Friends of the library

I love "Friends of the Library" book sales. Yes, there's invariably a lot of drek out on the tables, but there are also plenty of books that turn up I've never heard of. Some of these are real finds. There was one in San Marcos over the weekend, and the whole family stopped by for Sunday's $3 shopping bag sale. They had a tremendous children's section this year--they'd cleared out a huge swath of their older science and natural history collection at the library, apparently, and Calista grabbed quite a few space and astronomy books. They're written for mid- to upper-elementary reader levels, but they're still a good find for her. One book, about the possibility of life on other worlds, really captured Calista's attention. She insisted on reading the first page herself, and did a pretty good--if halting--job of working through the tougher words. Mars is currently her favorite planet, and if you ask her, she'll start talking about dry lakebeds, polar ice caps and the possibility of finding fossils there. For her, it's simple: If there was water there in the past, then there was life there, too. Cut and dried.

I found a few interesting books as well. Universe 4, a Galaxy reader and a Silverberg collection, as well as a couple of novels by Poul Anderson and Jack Vance. All long out of print, sadly. I also stumbled into two intriguing history books I'd not seen before: John Prebble's Mutiny: Highland regiments in revolt, 1743-1804 and La Popessa: The Controversial Biography of Sister Pascalina, the Most Powerful Woman in Vatican History by Paul I. Murphy and R. Rene Arlington. Not only are both of these obscure and out of print, they both bring to my attention elements of history I'd been ignorant of up to this point. Fascinating stuff here, which I'm certain will find its way into my writing sooner or later.

Have I mentioned how much I like library book sales?

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