Literary Loot

So, this weekend, I went to the Friends of the Library at the Downtown branch of the Santa Cruz Public Library and picked up some literary loot. I actually was only there for one book in particular. My husband has resorted to faux subliminal messages (e.g. whispering the title at me every time I walk past him), so I figured I'd at least buy it. Let's see if it buys me some time. The book is Atlas Shrugged by Ayn Rand. I am not sure I have the time to read it right now, but eventually I'm sure I'll try it. 

I left the library without Atlas Shrugged, but I did get a few treasures: A Thousand Splendid Suns, The Woman in White, Slaughterhouse-Five, Never Let Me Go, Lord of the Flies, and A Mad Desire to Dance (an Elie Wiesel book I'd never even heard of). Not to be defeated, I took my family down the street to Bookstore Santa Cruz where I picked up my copy of Atlas Shrugged, and then, because I couldn't help myself, To Kill a Mockingbird, which I was shocked to realize I didn't own and Wolf Hall, because I love historical fiction revolving around the Tudors. 

Source: Karena Fagan

I'm also in the process of cleaning up my bookshelves: getting rid of those books that I bought in my early twenties that were of no substance, "books of the hour" (Ruskin, 1891), instead of "books for all time." Granted, I'm keeping a couple series that mean a lot to me, my favorite escapism books, but the majority I decided to swap out for those books that never go out of style, the stories that challenge us. I wrote on Sunday about breaking up with an author. This is part of that. That author takes up a good shelf and half, with one row of books in front of another. So these latest finds will take the place of those that are merely taking up shelf space. I'll donate what I can, see if some of the used bookstores will buy some, and then the rest usually go to my mom so she can sort through them and use them at her bookstore. 

I'm not saying I'm not buying "books of the hour." They're just going on my Kindle app, saving my shelves for these gems that I can pass down to my kids. I have a lot of work to do. 

What literary loot did you dig up this weekend? Any shelf cleaning?