Sunday's Book Haul

It was an unusually hot day in Hyderabad yesterday. I was late in getting to Abids because I noticed the front tyre of my bike was flat just when I took it off its stand. I waited impatiently while the tyre was fixed, my mind on the Joyce Maynard book I had seen last Sunday. I prayed that no one would pick it up and my prayers were answered when I found that no one had got it before me.

Joyce Maynard’s ‘At Home in the World: A Memoir’ was the first book I picked up yesterday. I got this almost-new, hard cover, first edition copy for only twenty rupees and the book ran to almost 350 pages. Judging from the cover and from the random paragraphs I read it appeared a good book. The reviews I had seen on Amazon were also good.

Joyce Maynard was a young writer when she attracted the attention of the reclusive writer, JD Salinger, with her story about life as a young person in the 60’s, that was on the cover of New York Times magazine in 1972. She was eighteen years old when she moved in with Salinger (35 years senior to her) who later threw her out of his house which was a devastating experience for her. This book speaks about her family, her time with Salinger and his influence on her, and the pain that followed their separation, her development as a writer, her marriage, and so on. Maynard wrote this book twenty-five years after the experience with Salinger. The book published in 1998 promises to be a good book and I am feeling really pleased with this find.

I found another good book with the same fellow I picked up the earlier book from. It was Joe Queenan’s ‘Balsamic Dreams’. Somewhere Dave Barry had said that Joe Queenan was one of his favorite writers and I remembered it when I chanced upon this book. I got this hardcover first edition for twenty rupees only. The blurbs say it is a very funny book. Dave Barry is the funniest writer alive and if he says someone is funny then I am going to read that writer.

The other book, the third of the day, was Stack the Deck’s ‘Writing Program’, a basic book on writing. I like to read these kind of books on writing because there is usually at least one thing to be learnt there.

The last find was the December 2007, that is, the latest issue of ‘The Atlantic’. I guess I was the only guy in Hyderabad reading the absolutely latest issue of noted magazine, that is, apart from the guy who sold it off. I got it for ten bucks only but when I got home I noticed that a few pages were missing but there were several articles intact. One of the most interesting articles was on the content that newspaper editors are feeding the readers. More about it in the next post