The Sunday Haul (on 08-08-2021)

Blog Anniversary: The blog is now in its 14th year! Forgot to mention in my previous post. 

After a record haul of nine books the previous Sunday I managed to repeat the same feat last Sunday too.  I simply couldn’t resist the books I saw on the pavements. Some of them were titles I already have but after I saw them I had to buy them more so when they were titles by Raymond Chandler and Dashiell Hammett.

However, the first title I came across at Abids last Sunday was a nice copy of ‘The Hungry Years’ by William Leith. The sub-title said ‘Confessions of a Food Addict’ and though I am not a food addict or a foodie I wanted to read it to know how it felt to be addicted to food.

 
A couple of weeks ago I had bought a book called ‘Arabs’ by David Lamb who had also written a book called ‘The Africans’ that I had bought long back and had read twice. David Lamb’s accounts of his travels in various African nations and their politics impressed me. I thought I would expect the same kind of insights in ‘The Arabs’ and so I had bought it. But I haven’t yet read it. Last Sunday at Abids I saw a copy of ‘From Beirut to Jerusalem’ by Thomas L Friedman that seemed a good enough book to read along with ‘The Arabs’ by David Lamb to get a complete picture of the Middle East. I got ‘From Beirut to Jerusalem’ by Thomas L Friedman for just fifty rupees.

 

A few steps down the road and I came to another seller where I stood rooted to the spot my eyes fixed on the books spread out on the pavement. There were half a dozen fantastic titles I wanted to buy right away. It did not matter that half of them were titles I already had. They were all in good condition and looked almost new. It was impossible to resist so I got down on my knees to gather them all before anyone could do so.

There were two Dashiell Hammett titles: ‘The Big Knockover’ and ‘The Dain Curse’ that I already had two copies. Then there were three titles by Raymond Chandler: ‘Trouble is My Business’, ‘The Simple Art of Murder’ and ‘The Long Goodbye’ all which I already have. I did not want to leave them behind so I took them along with a copy of ‘Pop…1280’ by Jim Thompson. Only very recently I had bought a copy of Jim Thompson’s ‘A Swell Looking Bird’ online. All of these titles came to me for one thousand rupees. But that was not the end of the day’s excitement.

At one of the sellers who keep their wares on the road in front of the General Post Office at Abids, I spotted a title that made my heart jump. I saw a nice copy of ‘The Hunters’ by James Salter.  But I had to be very careful for this seller was a clever one. If you showed the slightest interest in the book he would quote a high price. So I casually picked up the book as if I was not really interested in it, flipped through the pages and asked him the price. Luckily I was able to get it at a reasonable price of Rs 130.