Our Christmas 2011 Book Haul: Santa Went a Bit Overboard

by Tom B.

You know that kid on YouTube who was so angry about getting books for Christmas? Well, my daughter is the opposite of him. She was crazy excited about the literary bounty that Santa dropped off this year and… as you can see from the picture below… Santa kinda didn’t know when to say “when” this Christmas.

Our Christmas Books

Next year, Santa needs to adopt a new "less is more" mentality

Because that’s a lot of books, right? I haven’t even updated the “library total” at the top of the blog because I still have to catalogue all the new arrivals.

But can you blame Santa? That is a very cool collection of books that he and Mrs. Claus put together this year. And he probably got a lot of great deals from local indie book stores, children’s book sales at his office (new hardcovers were $4! FOUR DOLLARS!), reduced-priced school book orders, and amazing used book store deals that he just couldn’t pass up.

In fact, Santa went SO nuts this year that he asked me to stash about 15 other books in a box under my workshop desk because he overbought to such a degree that he simply couldn’t justify giving my daughter that many books all at once. Santa has a pretty serious impulse-control problem… apparently.

So, expect reviews – lots of reviews – of our new additions to the library soon. In the meantime, I’ll be on Web MD, checking to see if I have the psychological symptoms of a chronic book hoarder.

{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }

Barbara Medeiros January 14, 2012 at 9:49 pm

I SO identify with your impulse control issues! Although I was less than enamored with what the late Border’s Book evolved…devolved?…into, I am an occasional visitor to Ann Arbor, MI and recall the original State Street store with its’ two glorious floors of somewhat disorganized assortments of little-known and well-known works, cheek-to-jowl…with no artful display, just the thrill of the hunt. So it was that I spent way to much time, effort and money…well, not really!… this past summer, toting home bag after plastic carrier bag of whatever seemed appealing. Who could resist buying a $20 children’s’ picture book…at 75% off?!! Lest I be thought of as indiscriminate, I do have standards, but what fun it is to have my own copies (I admit to “vetting” many before giving them away!) of works that would not have been something I would have spent my book budgeted dollars towards. And so, I came to the discovery of two nuggets of deliciousness…:The Last Words Of Will Wolfkin” by Steven Knight and “The Mysterious Benedict Society” by Trenton Lee Stewart. Without the goad of a younger reader in the immediate family, I would have passed up these young adult books…but for the conjunction of availability and bargain pricing! Such trips necessitated the purchase of two additional bookcases…and I still have piles under the bench at the foot of the bed, stacked in the corner and also neatly stashed in my “gift closet” for birthdays and Christmas gift-giving…three years out! Yes, I think I am a hoarder of books…and I proudly admit to the vice!

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