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Oh my gosh, I GOTTA READ THAT!
What books do...
What books do you have a burning, itching desire to read? Does your local library have them? And if they don't, do you spend the day crying or going to a bookstore? And then what do you do if they aren't THERE? Use this thread to discuss books that you simply MUST READ!
submitted by WritingWarrior, age ???, Nowheresville
(August 2, 2011 - 4:12 pm)
(August 2, 2011 - 4:12 pm)
THE BIOLOGY OF TARDIGRADES BY IAN M. KINCHIN. It's about as easy to find as an unabridged copy of The Princess Bride and about as expensive. Also THE PHYLUM TARDIGRADA BY PROFESSORS RAMOZZATI AND M(A)UCCI.
(August 2, 2011 - 9:46 pm)
You do know there's no such person as S. Morgenstern, right? The "abridged" Princess Bride is the only one there is.
Or am I misunderstanding you?
(August 3, 2011 - 7:35 pm)
That was my point. I've been looking for months. I know it exists, but it isn't at any bookstore or library anywhere near me and out of stock at every online bookstore I can find, and even if it ever gets in stock, I've never seen it advertised for less than $60. That goes for both books. The first one's out of print, and the second is written in Italian, and the English version is limited edition. I think even the Italian versino may be out of print, too. I haven't checked, because I'm not quite to the point where I'd learn a foreign language just to read the book, although I'm very close. It's extremely frustrating.
(August 3, 2011 - 11:20 pm)
That was my point. I've been looking for months. I know it exists, but it isn't at any bookstore or library anywhere near me and out of stock at every online bookstore I can find, and even if it ever gets in stock, I've never seen it advertised for less than $60. That goes for both books. The first one's out of print, and the second is written in Italian, and the English version is limited edition. I think even the Italian versino may be out of print, too. I haven't checked, because I'm not quite to the point where I'd learn a foreign language just to read the book, although I'm very close. It's extremely frustrating.
(August 3, 2011 - 11:20 pm)
Oh, I see! Sorry.
(August 4, 2011 - 8:15 am)
Well I have been dying to read The Candle Man, Book Two: The Society of Dread and it is having to be taken from one library to another so I can read it and that means another few days to wait after already having waited two weeks. Has any one else read it or the first one, The Society of Unrelenting Vigilance?
I could really ramble on about all the books that I had to wait for because they were out of print or so recently printed that there was a 100-person waiting list at the library. It has happened several times for both those things.
(August 2, 2011 - 10:54 pm)
TOP!!!!!!!!!
(August 3, 2011 - 10:02 am)
The Hunger Games series! They have all the books, but whenever I look the first one is NEVER EVER there! They don't have ANY Lavine or the Books of Bayern or... This is driving me nuts!
(August 3, 2011 - 11:56 am)
@Elizabeth M: I am assuming you meant Levine. If I am wrong please correct me. I have not been able to find A Tale of Two Castles at any of the libraries. It has always been checked out. And I haven't been able to find the first book in the Maze of Bones series. (I think that is what it's called.) I have found the 2nd through the 5th but not the first. It is getting quite infuriating.
(August 3, 2011 - 9:58 pm)
I just checked and it's actually the 39 clues series. The book is called The Maze of Bones.
(August 3, 2011 - 10:00 pm)
@Lizzy- Oops, soory, Levine.
I am mad at the Young Adult Section in our library! All they have are disgusting "Teen Love" books. Why do they fill shelves with that when they could actually have real books?! I can't stand it. Plus I'm too shy to complain...
(August 4, 2011 - 7:12 am)
That sounds terrible. The Barnes and Noble where I live is like that; now I just skip it and go to the Children's and Sci-Fi sections. It's really a pity. Have you checked to see if there are any books by those authors in the children's section? Sometimes they'll put anything for non-adult's that isn't romance there.
(August 4, 2011 - 7:16 pm)
In my experience Barnes and Noble tends to be pretty bad in that respect (though the last one I went to had a lovely big sci-fi section; I bought myself a Temeraire book and would have bought more if I hadn't been there for presents for other people). Nevertheless, I don't think we can really blame B&N. They just have what's being written (and what sells but that's another matter), though there seems to be more and more YA dystopia being written which can only bode well. I don't spend much time in YA anymore, no matter what bookstore I'm in.
I don't spend much time in Children's either. Much of it doesn't look very interesting, or is just poorly written.
Which leaves Sci-Fi, and I've basically completely migrated there. It tends to be both bigger and have much better books than either YA or Children's, and also to have more of the authors that I enjoy and seek out.
(August 6, 2011 - 1:05 pm)
At the library, I split most of my time between YA fiction (my library has a great section for that) and adult nonfiction (I love biology books, and I do definitely think that the adult ones tend to be better-written and give more information), but I do usually visit the sci-fi section for HG2G (I admit I haven't yet read the entire series) and Terry Pratchett and Tolkien. I only occasionally go to the children's section of the library, but I go much more often at Barnes and Noble because that's where they put Levine and R. L. LaFevers and Rick Riordin and all those people.
Part of the reason my library's YA section is so good is that they have a separate romance section. I only know that because it's right by the sci-fi section, of course; I'd never dream of actually getting anything from it.
Yes, it's true that they're getting more dystopia books at Barnes and Noble. The last time I went, they had an entire section for fans of The Hunger Games. I didn't get anything, but I was still glad.
I recently ordered 17 nature books; I can't wait for them! They're mostly field guides and observation tips and activity suggestions and things. I found an entire website selling that sort of thing, so I chose the books that looked best and ordered them used from a website with much better prices. I'm quite excited!
(August 6, 2011 - 6:46 pm)
The library I most often go to when in US hasn't got a separate sci-fi section, which is a pity, because I enjoy sci-fi but tend to feel rather awkward browsing adult fiction, though I of course go through it looking for Gaiman and Tolkien and Adams and Pratchett and all the rest, and sometimes I serendipitously find excellent sci-fi I'd never heard of that way. (Occasionally I go to a bigger library which does have a seperate sci-fi section. Unfortunately I don't have a card for that library, though my mum does. And I was thinking I couldn't get one because I don't live in that city and you have to provide proof of address, but it turns out they have a reciprocal agreement with my main library which means I can get a card.)
I don't read much nonfiction outside of the Bible, and when I do it tends to be history/biography (Da wants me to read more biographies, and I think I'm going to start; I borrowed his biography of Einstein a while back and it was fascinating), or else by C.S. Lewis (mostly I've read his fiction, but I loved Mere Christianity, and all the essays of his I've read are fascinating). So most of the time the only thing I go into the nonfiction section for is poetry. (Or fiction if I'm in a Dewey Decimal library.)
(August 6, 2011 - 7:57 pm)