Thanks to N—-, I had a sizable gift certificate to the Concord Bookshop burning a hole in my pocket.\u00a0 The Concord Bookshop is my favorite bookstore, and I can’t think of anything more fun than having a guilt-free shopping trip there.<\/p>\n
Monday was the day I got to use my gift certificate, and for the first time in years (more years than I can count), I didn’t make an immediate beeline for the children’s and young adult section at the back of the store.\u00a0 In fact, I realized that I had absolutely no interest in looking at books in either of those sections; I wanted and needed to avoid them for a change.\u00a0 One bad side effect of being a children’s librarian is that you need <\/em>to read gobs of children’s and young adult books, and it becomes very hard to have enough time left to read grown-up books.\u00a0 And, for the first time in years, I think that I’m actually burnt-out on juvenile literature.<\/p>\n So here is what I ended up buying:\u00a0 two Agatha Christie books, The Mirror Crack’d From Side to Side <\/em>and The Mysterious Affair at Styles<\/em>, and a Philip Pullman book, Fairy Tales from the Brothers Grimm, A New English Version <\/em>(which was shelved in the adult section).\u00a0 Admittedly, fairy tales are often viewed as children’s literature, but I like to remember that they were not always intended for just children; I’ll be reading Pullman’s versions of the tales from that perspective.\u00a0 And, admittedly, Agatha Christie’s books aren’t necessarily deep and challenging novels for adults, but oh how I do love them.\u00a0 Nothing like a good murder mystery to keep you company by the woodstove on a winter’s evening.<\/p>\n It’s been lovely reading these books the last few nights, knowing that I don’t have <\/em>to read them, and that I can savor and enjoy them just because I want to.\u00a0 I’ll need to kick into gear this evening and reread Grace Lin’s Where the Mountain Meets the Moon <\/em>for tomorrow’s book group, but then I’ll move right back into one of my new purchases for a little study break before I dig into next week’s book group book.\u00a0 And I have a feeling that I’m entering a phase of obsessive reading of Agatha Christie…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Thanks to N—-, I had a sizable gift certificate to the Concord Bookshop burning a hole in my pocket.\u00a0 The Concord Bookshop is my favorite bookstore, and I can’t think of anything more fun than having a guilt-free shopping trip there. Monday was the day I got to use my gift certificate, and for the … Continue reading My New Books<\/span>