Monday, September 18, 2017

I've Got My Books to Keep Me Warm

Q: If you were kitting out a holiday cottage (vacation rental) what would you put on the bookshelf for rainy days?





- from Susan

Having spent some lovely vacation days from Cape Cod to Kauai sitting in houses staring out at the rain, I have either been grateful or frustrated at how various hosts have answered this question. Dog-eared, spat-upon paperback copies of baseball players’ or golfers’ memoirs, outdated Farmers’ Almanacs, paperbacks with covers that show half-naked women with long wavy hair I can only dream about exhaling on the exposed abs of half-dressed men who also have long curly hair I can only dream about….

Here’s a dream bookshelf, in no particular order since what I want to read at any moment changes with my mood:

Angelica’s Smile, Andrea Camilleri
Persuasion, Jane Austen
The Golden Spiders, Rex Stout
Me Talk Pretty One Day, David Sedaris
Indemnity Only, Sara Paretsky
Farleigh Field, Rhys Bowen
Cooked, Michael Pollan
Salvador, Joan Didion
Mrs. Dalloway, Virginia Woolf
The Severn Dials Mystery, Agatha Christie
Tripwire, Lee Child
The Perfect Storm, Sebastian Junger (for especially stormy days)
Through a Glass Darkly, Donna Leon

A baker’s dozen, enough to distract me from quite a few rainy days, although I expect if it were my holiday cottage the library would grow quickly. I’d have to update it every Memorial Day and would probably hit a bookstore in the resort town anyway. There can never be too many books – never!





2 comments:

Unknown said...

There CAN be too many books, you should check out my bookshelves!
Funny, I've been in that same cabin with the Farmers Almanacs

James W. Ziskin said...

Great list! Would love to find those books in a vacation house.