afternoon at the bookstore

I don't spend much time at bookstores. I wish I did, but the library is so much cheaper (and closer!) and so much more practical that I really have no need to go hunting through stores. Of course, everyone knows they're way more fun...but anyways. I had a $20 gift card (otherwise known as the perfect excuse to spend a few hours browsing books) and I was pretty excited.

 

Brooke and I stroked shiny covers and perused shelves, snickering quietly at several of the more cliché plots (sorry...) and pointing out the good ones for each other to preview. And when we got bored of that we tucked the keepers under our arms and wove our way through the shelves to the clearance section.

 

"Oh," I said, picking up a $3.99 book with a swirly lettering and a coffee cup on the front, glancing at the back cover, and quickly discarding it. "I've got an idea. Let's play a game. I'll pick a book, and you tell me what it's about based on the cover." I grabbed a book called Out of Time and held it up in front of her, scanning the summary as she thought.

 

"Umm..." she tilted her head, studying the horse on the cover. "Okay, so there's this horse. A time-traveling horse. And his owner really loves him and-"

 

I snickered, still reading the summary, and she whacked me. "Wait 'till I'm finished! Okay. This boy. And one day he goes for a ride on the horse, and they travel to another time...and then he loses the horse."

 

(and I'm really sorry but I don't remember how the rest of Brooke's version went. Except it was pretty awesome and she should probably write a book someday.)



source

 Between the two of us, we summarized the plotline of another novel based solely on the front cover and one-sentence pitch. Right down to the number of children the (single) mother had. And the fact that she and the love interest had known each other in high school. And of course got married in the end. (needless to say, neither of us went home with that one.)

 

I did, however, purchase two books. And I'm not sure quite how it worked (because when I get books at the public library, they're usually okayish...but not completely amazing) but I walked home with two keepers. I seriously fell IN LOVE with the books I brought home (which doesn't happen often.) It was $20 well spent. Replication by Jill Williamson, and Angel Eyes by Shannon Dittemore were both really excellent books. I think maybe I'll have to write up a couple book reviews - it's been a while since my last one.

 

(and in case anyone was wondering...yes, Out of Time was one of the books Brooke purchased. ;) We both read it and thought it was good, even though it didn't have a time-traveling horse.)