Monday, June 13, 2011

Shopping in an Empty Box

I went to Barnes and Noble tonight to try to find something to read that might hold my interest. After all, why not? Husband and I are free of children this week, so 7:30pm trips alone to the bookstore seem like a good idea. There's only one problem: I forgot about the five main rules of shopping at a modern chain bookstore.

1. If they have a lot of it, it will suck. See Stieg Larsson, JD Salinger, and anything with vampires.

2. If you want to buy title A from a particular author, they will always have the inferior B and C, but never, ever A.

3. Whatever on your list you want the most, they won't have at all. They might not even have anything that author has written, no matter how prolific.

4. Browsing never solves anything. Otherwise known as: if the back cover review is written by Barbara Kingsolver, put the book down and back away slowly.

5. No matter how hopeful you are, books with dogs on the cover will always end one way: with a dead dog.

Me, I'm home now and (re)borrowing one of One's Percy Jackson's. Now that kid? He has a much better book selection in his room than any bookstore I've ever seen. Lucky boy.

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