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Browsers' Bookstore Newsletter for August, 2005

STORE NEWS

I love the summer! It's great meeting all the tourists who come through town - or at least the ones who stop by the store. We've met a lot of avid readers who have been very happy to discover our store. The big news for this month, besides Gerry and I surviving Mel being gone for the first two weeks, is all the books we've been buying! Everyone is clearing out their shelves (or going to garage sales) and bringing the best books to Browsers'. The huge influx has been a bit overwhelming at times, but we've been able to sift through a lot of it already.

THIS MONTH'S HIGHLIGHTS

This month, let's have themes for our highlights! The first theme is: conspiracy theories, my favorite thing in the world! There's nothing quite like reading about a conspiracy theory - half of me believes it (or at least WANTS to believe it), and the other half laughs at anyone (mostly myself) stupid enough to believe it! Wonderful, ridiculous stuff, and it keeps you questioning authority if nothing else.

1. The Original New Testament: A Radical Translation and Reinterpretation. Hugh Schonfield. This guy is awesome. Back in the 1960s, he wrote a book called "The Passover Plot" which claimed that Jesus intentionally created situations that would fulfill Old Testament prophecies about the Messiah. Ridiculous! Schonfield uses a strange combination of taking the Bible as literally true, and reading between the lines in the most creative manner. Eat his dust, Dan Brown! Popular and controversial enough at the time for a Christian response to be written ("The Passover Plot Exposed" which I haven't read.) Anyway, he apparently translated the New Testament by himself, complete with footnotes. No matter what your beliefs, this is a great piece for the Bible collector, conspiracy reader, or historical Jesus reader. VG/VG $15.

2. Somebody Else Is On the Moon. George H. Leonard. I love moon conspiracy theories (some of you probably didn't even know they existed - you really need to read up on this stuff!) This is one of the classics, which purports that there are intelligent beings on the moon. This theory dovetails nicely with the theory that the moon is a hollow spaceship from beyond our solar system (see "The Mysterious Spaceship Moon" for full details.) I've always been tempted to read this one, but every time I think about it, I look at the pictures the author uses to "prove" his theories. Ridiculous! I had previously only seen the paperback, so I was hoping the hardcover would have better images - but they're still ridiculous!! (I admit, I still have a paperback copy on my "to read" shelf, just in case...) Fine/VG $100.

For our next theme, we have the Gambler's Specials:

3. The Da Vinci Code. Dan Brown. 1st edition. Keeping up with our conspiracy theory theme, here's the book that made them popular again. From all accounts (for I have not yet read it), this is a ridiculous book -- as a good conspiracy theory must be. The gamble is: will anyone care about the first edition in 10 years? If you think so -- buy it now before the price skyrockets. If you think not -- laugh at me for even hoping to get fifty bucks out of this book! VG/VG $50.

4. Deception. Denise Mina. 1st edition. Supposedly this author is an up-and-coming great mystery writer. She is at least critically acclaimed, for certain. Priced at half cover price, you're taking a bit more of a gamble (most of our recent hardcover fiction is 1/3 or less of the cover price) -- but not if you think this author is the next Agatha Christie! Fine, $12.

Our final theme is large collections:

5. Civil War. 40+ books, hardcovers, excellent condition, mostly $5-8, most of them printed in last 10 years. And a twin deck of playing cards - one is Union Generals, one is Confederate Generals. Silly but fun.

6. Firearms. Huge collection, at least 200 titles. Varies from Gun Digests to hard-to-find technical books to rare and valuable history books to hunting narratives, etc. etc. Most in the $4-10 range, several in the $15-25 range and a few higher.

7. Ayn Rand. Got about 8 of her paperbacks left, various titles, $1.50-$3.00. Great shape.

8. DVDs! This month, we purchased a big collection of about 60 movies, in addition to the usual inflow of titles. By the way, we guarantee all of our DVDs will work - if you ever buy one that doesn't, just return it for store credit. $8-10.

That's about it for themes, here are a few individual titles we got in that are especially interesting:

9. The Dancing Wu Li Masters: An Overview of the New Physics. Gary Zukav. A nice hardcover copy of this classic, which is hard enough to find in paperback. Reprint, VG/VG, $10

10. At Home in the Universe. Stuart Kauffman. This is a fascinating book which argues that organization follows naturally from complex systems. It is readable by English majors like myself despite the necessary math. Trade paper, $8.50.

11. Lingard. Colin Wilson. 1st edition. I've never read anything by this guy but he's supposed to be awesome. I just like the author's photo on the back -- not many authors look cool. VG/VG $20.

12. The Anarchist Cookbook. William Powell. Reprint, $15.

13. Tillamook: Lest We Forget. Tillamook Pioneer Assoc. A good book for all you Oregon historians out there. VG, $25.

14. Buckaroo. Kurt Markus. 1st edition. Well, blow me down, it's a coffee table book that's actually worth something! Gerry, who works in the store & has 30 years experience selling books, tells me that this book has always been a high-dollar item. It is easy to believe: even I, who have very little ability to differentiate between good & mediocre photography, can see that this is excellent photography. A great gift for the cowboy in your life. Card signed by the author attached to half-title page. VG/VG $100.

15. Harry Potter & the Half-Blood Prince. J. K. Rowling. Did you _really_ think a bookstore newsletter could avoid mentioning this? We currently have two in stock. Fine, $15

----> Most of the above books are _not_ listed online, so if you live out of town, please send us an email if you're interested.

WE BUY BOOKS

In case you haven't figured it out, we buy books. Bring them on in for cash or store credit!

BROWSERS' ON EBAY

A lot of customers ask us if we sell on eBay, and the answer is: usually! Most of the items we sell on ebay are either books we have multiple copies of, large groups of magazines, or stuff that we don't really have room for in the store.

This past month, we listed an ugly copy of a first edition of "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone" on eBay. This went for about $200 and two-thirds of that will be donated to the Albany Public Library (the book was withdrawn from their collection.)

Be sure to check our eBay auctions for other cool things that aren't on the shelves - our user name is "browsersbooks" or you can follow the link on this page: www.browsersbookstore.com/links.html (it's at the bottom.)

BOOK BLOG

As if this email hasn't taken up enough of your time already! Check out our blog of book reviews at http://www.browsersbookstore.com/blogger.html.

That's all for this month. Keep on reading!

Scott Givens

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