The Meadowlands Public School Book Sale

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I'm a sucker for booksales. If they're organized by a cash-strapped school and money raised goes to support the school library, so much the better! I didn't even know about this one until yesterday, when I read our local MPP's newsletter. I go to these book sales with no prior expectations - I just browse to my heart's content and pick out anything that looks interesting. Today's haul was a total of 32 books, the whole bag for $65. Some were very old, some newish, some in pristine condition, others well-thumbed, more what dealers would call a "reading copy".

Twelve were fiction:

1. Collectif de l'Association des écrivains québécois pour la jeunesse - Bye-bye Les Parents (YA short fiction)
2. Crummey, Michael - The Innocents
3. Demaline, Cherie - Empire of the Wild
4. Florence, Elinor - Wildwood
5. French, Nicci - Blue Monday
6. Graham, Genevieve - Bluebird (Historical fiction)
7. Ikkumaq, Jessica Rose - Why do Northern Lights run around? (English & Inuktitut)
8. Ness, Patrick - Chaos Walking: The Knife of Never Letting Go (SF)
9. O'Neill, Heather - The Girl Who Was Saturday Night
10. Pearse, Lesley - The Woman in the Wood
11. Smucker, Barbara - Underground to Canada (Children or YA)
12. Wagamese, Richard - Indian Horse

Another five would go into the category of biography or memoir:

1. Appleby, Timothy - A New Kind of Monster: the secret life & chilling crimes of Col. Russell Williams
2. Belli, Gioconda - The Country under my Skin: a memoir of love & war
3. Prince Harry - Spare
4. Thistle, Jesse - From the Ashes: My story of being Metis, homeless & finding my way
5. Trudeau, Alexandre - Barbarian Lost: Travels in the new China

Four under food & drink, and general reference:

1. The Beer Bible - Jeff Alworth
2. The Canadian Press Stylebook: A guide for writers & editors, 16th ed. (2010)
3. Cheese Stakes: Lanark County's mammoth cheese & its place in cheesemaking history - Ron W. Shaw
4. Vegan Secret Supper: Bold & elegant menus from a rogue kitchen - Merida Anderson

And finally ... all the rest. Some history and politics, local interest, autofiction, general nonfiction, trivia, humour. Stuff that caught my interest but I'm too lazy to fit into a specific category, which would feel too much like work.

1. Crankshaw, Edward - The New Cold War: Moscow v.Pekin
2. Deacon, Gillian - Green for Life: 200 eco-ideas for every day
3. Fogarty, Catherine - Murder on the Inside: True story of the deadly riot at Kingston Penitentiary
4. Gardam, John - Fifty Years After (WWII)
5. Laprade, Sam & Caroline Phillips - Ottawa Made
6. Mackenzie, Tom H. - The Last Foundling
7. Moorehead, Caroline - A Train in Winter: Extraordinary story of women, friendship & survival in wwII
8. Peterson, Jordan B. - 12 Rules for Life: An antidote to chaos
9. Stanbridge, Joanne - Famous Dead Canadians
10. Wallace, Garth - Cockpit Follies
11. Wilson, Richard Albert - The Miraculous Birth of Language (preface: Bernard Shaw)

I expect that the 32 books I've listed here will all have different destinies. Some I'll read once and then quickly pass on to a friend or a little free library or a future book sale; others won't be read cover-to-cover but I'll likely refer to them from time to time; others will stay in my permanent collection, for my descendants to read or dispense with as they see fit.

Comments

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"Famous Dead Canadians" ?

Frodo had to deal with them in his story, correct? Or was it Bilbo?

LOL