A Book Fetish

I love books. I love everything about them -- the smell of the paper, the way they feel in my hand, the different typefaces and methods of pagination and decoration, their covers and cover art, dedications and epigraphs, blurbs, ideas and words and typos and . . . well you get the idea.

I used to have one book wall, with enough shelves to leave quite a lot of room for more books. That was six years ago. Now I have a book corner too. And I've eaten up almost all of that space. I have a perfectly good library here at the college, but leave it to me to want to read things I can't find there.

Like this little book I bought through Alibris.

What makes it so special, you wonder? My friend Jill wrote it. I read about it on her blog and decided I wanted to read it and own it. I don't personally know many actual published writers. Yes, there are my sometime neighbor and Naomi Shihab Nye and my own brother Billy. And there are Milly Barranger and Andrew Hudgins and now John Jeremiah Sullivan. But in the grand universe of things, they number few. Some of them are really just acquaintances anyway, but Jill is a real friend with a great eye for detail, an incisive wit, and keen intelligence.

Oh. Did I mention she has a beautiful garden and a yen for cats and dogs? And now I have one of her books. It's next on my Shelfari list of things to read.