My library shelves getting a touch overloaded, so the other day I decided to have a cull. But how do you pick which books to keep and which to recycle? I ran along the rows and for each I asked myself - "Will I ever read this book again?"
I found that even when the answer was clearly "No" I was still reluctant to chuck it on the heap, mainly because - (a) some years back I had the routine of giving Toots a Xmas pressie list of well-reviewed books and she'd put a copy or two in my stocking because she's a great daughter so now I hesitate to chuck them out even though blah blah blah! - and (b) I bought them overseas in some op shop in a good-memory place and wrote as much on the flyleaf so sentimentally attached.
But I gritted my teeth and dumped some of each in the first round...
Blackberry Wine - Joanne Harris (UK 1999)
Don't remember what this is about so clearly it didn't make an impression even though it had big reviews.
About A Boy - Nick Hornby (1998 UK)
Seen the movie a couple of times, and still worth a look, but don't need the book.
Heart Songs - E. Annie Proulx (1994 USA)
Collection of her short stories that disappointed acutely, came across as someone with a big name cleaning out her offcuts.
The Longest Crawl - Ian Marchant (2006 UK)
Some reality thing about a nation-wide British pub crawl that I skimmed and dropped.
The Paperchase - Marcel Theroux (2001 USA)
Ditto comment "Blackberry Wine"
The Kite Runner - Khaled Hosseini (2003 UK)
Ditto comment "Blackberry Wine"
Angela's Ashes - Frank McCourt (1996 UK/Ire)
Ditto comment "About A Boy"
Bitin' Back - Vivienne Cleven (2001 Aust)
A not bad story I think, aboriginal, narrow subject matter
Eucalyptus - Murray Bail (1998 Aust)
A big review at the time, pumped up by the critics, but didn't do it for me, something about a bloke having to name a hundred gum trees to get the girl of his dreams. Or something.
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Ahhhh, then there's these three! In a special category. The category named "The Literati Say This Is A Classic And You Have To Read It Or At Least Say You've Read It And Totally Understand It To Be Considered As One Of The Literati"
Illywhacker - Peter Carey (1985 (UK/Aust)
Midnight's Children - Salman Rushdie (1995 UK)
Ulysses - James Joyce (1922 UK/Ire)
I'm sorry folks, but I tried and I tried but never got all the way through these even once and in Salman's case only got to page 35 on both tries. The other two I did manage to get to about page 732 before I gave up. In all three instances not understanding what the hell it was all about and what they were trying to say. And didn't care.
So they've all gone into street-side libraries with my blessings and I hope someone gets a good read out of them.
That's all, just though you needed to know that. (Do you chuck books out that have passed their use-by date?)
Cheers....
T.R.E.
>>>>>>>>>>>