| Treasure hunting at the library's free table ... There it was, piled high with mounds of words and sentences and paragraphs, all wrapped up in hardcovers, dust jackets or dogeared paperbacks — the FREE table at the Montrose Regional Library!
I'd stopped by this afternoon while I was out for lunch and fell face first into the pot of gold on the other side of the rainbow, finding a treasure-trove bonanza in the middle of a Wednesday.
This is exciting stuff. With the holidays on the way, my excitement level was already bursting at a seasonally-mandated high, and this free-books encounter at the library really just put it over the top. You see, the free-book table at the library — or the free book stand outside the music store on Main Street, or free books anywhere, for that matter — combine a couple of my favorite things: books & free. It's actually a little deeper than that. Recycled free books — in fact, used books that have failed to attract a paying reader — represent something a little special. They are works of words — literature, biographies, historical recollections, instructional manuals, etc. — that have lived a full life, being read or perhaps not read at all, and are now awaiting reincarnation, awaiting a new reader to immerse themselves within the pages, awaiting a new bookshelf in a new environment. Also, they're free. Today at the library, the librarians were still bringing fresh selections out to the lobby, wheeling them from whatever secret, magical lair in which they are hidden until making their debut on the free table. Having already scanned the books on the tables, I began "helping" the librarians transfer the newly arriving books from the cart to the table, making sure to snag any treasures. If you hurry, there may still be some good stuff left out on the free table. But there are a few selections you won't find there anymore, as they are shuffling into the mix in my home library: a couple of Vonnegut hardbacks, a rock climbing book for my daughter and an old L.L Bean cookbook.
Happy hunting, happy reading!
Have a Good One,
Jeremy Morrison, managing editor
jeremy.morrison@montrosepress.com
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