Books We Gave and Received

Posted at Jan 12, 2014 1:10 am

The front corner of our house probably sagged with the weight of books under the tree this year. Perils of old houses, partial foundations, and pallets of paper. I started buying books early, lost track of what I stashed around my hiding places, and then saw another perfect book. And another. Other family members don’t read romance, so I have to be literate in non-fiction too!

I also have a streak to maintain: for eight years I’ve given my in-laws books and not one has been something they had already read. Add to that a mother-in-law who ran a children’s bookstore thirty years ago, and you can imagine the stacks of books lurking under our tree.

For my father-in-law: Ghostman (heist/thriller/noir) and Frozen in Time: An Epic Story of Survival and a Modern Quest for Lost Heroes of WWII (tale of bomber crash in Greenland).

For my mother-in-law: The Most of Nora Ephron and The Boys in the Boat: Nine Americans and their Epic Quest for Gold at the 1936 Berlin Olympics. Our family loves the Olympics, my sister-in-law used to row, and I often try to find a local Seattle book for my mother-in-law, so this was a trifecta.

The Big Boy received aviation enthusiast magazines, Paris Underground: The Maps, Stations and Design of the Metro, and a vintage reissue whose well-placed apostrophe and cute cover were irresistible: The Mad Scientists’ Club. It also fit nicely with the snap circuits set Santa left under the stocking.

Miss Bossy enjoys the Clementine series by Sara Pennypacker, so she received one of those and a hilarious field guide to Sasquatches from REI, as well as several greatest hits of Canadian children’s literature such as the Minnipins series (actually being read by Big Boy right now) and Message from Arkmae.

That was a small fraction of the books given and received here!

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