What I miss most about having half-a-dozen favorite bookstores to make regular visits to is the pleasure of shutting out the rest of the world for an hour or two while slowly making my way through shelf after shelf of books I'd never seen before. Whichever book caught my eye next was going to, at least for a few minutes, feel like a new gift to be opened. I couldn't wait to see what was inside "the box."
Sadly, those days are long gone. In the Houston suburbs I now have relatively easy access to two Barnes & Noble big box bookstores, but except for their physical layout they are pretty much the same. And neither of them offers any real bargains anymore other than the same handful of discounted books I can find in any Target store in the country - or even in my local Kroger grocery store, for that matter. Knowing that I'm unlikely to be able to carry home for much under $30 any book I might fall in love with (even though I didn't even know I was looking for it when I came into the store) takes away most of the joy of exploring the shelves. Instead of walking away with four or five new books on each visit - some from the now non-existent remainders shelves - I might come home with one, or none, nowadays. Let's face it, all of us read a lot of books or we wouldn't be talking about them so much, but most of us can't afford to pay $100 for four or five new ones every couple of weeks.
So I don't browse much anymore, and when I do I often (I know, I know...that's not the thing to do) come home and place an order with Amazon. And I always come home at least a little bit angry about what Barnes & Noble has turned itself into after so ruthlessly driving all the competition right out of business like it did.
But I've found a solution of sorts. And in Part II, I'll tell you what that is and how it's worked for me for the last thirty days.
