Comments on: Books as Snapshots

By: Pop Culture Nerd

Pop Culture Nerd — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 23:29:49 +0000

Thanks very much, lp13, for reading and your kind words.

By: Pop Culture Nerd

Pop Culture Nerd — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 23:26:31 +0000

Sounds like you've had vivid relationships with your books and have gone through a lot with them, Jen. I'm glad Monkey's Raincoat made you a full-fledged card-carrying member of the crime fiction community.

By: Pop Culture Nerd

Pop Culture Nerd — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 23:02:43 +0000

Ohhhhh, Calvin & Hobbes. I don’t have enough words to describe how much I love and miss them. Not only do have the complete set of books, a friend framed the last strip for me and it hangs in my living room as one of my favorite gifts ever.

By: Pop Culture Nerd

Pop Culture Nerd — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 23:00:18 +0000

I know what you mean about wanting a particular copy of something. I managed to replace my Tintin books but I still long for the ones translated into Vietnamese that I read as a child. I hate the finality of it, having to accept I’ll never see them again.

By: Pop Culture Nerd

Pop Culture Nerd — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 22:57:47 +0000

Like Shell, I love that quote. My books are indeed heavy with memories.

If you don’t mind my asking—what’s a food technologist? Sounds intriguing, mostly because it involves food.

By: Pop Culture Nerd

Pop Culture Nerd — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 22:56:08 +0000

Thanks for sharing. I’m glad you’re better now. I love how books can not only entertain, educate and inspire, but also heal.

By: le0pard13

le0pard13 — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 04:10:45 +0000

I very much enjoyed reading about your experiences in this post, PCN. It’s something quite special to take in how the books in your life were crystalized to a specific time and place, and held in memory. This was a magnificent and very personal post. Thanks for this.

By: Jen Forbus

Jen Forbus — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 00:42:36 +0000

My first year in college I was miserably homesick with the pyscho roommate from hell. I desperately wanted my parents to let me leave and go home…attend the community college close, but they said absolutely not. I had to stick out the year. I was at Kent State, which is the third largest school in Ohio, so most of my classes were huge and impersonal. However, my English course was an honors course and it was only about a dozen students. That semester, ironically, Dante’s THE INFERNO and Kesey’s ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO’S NEST made me fall madly in love with literature – even more than I already was – and they got me through that year. The next year I transferred to Baldwin-Wallace, which was much smaller and I ended up getting a degree in English Lit.

I also have a soft spot in my heart for THE MONKEY’S RAINCOAT, which really hooked me on crime fiction. I had read Patterson and Grisham and Cornwell before but they didn’t leave me desperate to find more crime fiction. THE MONKEY’S RAINCOAT totally did!

And finally I have to mention the audio of THE DARK HORSE by Craig Johnson. I listened to that driving to my first Murder & Mayhem in Muskego. All of those audios stick with me because they have brought such pleasure to my driving experiences – I typically hate to drive, but while listening to George Guidall read Craig Johnson, no one’s stupidity bothers me then!

So many books have left me with wonderful memories, even if I just read the whole thing sitting in my living room. They are so amazing!

By: EIREGO

EIREGO — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 18:49:35 +0000

I have the Calvin and Hobbes complete collection to keep me from losing it. They remind me of a simpler time when I took for granted being a kid. I got older, moved out of the house and went off to college and beyond, then I realized that mom won’t be making me grilled cheese sandwiches any more and those character building chores of Dad’s were supposed to help me survive in the big bad world of adulthood.

By: Shell Sherree

Shell Sherree — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 12:52:49 +0000

Another poignant and thought provoking post, PCN. And I love that quote of Poncho's from Cornelia Funke’s Inkblood. I don't tend to re-read fiction, but some books have stoically remained on my shelves in spite of my regular de-clutterings, and I guess it's due to their fingerprints on my timeline. I remember at the age of fifteen struggling and failing through the first hundred pages of Lord of the Rings several times, until an overseas trip involving numerous departure lounges and bus tours finally got me over the line and into a world I then had to drag myself away from. The poor old paperback is falling apart, but I don't want a new one. I just want that one. I'd have a hard time not slipping it out of the backpack before striking the match!