Don’t worry, you will read these wonderful books, just not yet. (Italo Calvino’s lovely beginning to If On a Winter’s Night a Traveller comes to mind.)
According to Calvino’s novel, you can find the following sections in the bookstore (Just add ARCs of Books That Are Forthcoming to the list):
- “Books You Haven’t Read
- Books You Needn’t Read
- Books Made for Purposes Other Than Reading
- Books Read Even Before You Open Them Since They Belong to the Category of Books Read Before Being Written
- Books That If You Had More Than One Life You Would Certainly Also Read But Unfortunately Your Days Are Numbered
- Books You Mean to Read But There Are Others You Must Read First
- Books Too Expensive Now and You’ll Wait Until They’re Remaindered
- Books Ditto When They Come Out in Paperback
- Books You Can Borrow from Somebody
- Books That Everybody’s Read So It’s As If You Had Read Them, Too
- Books You’ve Been Planning to Read for AgesBooks You’ve Been Hunting for Years Without Success
- Books Dealing with Something You’re Working on at the Moment
- Books You Want to Own So They’ll Be Handy Just in Case
- Books You Could Put Aside Maybe to Read This Summer
- Books You Need to Go with Other Books on Your Shelves
- Books That Fill You with Sudden, Inexplicable Curiosity, Not Easily Justified
- Books Read Long Ago Which It’s Now Time to Re-read
- Books You’ve Always Pretended to Have Read and Now It’s Time to Sit Down and Really Read Them”
Where the Wild Arcs Are
I work in an indie bookstore, which can’t afford to pay like a law office, of course. But there are perks, and one of the best is the overflowing gondolas in our freight room with fat, juicy, tempting, beautiful Advanced Readers Copies (ARCs)of books hot off the presses. Sometimes the ARCs come out a year in advance of publication, sometimes less. Booksellers get to review these, and see which customers might love them.
The section of my blog called “What Should I Read Next?” features published ARCs I grab off the shelf, along with backlisted books it occurs to me to pair them with.
Note: The entire blog in general, and this page in particular, consists of my opinions and beliefs only, and not those of Auntie’s Bookstore, or any of its management, ownership, or staff. Thanks for dropping by, and happy reading!
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