Always be first to know about the latest donations coming into the shop! Every time we get a box of something special, we'll blog it right here. That way you won't end up coming in right after the books you wanted got sold. We look forward to seeing you often and making your book shopping much easier!



Thursday, June 30, 2011

Books on Race and Black Americans

  Ethical Dilemmas, 1964 to 1982, by Nathan Glazer (TPB, 1983, $2)
How did society change after the Civil Rights Act of 1964? Read it here from the perspective of 1983.

* The Black Man's Burden: The White Man in Africa from the Fifteenth Century to WWI, by E. D. Morel (TPB,  $1.50)
Writing in 1920, " Morel reviews the history of each area of Africa , and describes the methods and techniques used by Western civilization to exterminate, enslave, and exploit the black populations and their cultures during five centuries."

Long Memory, The Black Experience in America, by Mary Frances Berry (TPB, 1982, $2.50)
A mixture of memoirs, poetry, song, folklore, cartoons and other creative works that expressed ideas reflecting black attitudes.

Image of the Black in Children's Fiction, by Dorothy M. Broderick (HC, 1972,  $2)

Race, the History of an Idea in America, by Thomas F. Gossett (HC, 1970, $1)

* Segregated Sabbaths: Richard Allen and the Rise of the Independent Black Churches, 1760-1840, by Carol V. George (TPB, 1973, $1.50)
As the egalitarian ideals of the Revolution faded, and the numbers of free blacks increased, white politicians and community leaders began to restrict the actions of blacks, so Richard Allen and other free blacks started to form their own independent  religious societies. This is the story of the birth of the African Methodist Episcopal Church in 1815. The birth was not an easy one, as white Methodists were, to say the least, not happy with this new development..  This is the start of  black theology and its urban social focus.  As always, from conflict comes growth, but always at a price.

Read these books and ponder. You can find them in the African American section (which if you are interested, is particularly full these days).
(* means I think these books are special.  Come, read them and make up your own mind.)

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

SOLD-The children's stories of Frank R. Stockton

Never heard of Frank Stockton?
Neither had I till we got this set of six wonderfully preserved hardcovers.
Mr. Stockton wrote using humor, in a day when almost all writing was consumed by the time's Victorian morality. You have probably heard the plot of his most famous story, The Lady, or the Tiger.  Which door did the hero chose to open?  Read our book and find out the answer. (Or maybe not.)

This 1908 six volume set of books with bright green covers and gold trim can come home with you for only $14.
So curl up next to a fan, or if you are lucky enough, to the air conditioning, and let yourself be swept away to a different time and a different place. (Look for these beauties in the sets section.)

Adventures of Captain Horn
The Lady or the Tiger
The Late Mrs. Null
The Magic Egg
Mrs. Cliff's Yacht
Rudder Grange

P.S. Not only was Frank a writer and a humorist, he was also the world's record Hot Dog Eating Champion of the 1850s. That's a pretty unique way to make money to feed your family, but that is what he did to bring in the needed ten cents a day. To me that makes him sound strange, creative and probably a whole lot desperate.

Movie stars!

Newly arrived,

Warren Beatty, A Life and Story, by David Thomson (HC, 1987, $2.50)
Warren  Beatty, The Last Great Lover of Hollywood, by John Parker (HC, 1994, $2.50)
All My Best Friends, by George Burns (TPB, 1990, $2))
What's It All About, the Autobiography, by Michael Caine (HC, 1992, $3))
Kevin Costner, the Unauthorized Biography, by Todd Keith (HC, 1991, $2)
Daniel Day-Lewis, The Fire Within, by Garry Jenkins (HC, 1995, $2.50)
Lethal Hero, The Mel Gibson Biography, by Oliver Boohs (HC,1993, $2)
Audrey Hepburn, A Celebration, by Sheridan Morley (HC, 1993, $2)  SOLD
Audrey Hepburn, An Intimate Portrait, by Diana Maycheck ( HC, 1993, $2)
In the Arena, An Autobiography, by Charlton Heston (HC, 1995, $3)
Anthony Hopkins, The Authorized  Biography, by Quentin Falk ( HC, 1993, $2)
Paul and Joanne, A Biography of Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, by Joe Morella (HC, 1988, $3)
Jack Nicholson, The Life and Times of an Actor on the Edge, by Peter Thompson, (HC, 1997, $2.50)


These books can be found in the biography section.

North American archaeology, Native history

The First American, a Story of North American Archaeology, by C.W. Ceram, (HC, 357 pages, 1971, ex-library, $2.50)

 Letters and Notes on the Manners, Customs, and Conditions of North American Indians, by Grorge Catlin
Two volumes (TPB, each volume is 264 pages, 1973, price for the set is $3)
George Catlin was an adventurer and a self-taught painter. He visited, painted, and got to know many tribes of the North American Plains.  Included here are 257 photos of his original oil paintings, as well as 55 of the original book illustrations.  The natives he met were still tightly connected with their traditions. Sadly, he was one of the last white to see any members of the Mandan tribe. Five years after Catlin's visit a smallpox epidemic hit the tribe, and no one survived.  How tragic, but what a great thing someone recorded their existence.

America's Ancient Treasures, by Franklin Folsom (TPB, 202 pages, 1971, $1)

Indians of Canada, by Diamond Jenness (TPB, 432 pages, 1986, $2)

Indians Before Columbus, Twenty Thousand Years of North American History Revealed by Archeology, by Paul S. Martin (HC, 1967, 582 pages, ex-library but in GREAT shape, $3)

The Archaeological Story of Two Continents, by Emily C. Davis (HC, 1975, 311 pages, ex-library but in great shape,$2)
  (translation: great shape means slightly less great than GREAT shape.)

These books can all be found in the Native American section.

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Observed today at the Big but Navigable bookstore

"Big but Navigable" doesn't seem to be ordering very many books in hardcover all of a sudden.  Particularly in literary fiction (the stuff you might want to buy and keep) every book on every shelf was either a trade or mass-market paperback.

Maybe it's just my particular store, but I found it intriguing and would hasten to assure all and sundry that we enjoy stocking and selling hardcovers as well as paperbacks.  When it comes to building a home library, they hold up much better and, of course, nothing furnishes a room like books!

More Civil War books

SOLD-
The Blue and the Gray, two volumes in one, by Henry Steele Commager
HC, 1201 pages, ($2)  
SOLD-
Bruce Catton's Civil War, three volumes in one.  
Mr Lincoln's Army, Glory Road, and A Stillness at Appomattox
HB, 730 pages, ($3)

Shelby Foote's  The Civil War
       Fort Sumter to Perryville, TPB,740 pages, ($.50 due to its condition)
       Fredericksburg to Meridian, TPB, 988 pages,  ($2.50)

All to be found in the military history section

Africa and African Americans

Just in, a selection of books on Africa and African-Americans.  (Look for them in the African-American section)

The two most special (in my opinion) are:

SOLD:Africa, a Geography Reader,  1930 ($3) 

Inherit the Trade, by Thomas Norman DeWolf,  TPB, 2008, AUTOGRAPHED,  ($3)
In 2001 the author found out he was related to "the most successful slave-trading family in US history, responsible for transporting at least ten thousand Africans." This is his journey as he traces his family's terrible legacy.

Also,
Africa and Tomorrow, an Outline of Basic Facts and Major Problems, by John Hatch, TPB, 1961, ($1)

A Documentary History of the Negro People in the United States, volume 1 (From Colonial Times to the Civil War), edited by Herbert Aptheker, TPB,  ($2)
"The history of the Negro people told in their own words" along with the editors comments.

The Black Americans, Interpretive Readings, edited by Seth M. Scheiner, TPB, ($2),
which covers the early years of slavery all the way to the 1960s and  Black Power.

Sunday, June 26, 2011

Our new coffee bar

This is Phase One of the coffee bar.  Soon the plants will be hanging and the drawers
will be black and sporting matching, new hardware.  But the main thing is...
coffee's on!  And also tea and cocoa, just $1 tax included.

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Sale's on! Don't miss out!

Our semiannual sale (summer stock-up time) is on through Sunday the 26th.  Most books are half-price; the Local Interest, Sets & Volumes, and Glass Case books are 20% off.

If that's not incentive enough, we've just opened our new coffee bar with a wide selection of Keurig K-Cup beverages available for only $1, tax included.  There's even a lid for your cup!

We look forward to seeing you between now and Sunday.  Don't forget to use the elevator near Lento.  The other elevator?  Well, "you can't get here from there."

"Love Inspired" Harlequin historical romances

Nine paperbacks, each for $1 or less. Look for them in the PB fiction area.

Rochester's soldiers in the Civil War -- SOLD

Where They Fell: Stories of Rochester Area Soldiers in the Civil War
By Robert Marcotte  ($20)

What a wonderful book in wonderful condition. It's even autographed.
295 pages, HC, by our local historian and the Democrat and Chronicle's columnist. (Look for this book in our local section.)

Rochester sent 17 regiments and batteries to war. They fought on land, in the trenches and on the ships that captured New Orleans, and many would  die in Andersonville. 

Shields Green, a clothes cleaner, was hanged for taking part in John Brown's raid on Harper's Ferry.  James Gibbons helped defend Fort Sumter.  The wealthy, including George Ellwanger, Rochester's nurseryman, contributed to a relief fund for the families of enlisted men. Women of the First Presbyterian Church sewed shirts, "drawers", "ticks"and linen capes for the soldiers.

When the first soldiers left, more than 20,000 people lined the streets. 10,372 soldiers would eventually march away, with over 1,300 never coming home. They died  in battle, of wounds, and, even more commonly, from disease. Come and read their stories.

Thursday, June 16, 2011

Middle Ages history, literature, culture, and all that good stuff

I don't know if this stuff is new, or whether it is just noticeable because we are now organized, but suddenly we have a lot really good books on the Middle Ages:

Courtly Culture: Literature and Society in the High Middle Ages, by Joachim Bumke
(Trade PB, 770 pages, reprinted in 2000 from original 1986 German edition, $3. )

The Civilization of the Middle Ages, by Norman F. Cantor   ***SOLD***
(HC, 604 pages, 1993 revised edition, " centering on culture and religion rather than political history."  $3.50))

SOLD-
Medieval Civilization 400-1500, by Jacques Le Goff
(HC, 394 pages, reprinted in 1988 from 1964 original, $3.00)

SOLD-
The Age of Chivalry, by the National Geographic
(HC, 378 pages, 1969, lots and lots of color pictures, $3.00)

The Medieval Underworld, by Andrew McCall     SOLD
(HC, 319 pages, 1993 edition of the original 1979 book, $ 2.50 )
This one is the most interesting, in my opinion. What are the underworlds? In the author's view, they "comprise all those people who were either unwilling or unable to comply with the law of the Church."  That would include  "outlaws and brigands, homosexuals, heretics, witches, prostitutes, thieves, fraudulent beggars and vagabonds". If you want to know what "they" did, and then what the Church did "to them", this is the book to buy.

In Search of the Dark Ages, by Michael Wood
(Trade PB, 250 pages, 1987, $ 2.50 )
If you want an easier to understand book, this is it. Larger print than most, with lots of pictures (but not in color, sigh). Large print , lots of pictures, and no fancy words...  that suits me just fine. What about you?

All these books reside in the western civ. section.

The Story of Civilization

The Story of Civilization, by Will and Ariel Durant
This is a beautiful hardcover set of 11 massive books written in the 1960s and 1970s 

Part 1. Our Oriental Heritage
        2. The Life of Greece
        3. Caesar and Christ
        4. The Age of Faith
        5. The Renaissance
        6. The Reformation
        7. The Age of Reason Begins
        8. The Age of Louis XIV
        9. The Age of Voltaire
       10. Rousseau and Revolution
       11. The Age of Napoleon

Add them to your library for only $35. Look for them in a box under the new non-fiction table. (I couldn't find room for them any place else!)

World War One papers of Walter Page and Colonel House

The Intimate Papers of Colonel House, by Charles Seymore
A two volume hardcover set from 1926

Colonel E. M. House was not really a colonel. He did however strongly influence a president. He helped Wilson become president, and later helped set the US wartime foreign policy. These books include his papers up until 1917 when the US enters the war. In 1919 he will fall out of favor with Wilson, but till then he was the closest of advisers, even living in the White House for awhile.

The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, by Burton J. Hendrick  (Pulitzer Prize winner of 1923!)
A two volume hardcover set from 1922

Walter Page was the US ambassador to Britain during WWI. He was very pro-British and helped bring the US into the war on the British side.

Come and enjoy the behind the scenes drama of WWI.  The sets are $7.00 each, at 1/3  the Internet price.  Both are located on the new non-fiction table.

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Explore the Americas

The chaos in American history is now history: sections sorted, easy shopping ahead!

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Robin Jarvis, anyone?

The Deptford Mice Trilogy -
Books One through Three:
The Dark Portal
The Crystal Prison -- SOLD
The Final Reckoning -- SOLD

The Deptford Histories -
Books One through Three:
The Alchemist's Cat
The Oaken Throne
Thomas

Look for them in the fantasy section, each hardcover  for only $1.50, as they are ex-lib. copies

Winston Churchill

No, NOT Sir Winston, but Winston Churchill the American novelist from St. Louis who wrote in the early 1900s. The following novels, to be found in the general fiction area:
A Far Country - $3
The Dwelling Place of Light - $2
The Crossing - $3
Mr. Crew's Career, a rarer book - $7 (1/3 the Internet price)
A Modern Chronicle - $.50 (as it is in poor shape)
and a Grossett published Richard Carvel - also $.50

More classics

Another box of books donated by the same person who donated the last batch. (Many, many thanks to R.B., whoever you are!) These are all hardcover, in nice shape and priced at $2.50  (or less) each. Look for them either in the classics section, or in the sets section.

They are the Classic Club editions from the 1940s:
Balzac's Old Goriot
Butler's The Way of All Flesh
Checkov's Selected Stories
Defoe's Robinson Crusoe
Emerson's Essays, Poems and Addresses
Epictetus's Discourses
Bret Harte's Selected Stories an Poems
Homer's The Odyssey and the Iliad
Horace's Selected Poems
John Locke's On Politics and Education
Montaigne's Sellected Essays
Thackeray's Henry Esmond
Turgenev's Fathers and Sons

SOLD- Lots of oversize hardcover classics, especially Dickens

Please check out ALL the new hardcover books in the classics section.

-SOLD-
Especially the Charles Dickens (to be found in the sets section):

Our Mutual Friend ($2) (The only one not in good shape, but it is still a good reading copy.)
A Tale of Two Cities ($3)
The Pickwick Papers ($4)
David Copperfield ($4)

Calling all Civil War buffs....

Just before we moved, some nice person donated a box of military books, with the Civil War ones being the best of the bunch. (At least in my opinion. Come and check them all out and let me know what you think.)

Hardcovers, in wonderful shape, for $3 each:

SOLD-
For Country Cause and Leader, the Civil War Journal of Charles B. Haydon, by Stephen W. Sears
This is an eyewitness account of the Civil War by a Union soldier who fought from Bull Run to Knoxville. Charles Hayden kept a diary for the three years he was a soldier. He started as a third sergeant, and ended as a lieutenant colonel. The greatest irony was his death in 1864 from pneumonia while on his way home for some R and R.

The Class of 1861: Custer, Ames and Their Classmates After West Point, by Ralph Kirshner
Lincoln needed lieutenants, so in 1861 West Point graduated two classes. These are the stories of those graduates at West Point, in the Civil War and after.  First in the May class was Henry du Pont. Last in the class of June was George Armstrong Custer.  Du Pont became a Senator and a businessman. (You guessed that "businessman" part, didn't you?) George Armstrong Custer, after finishing last in a class of 34, ends up... (Well, we all know THAT story.)

SOLD
Last Flag Down, the Epic Journey of the Last Confederate Warship, by John Baldwin and Ron Powers  
Late in 1864 the Confederacy launched a last ditch attempt to bring down the North's economy: "A state-of-the-art raiding ship whose mission was to prowl the world's oceans and sink the US merchant fleet." This ship "would spend nearly a year sailing 2/3s of the way around the globe, destroying dozens of Union ships and taking more than a thousand prisoners."
Except, oops, by that time the war had long been over.

Finally, three soft covers,
Reflections on the Civil War, the last book written by Bruce Catton  ($1.)
The Causes of the Civil War, discussed by historians and the public figures of that time, edited by Kenneth M. Stamp ($1.50)
Battle Cry Freedom, the Civil War Era, by James M. McPherson. Winner of the Pulitzer prize!  ($4)

They can all now be found on the "new non-fiction" table. Come and enjoy!

Friday, June 10, 2011

This just in...

We've just received a large donation from the Houghton College library.  Among the many treasures are several cartons of VHS movies at 50 cents per cassette (both adult and children's fare) and a goodly number of opera and classical vinyl LP sets at $1 per disc.  If your listening tastes run to something newer and mellow, we still have a nice selection of 80s R&B discs as well.

The videos are near the front of the store while the record albums are in the last room.

Thursday, June 9, 2011

Do you want to give your child the world?

Big Block World Atlas by Costanza Gechter
This is a wonderful resource for any child. There are multiple methods of learning geography and landmarks such as a poster map, stickers, 32-page activity passport, trivia card game and block puzzle. The price of this item is $7.00 and it can be found in the Children's area.
                                                    

Tuesday, June 7, 2011

How to home decorate?

The Complete Home Decorator, by Stewart and Sally Walton

200 projects, with more than 1000 color photos, to show you how to create your dream rooms.
It's only $7, to be found in the home arts section.

Have you ever wondered about the history of literary and political cartoons ?

The Complete Cartoons Of The New Yorker, by Robert Mankoff

A cornerstone of The New Yorker magazine is its creative cartoons. This collection covers the entire history of material dating back to 1925. Hundreds of talented artists are featured: Peter Arno, George Price,Charles Addams and Alex Gregory etc. ( 655 pp. with 2 cd roms). This book is $18.00 and can be found in the Humor section.

Interested in China? **SOLD**

 A Day In The Life Of China, by David Cohen

This book was photographed on April 15, 1989.  Every photo had to be taken in a 24 hour period. The 90 photographers were offered unprecedented access to every province and autonomous region. Little did they know that events such as a prominent Chinese figure's passing and  an uproar in Tiananmen Square would occur on this day.

Oversize HB , 224 pp., priced at $ 8.00 and can be found in the Asian section of the store.

Monday, June 6, 2011

Did you know...

...wir haben Bucher auf Deutsch?
...avons des livres en francais?
...abbiamo libri in italiano?
...tenemos libros en espanol?

And other languages too.  You can find them at the far end of the shop.

A mystery no longer!

For those of you who have been mystified by the lack of alphabetization in our Mystery section... fret no longer, your favorite mystery authors are now once again easy to find!

The same is not yet true for every section, but we're getting MUCH closer.  Thanks for your patience!

Sunday, June 5, 2011

Computing... from a time long ago!

Two too cool computer books from the 60's:

From 1962, Principles of Punched Card Data Processing, by Robert G. Van Ness (HC,ex-lib,263 pages, $3.50)
And from 1966, Computer Dictionary and Handbook, by Charles J. Sippl (HC, beautiful shape, 766 pages, $8.00)

(They are both on sale for 1/3 the listed Internet prices, and can be found in front of the science section.)

The Human Body (1984), 7 volumes

What a stunningly beautiful series this is - 7 oversized hardcovers filled with photos and diagrams!
These books are in like new condition, even though ex-lib.
We have the following issues:

Blood, the River of Life
Respiration, the Breath of Life
Hearing, Taste and Smell, Pathways of Perception
Digestion, Fueling the System
The Nervous System, Circuits of Communication
The Eye, Window to the World
and
The Heart, The Living Pump

Each of the books sells for $2.50. Look for them in front of the biology section.

Flying and safety....

Have you been following the news with its stories on black boxes and sleeping traffic controllers? If you are like me you wonder how safe your next flight will be. Here are some books for you to read and ponder:

For pilots-to-be, the 2004  Airplane Flying Handbook   by the FAA. (Soft cover, $2)
For history buffs,  The Search for Amelia Earhart, by Fred Goerner (HC, 1966, $4)  Read this if you want to know what really happened in 1937- or at least what the author thought happened.

And for discussions of actual aviation safety:
George Johson's  The Abominable Airlines (HC,1964, $3)
 and,
John J. Nance's Blind Trust, The Revolution in Aviation Safety- Coming to Grips with Human Failure. ( Remember the 1987 airline deregulation when competition changed the business of flying forever? HC, 1986, autographed, $5)

Look for all these books in front of the general non-fiction section

Genetics Anyone?

Three books on genes and heredity, starting with:

Towards an Understanding of the Mechanism of Heredity, by H.L. K. Whitehouse  (hardcover , 1969, $ 3)- the most technical of the books, and the oldest.

The Human Blueprint, The Race to Unlock the Secrets of our Genetic Script, by Robert Shapiro (trade PB, 1991, $3)-written for  nonscientific readers as well as the scientifically inclined.

Quest for Perfection, the Drive to Breed Better Human Beings, by Gina Maranto, ( hardcover, 1996, $3)- the newest, and  the one to read while you ponder the possible consequences of "society's attempts to control human destiny by regulating birth outcomes".

Look for them in the biology section.

Thursday, June 2, 2011

Rollo May and other psychiatrists

 5 books by Rollo May:

Man's Search for Himself,
Psychology and the Human Dilemma
Power and Innocence, a Search for the Sources of Violence
Love and Will
Freedom and Destiny (hardcover)

plus:
Bruno Bettelheim's The Uses of Enchantment -- SOLD and The Informed Heart -- SOLD
Jung's Psyche and Symbol
Joseph Campbell's An Introduction
Erich Fromm's The Anatomy of Human Destructiveness

plus an easier one: The Complete Idiot's Guide to Psychology

SOLD
and an older one: The Knack of Using Your Subconscious Mind, by John K. Williams (hardcover, 1952, $6.50)SOLD

All the books are trade paperbacks or paperbacks,except where marked as hardcover. All but the older book by Williams are $1 to $2.50. They can be found in the psych section. Come and exercise your mind!

Cookbooks and more cookbooks

We have unloaded a whole lot of cookbooks. The most interesting of the lot is:

The Horizon Cookbook and Illustrated History of Eating and Drinking through the Ages,  by the editors of the Horizon Magazine, and published  American Heritage.
These are two hardcover volumes in a slipcase, all in wonderful condition. The first volume contains the illustrated history of cooking and eating. The second volume contains menus and recipes. The recipes have all been modernized, so you don't have to plant a garden to get the ingredients, or find an open hearth to do the cooking. (Thank heavens... It is getting pretty warm for open hearth cooking.)
Enjoy these books for $6. They can be found (surprise, surprise...) in the cooking section.