Reading Between Raindrops

People often ask me how I do on rainy days. Actually, rain is usually good for business. Rainstorms make people think of staying inside; and if you’re indoors, awaiting sunshine and better days, it’s a perfect time to read.

For myself, when rain strikes, I like to sit on my bed, listen to the rain on the rooftop, and put on some chamber music, and then crack open my current reading project. Right now I’m reading the World War II reminiscences of local author John Shirley, in his book, I Remember.

Our recent book acquisitions include:

Butterfield 8, by John O’Hara

Lalla Rookh, by Thomas Moore

The Concise Horizon History of England

500 Recipes by Request from Mother Anderson’s Famous Dutch Kitchens, by Jeanne M. Hall.

The Occult: A History, by Colin Wilson

Present Day Italian, by Josph Louis Russo

The Northern Shoshoni, by Brigham D. Madsen

Icy Sparks, by Gwyn Hyman Rubio

Somebody to Love: The Autobiography of Grace Slick.

Machiavelli in Hell, by Sebastian de Grazia (biography of Machiavelli)

Henley’s Formulas for Home and Workshop, edited by Gardner D. Hiscock

The Thanksgiving Memoir & A Christmas Memory, by Truman Capote

Jesus: An Historian’s Review of the Gospels, by Michael Grant

Houses Architects Design for Themselves, edited by Walter Wagner

And many, many more.

I’ll be having a Spring Cleaning Sale on May 6th. Everything in the store will be ½ off! As such, I’m working extra hard to get as many books on the floor as possible. If you want to get the jump on the Sales-Only customers, now is the time!

Speaking of new books, I am toying with the idea of selling retail books on demand here at Book Oasis! With the demise of Goodenough Books and Altamont Books, many people have been asking for new books. If I were to sell retail books here, would you buy them? Please let me know by return email. If enough of you say yes, then I will do so. But, before I can do so, I have to have an assurance of patronage. Remember: having your “custom of shopping” is the origin of “customer”!

CLOSE THE BOOK ON: Octavia Butler, from a fall and subsequent head injury, 2/24/06. An accomplished writer, capable of putting a personal spin on uncommon events, as evidenced by her book "Kindred," a time-travel novel in which a black woman from 1976 Southern California is transported back to the violent days of slavery before the Civil War. “Kindred” is now a popular staple of high school and college students.

Recently a customer told me that she was well acquainted with Butler, and knew her more as a friend than as a writer. “She was very gracious, and kind.” Would that we could all be remembered as such when we are gone!

Last month Book Oasis was the recipient of three personal libraries, including that of a teacher! As such, the store is bulging at the seams with books on a wide variety of subjects from American Indians to the history of Texas! Check the books out before others snap them up.

Finally, a note of wonder: a young man of about eleven came in clutching a Latin/English copy of Caesar’s Gallic War which he’d plucked from my fifty-cent cart. After some conversation, he also snapped up a copy of Shakespeare’s King Lear, and some other brainy titles. So, for those of you who despair of ‘the new generation’, take heart: the Classics continue to attract!



Larry Burdick on 04.07.06 @ 01:53 PM PST [link]