. 

40. Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone - £1 Cancer Research UK
41. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets - £1 Cancer Research UK
42. Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban - £1 Cancer Research UK

I bought them and smuggled them home. I didn't want to display them on the bookshelf as it's becoming awkward having to guiltily confess to my other half what i've been "forced" to buy whilst out of the house. "erm, i'm really sorry, I did something bad", "you bought books?", my response either being "no, why do you always think I buy books?!" or "I really did have to, I've been looking for this one for ages, it's worth £34.17 on amazon!"

So Harry Potter 1, 2 and 3 went down the side of my bed for a safekeeping and from there I could slowly assimilate them into the library without anyone noticing... This maybe in itself might not be a healthy attitude to relationships and I certainly know that hiding books is a bit of a flag, but then there are flags everywhere. 

The hurt that resulted was not so emotionally complex this week. It was more physical and material. It took a great deal of money and effort on my part to make our flat more home-like with posters, pictures, side tables, foot stools, rugs, throws, coffee tables, candles, lanterns, lamps and book shelves. My partner had no input on the above as he would not even have thought for a moment that a lamp would help you see and make a room look and feel more cosy. If he didn't have a well considered side table for his glass of water, he'd put it on the floor and proceed to knock his phone into said glass. My overladen bookshelf was hurt by my actions. The middle shelf with books stuffed in every gap, 2 books deep, collapsed under the mass of books. The bookshelf deserved better. And that was before I even added the start of my HP collection. 

I have very much officially run out of places to shelve my books. I have two medium sized book shelves that are stacked 2 deep with more stuffed in the gaps, a deep shelf above the sofa and another along my desk for the bigger books and hardbacks, the window sills are filled and I have a stash in my room/in handbags ready to go out or read in bed and a box of overspill is a my mum's house (tending to be heavy hardbacks to annoying to carry on the train). I don't really have any room to put a new shelving unit, maybe I could store books in the wardrobe and throw out some clothes? Or start tower-esque piles around the flat like side tables? Or create a desk, coffee table and sofa out of books and throw out the actual furniture?

Quantity vs quantity

I've been busy at work. I've been working late and not had "me" time to sit down and write. Saying that, I have found time to buy. After last month was tight, I paid myself early (I do my own payroll:/) and got out of London for a weekend of sun and sea in Essex. I only took a small bag with essentials in including Why I Am Not a Christian by Bertrand Russell, to read on the train.

My plans were to generally look for cheapish dress for a birthday party later in the month, catch up with some reading and eat some decent grub. Again, I have to say I cannot resist a bargain and clearing living in London has inflated my idea of what is cheap. I've been buying second-hand books for £2, £3 or even £4 and going mad with actual new books. When I found a Cancer Research shop with all books for £1, I thought it couldn't get any cheaper. I was wrong. So at the weekend, I went a little overboard. Not over the pier at Clacton-on-Sea, but I did buy more books than I thought I could physically carry with me.

It starts with a few interesting covers:

24. The Trial - Franz Kafka - £1.99 Oxfam (classic penguin books orange cover - looks so good)

25. Burmese Days - George Orwell - £1.99 Oxfam (I had to buy after just finishing Down and Out, perfect accompaniment, another penguin classic)

26. The Ballad of the Sad Cafe - Carson McCullers - £1.49 Oxfam (discovered Carson McCullers about 5 years ago, fascinating author who's first novel The Heart is a Lonely Hunter was written at 21)

27. The Viagro Book of Women Travellers - Various - £1.49 Oxfam

Then I wander by a book fair with free entry run by the Samaritans. Tea and cake is served whilst old friends catch up and others quietly peruse the titles. There aren't as many books on offer as I was hoping, but the prices are dirt cheap and I cannot let any interesting titles escape me.

28. Keep the Aspidistra Flying - George Orwell - £0.50 The Samaritans (3 for £1) (following in the theme of George Orwell, in trying to read all his work)

29. Hamlet - Shakespeare - £0.50 The Samaritans (3 for £1) (never read this at school)

30. Pere Goriot - Honore de Balzac - £0.50 The Samaritans (3 for £1) (interest stoked only after reading Balzac and the Chinese Seamstress by Dai Sijie)

31. Gulliver's Travels - Jonathan Swift - £0.50 The Samaritans (great adventure novel, perfect for a train journey or beach)

32. Hong Kong: Epilogue to an Empire - Jan Morris - £1 The Samaritans (3 for £2.50)

33. The Silent Traveller in London - Chiang Ye - £1 The Samaritans (3 for £2.50) (found an expensive first edition of this years ago in Oxford, the first Chinese traveller to write about his experiences in London)

34. China and Japan; Myths and Legends - £1 The Samaritans (3 for £2.50)

35. The Heritage of Chinese Cooking - Elizabeth Chong - £2 The Samaritans (looking through this makes me want to cook glorious dishes every night, this book will make me fat)

These were quite heavy with two being quite meaty hardbacks so I set off. Feeling though that for £6 that I wouldn't find prices like this again for a while, I went back for more.

36. The Penguin Book of English Verse - John Hayward - £1 The Samaritans

37. Under a Glass Bell - Anais Nin - £0.50 The Samaritans (3 for £1)

38. The Overcoat and Other Short Stories - Nikolai Gogol - £0.50 The Samaritans (3 for £1)

39. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich - Solzhenitsyn - £0.50 The Samaritans (3 for £1) (obviously bought this recently but the 70s cover looks so good and it was only 33p)

I feel if they are going to sell books three for a pound, it's not really my fault, I do have to buy them. I probably did buy too many, I mean, they were extremely heavy and my bag was literally bursting it's very seams. 

I should be more worried. 39 books in nearly a month, nearly a book a day, 70 quid-odd or £2.29 per day. 

It vaguely and very much on the very thinest layer concerns me that this is not normal. 

I wouldn't say it was unhealthy though. 

Actually, I think it is fine. A healthy and robust interest in books (and reading).

Slow week

It was a slow week. I overspent last month and this month is tight. I've been trying to cut down on everything, on coffees, on lunches, eating out and non essential spending. I'm not really tracking how it's going as I know it's not great. On my way to work yesterday I made sure I was on the boring side of the road, so once past the first 3 coffee shops right by the station there are only pubs, bars and restaurants so that in the morning everything is closed. Further up the road there are 5 charity shops and a big Nero's so it was imperative for me to stay on the left side of the road, away from temptation.

I am weak. Roadworks ahead forced me to cross exactly in front of Cancer Research UK which had it's doors open to circulate the air of the recent heatwave. I crossed over and sailed right in. In my defence, the books there are cheap and when I read them that'll be keeping me out of the supermarket/pub/cinema, so I am actually saving money in some twisted way. A rather "red" theme was on offer, along with the usual second-hand trash. I got:

21. Revolutionary Road - Richard Yates - £1 Cancer Research UK
22. Poor Folk and The Gambler - Fyodor Dostoyevsky - £1 Cancer Research UK
23. Russia: A Concise History - Ronald Hingley - £1 Cancer Research UK

Three books for less than the price of a pint. There was nothing I could do.

Finished Down and Out in Paris and London and read Perfume by Patrick Suskind. Perfume was a perfect read for being out in the sun and transporting me out of London. After finishing I was much more aware of the odours around me, driving me to be even more revolted by the sweaty pits of hairy men on the tube. Perfect.

Continuing to fall off the wagon...

I have my usual charity shops that I like to pop in to with a nice turnaround of stock and I tend to prefer the shops who organise their books well into sections. I should visit the less usual shops more often (or maybe I shouldn't?) as I have discovered that my local Cancer Research UK has all books for £1, and on asking if this was a special offer at the till, this is the normal price of a book. I feel I have may have overpaid elsewhere on a number of occasions but my as my thoughts always conclude, the money is for charity and this can only be a good thing.

So last Thursday I discovered Cancer Research UK (which incidentally have a weak A-Z system of shelving, with a large part of the bottom shelf being obscured by clothes) and I was impelled to buy 5 books, one of which was a gift so I shall only list the 4.

14. One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich - Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn - £1 Cancer Research UK
15. The Return of Sherlock Holmes - Sir Arthur Conan Doyle - £1 Cancer Research UK
16. Geisha - Liza Dalby - £1 Cancer Research UK
17. The Fobidden City: The Great Within - May Holdswoth & Caroline Courtauld - £1 Cancer Research UK

I hadn't heard of Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn but the Penguin modern classics cover caught my eye and the back cover interested me "the brutal, shattering glimpse of the fate of millions of Russians under Stalin shook Russia and shocked the world when it first appeared". I see now that Solzhenitsyn was awarded the 1970 Nobel Prize for Literature and I am certain that for £1 this is an absolute bargain. It would only be better if the cover was more retro looking but then again I might not have picked it up.

I've not read Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden and I hated the film (mainly because just like I find it hard to watch Liam Neeson or Gerard Butler playing Americans, it's hard to watch Michelle Yeoh and Ziyi Zhang playing Japanese) but I am interested in Japanese culture and bought Geisha by Liza Dalby. A non-fiction book, Dalby is an authority in geisha and was a consultant to Arthur Golden in writing the book and producing the film. The back cover claims that she was the only foreigner ever to become a geisha but with a quick internet search I am not sure this is the case. It looks like Dalby attended events and researched into geisha lives but did not formally debut as a geisha but Fiona Graham apparently did. Although I am not giving any extra kudos to Graham, I just think the cover seems misleading at first look. I shall have to read it!

And... on Friday I returned to the same shop and found I must buy:

18. The Accidental Theorist - Paul Krugman - £1 Cancer Research UK
19. Boy - Ronald Dahl - £1 Cancer Research UK
20. Memoirs of a Geisha - Arthur Golden - £1 Cancer Research UK

Whilst my reading rate is nowhere near my shopping rate I thought it might be good to log what I actually read as well. Currently I am on p170 of The Adventures and Memoirs of Sherlock Holmes by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, p180 of Down and Out in Paris and London by George Orwell and have about 5 China related books that I am partially way through that I won't bother to list.

In the last fortnight I have finished reading a wonderful 1986 edition of Aldous Huxley's Brave New World (99p Oxfam) and a 1981 Penguin Modern Classics print of Hiroshima by John Hersey (£1.50 British Heart Foundation) which I read whilst listening to All Farewells are Sudden by A winged Victory for the Sullen for an absolutely haunting experience.

I didn't buy any books over the actual weekend as I was in Bruges and although I did try and look at bookshops, the books on sale were in Flemish. My recent books however should tide me over for a while, they're piled into a tower on my desk and I'll be sorting them this afternoon.

Step 2: A greater power can restore sanity

So without realising what might follow after step 1: admitting you have a problem, I have unwittingly ordered online some material that for me fits nicely with step 2. Although I should say that I have still not truly admitted to myself that this is a problem, my compulsion for buying books. Looking to a greater power, higher than myself I have indulged in new copies of:

11. Why I am Not a Christian: and Other Essays on Religion - Bertrand Russell - £11.99 Amazon
12. God is Not Great - Christopher Hitchens - £5.89 Amazon
13. Arguably - Christopher Hitchens - £7.92 Amazon

I have been looking out for these titles at charity shops for months but have come to realise that people that own these books must treasure and keep them which is why they are so relatively rare in the charity shops I go to. Hence I bit the bullet and bought them with some birthday vouchers and they arrived today.

There is an obvious theme to this batch of books, which as anyone can guess goes hand in hand with having already read several Richard Dawkins books as well as owning An Atheists Guide to Christmas  and a mega copy of The Origin of Species and The Voyage of the Beagle. Add that I have a background in physics and have not been baptised and you may as well throw me on the heathen fire.

Just writing about these books is making me feel a little uneasy, after years of conditioning reminding me not to offend others. I have already decided that I cannot read God is Not Great on my commute, after the only time I took The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins on the tube, two nuns and a Jewish man wearing a kippah sat opposite me. Nothing of course happened to make it impossible to read a book about religion in public but I perceived an awkwardness and feared that someone might say something to me about my choice of reading material. I shall, however, relish reading these titles from the safety of my sofa. They've already made me quite happy just being in my collection.

Step 1: Admitting you have a problem

Work was busy yesterday. I was shuttling from site to site and even may have in my shift dress been slightly running when I thought no one was looking. Twice I visited the bathrooms only to find I was in a queue and ditched it, feeling I had no time. I was quite thirsty but also didn't seem able to stop and have a drink although I did take a swipe off the water fountain a couple of times but my technique is poor and I think the equivalent water I actually drank was half a sip. Yesterday I was literally run off my feet.

When I came home and tried to tell my partner all my woes, I dumped my bag on the floor by my  shoes and dug out my phone which was dead. In order to get to my phone I had to take something out of my overfilled bag. Describing my crazy day as I did, I paused and said, "sorry, I also managed to buy a book" and took out the offending article sheepishly.

In-between not being able to pee or drink, in-between jogging between offices and dashing about not stopping to answer colleagues' questions, I had gone past an Oxfam Books shop. I was in a hurry so I obviously popped in to browse the books. I didn't bother looking at the fiction (to save time) and just looked at the history section and languages and self-help type books. After 4 mins I saw a book I have been wanting a copy of for about 6 years but had yet to see it in a charity shop. It was £2.99 and I bought it immediately. I left the shop and ran down the road.

In this post, I'm not admitting to myself that I have a problem, just maybe suggesting that this is not quite fully normal behaviour. Between essential bodily functions and buying a book, I gave the book the priority.

In the last 4 days I have bought 9 books. Not including the books that have arrived in the post nor the ones I have ordered online and have yet to arrive (online shopping is not at real/bad as real life buying in shops??). Okay an 10th book arrived in the post as well and I'll wait for the others to arrive before I count them as "mine". I am hoping to be able to use this blog to log what I am buying and maybe gauge if this a problem or not. I mean, it's not a problem, it's a complete joy, but isn't that what an addict would say?

In the last 4 days the books that have arrived in the post and that I have also bought are:

1. Ignorance - Milan Kundera - £0.89 Oxfam
2. Tin Tin in America - Herge - £0.89 Oxfam
3. The Broons and Oor Wullie - The Fabulous Fifties - £1.99 Traid
4. Out of Africa - Karen Blixen - £1.75 Shelter
5. The Dissident - Nell Freudenberger - £2.25 Shelter
6. The Story of Tibet - Conversations with the Dalai Lama - Thomas Laird - £2.25 Shelter
7. Treasure Island - Robert Louis Stevenson - £2.99 Traid
8. How the World Came to Oxford - Amnesty International - £2.00
9. Mathematical Carnival - Martin Gardner - £2.25 British Heart Foundation
10. They F*** You Up - How to Survive Family Life - Oliver James - £2.99 Oxfam

I've fancied reading this since I saw it in Fopp in the mid noughts. The cover obviously caught my eye but I am genuinely interested in finding out how my parents f***ed me up and how to attempt not to f*** up any future kids I have.