Last year I guess I was out of library books but too close to our date of return to Massachusetts to check any new books out. I must have mentioned my plight because a friend loaned me a paperback mystery, which saved me from the horror of having nothing to read. In the meantime, I had downloaded one to my iPad, so I was doubly rich.
I returned the book to her in January
when we got back to Florida, and a couple of weeks later, there she was at my door with
another loaner.
For Valentine’s Day, My Guy surprised
me with a James Patterson – who I never read – because he knew
how much I love mysteries, and the title - Holmes, Marple, and Poe -was so serendipitous.
Today, on my way to play pickleball, another friend stuck an arm in the car and dropped in yet another unsolicited offering.
The pressure is on. Do I plow through
each so I can give a genuine response to the people kind enough to offer them?
Or do I just wait a decent interval and return them with a big smile and a
thank you? After all those years of getting English degrees and then teaching
it, I want to choose my own reading material.
Oh, and I’m trying to make myself
re-read my own first novel so I’ll know what the hell I’m talking about when I
speak at a friend’s book club in a couple of weeks.
Or you could just return them and say you have too much on your plate right now for an extra book to read.
ReplyDeleteYes, and the danger is that if I'm too enthusiastically grateful, they'll just give me more.
DeleteI like James Patterson, though I no longer own any of his books except the ones on the kindle. I gave the real ones to my younger son along with many others. i've never yet read Alexander McCall-Smith. I believe Kate Atkinson is an Australian author?
ReplyDeleteActually, I think there's an Australian actress by the same name. This Atkinson lives in Edinburgh, Scotland.
DeleteWhat an embarrassment of riches, too many books!
ReplyDeleteI've read a couple of Kate Atkinsons and enjoyed them both. I've read McCall Smith's first two Precious Ramotswe books, and I liked them, but for some reason just never picked up anything else by him.
ReplyDeleteIf I were you, I'd keep the loaners for a while, just in case you might actually decide to read one, and then I'd give them all back before I went north for the summer. You can blame the calendar!
Yes, I started with his African Women's Detective Agency series, but the ones I truly love are about a woman who edits a philosophical journal in Scotland. Not much happens, but if you like mulling about things, this is your series.
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