I just want to say that I LOVE BOOKS!

This realization came about today (again) while filling my cardboard box with rejected books at the UNC Friends of the Library book sale. I came home with a bunch of great books that will now have a nice loving home on my bookshelves. In no particular order:

The personality of the cat / edited by Brandt Aymar. New York : Bonanza Books, 1978.

• 44 chapters with stories about different personality types of cats. Some are excerpts of other works like Macavity: The Mystery Cat by T.S. Eliot (The Criminal Cat) and Puss in Boots by Charles Perrault (The Clever Cat). I'm looking forward to reading How a Cat Was Annoyed and a Poet Booted by Guy Wetmore Carryl (The Diversified Cat).

Braude's treasury of wit and humor / by Jacob M. Braude. Englewood Cliffs, NJ : Prentice-Hall, c1964.

• "... hundreds of anecdotes, jokes and stories which follow that can be used over and over again to help you scintillate in your daily conversation." -introduction
  
• The first part of this book is organized by topic, the second gives alternate funny definitions of words (i.e. Adam: the first white slave - HAHA!). It also has a really good index.

Reader in American library history / edited by Michael H. Harris. Washington, DC : NCR, c1971.

• Including classic essays by Jesse H. Shera, Sidney Ditzion, and Robert Lee.

Thesaurus of words and phrases / by Peter Mark Roget ; enlarged by John Lewis Roget ; new edition revised and enlarged by Samuel Romilly Roget. New York : Grosset & Dunlap, 1941.

• Instead of being listed alphabetically, this work divides words into 6 broad categories with several layers of subdivisions for each. It's actually really complicated (the synopsis of categories is 13 pages long)! But it has a good index.
• A fascinating and unique attempt at classifying knowledge.

Information, please! / edited by Dan Golenpaul. New York : Simon and Schuster, c1939.

• "A game book based on the famous radio program starring Clifton Fadiman, Franklin P. Adams, John Kieran, Oscar Levant, and the other celebrated "Information, Please!" experts." -title page
• Really fun questions. Matt and I got a kick out of this one:
• Define four of the following six words:
• a. Swizzle
• b. Mizzle
• c. Nuzzle
• d. Ouzel
• e. Frizzle
• f. Grizzle
• The answers are pretty much what you'd expect. Why don't you give it a try?
• The previous owner signed the book in this funny little way:
• On the front fly leaf: Question: What is an absolute necessity at any party that is to have oomph? (Answer on back page)
• On back page: Mary J. Griffin

Loving is... / compiled by Gilbert Hay. New York : Essandess Special Edition, c1967.

• A miniature book of quotes about love.

Walden Two / by B.F. Skinner. New York : MacMillan, 1962, c1948.

• Skinner's utopian classic

The tombs of Atuan / Ursula K. Le Guin ; illustrated by Gail Garraty. New York : Bantam, c1970.

• The sequel to A Wizard of Earthsea

The first circle / Aleskandr I. Solzhenitsyn ; translated from the Russian by Thomas P. Whitney. New York : Bantam, c1968.

• By the Nobel Prize laureate, author of one of my favs: One day in the life of Ivan Denisovich.
• Also one of the most widely available books at that particular book sale.... strange....

This magic moment / Nora Roberts. New York : Silhouette Intimate Moments, c1983.

• An early saucy-looking Nora Roberts romance!

Growing up female in America : ten lives / edited and introduced by Eve Merriam. New York : Dell, c1971.

• Excerpts of letters, unpublished manuscripts, and autobiographies detailing the lives of an 18th century schoolgirl, a 19th century founder of the women's suffrage movement, 19th century astronomer, 19th century wife of a confederate officer, 19th century pioneer, 19th century minister and doctor, 19th century freed slave, 19th century labor organizer, and 20th century Jew from the ghetto.
  

Some classics that as a librarian I figured I should own (and eventually get around to reading):

• The expedition of Humphry Clinker / by Tobias Smollett. (just one particular manifestation of the work! *rolls eyes* The FRBR-loving cataloger in me got excited when I found this.)
  
• Man and Superman : a comedy and a philosophy / by George Bernard Shaw.
• Tess of the d'Ubervilles : a pure woman / faithfully presented by Thomas Hardy.
• Pride and Prejudice / Jane Austen.
• Tristan / Gottfried von Strassburg, translated for the first time by A.T. Hatto ; with the surviving fragments of Tristan of Thomas, newly translated.
• The saga of Tristam and Isond / translated with an introduction by Paul Schach. (From what I gather, this is the Norwegian 'Thomas' part of the legend. I am intrigued!)

Some incredibly random novels:

• Vintage stuff / Tom Sharpe.
• The Wilt alternative / Tom Sharpe.
• Murder by the book / Jennifer Rowe.
• The last camel died at noon / Elizabeth Peters.
• Moving target / Elizabeth Lowell.
• Soft focus / Jayne Ann Krentz.
• Change baby / June Spence.

ALL THAT FOR JUST $3!!!!!