Monday, January 23, 2006

Latest Reading and Women's Lib

In spite of all the new books I purchased just a week or so ago, I have once again been glomming an author. (For an explanation of glomming, go here.) A few weeks ago I discovered Anne Weale's blog "Bookworm on the Net" and was inspired to get out my collection of her books. I also discovered there were a few of her books that I didn't have yet. I don't understand how that can happen, since I carefully review lists of "coming" books online and in a magazine. It's a mystery. Whatever. So I ordered three of these books online and I'll keep looking for the one I could get. (Man, I love being able to order online--it's so convenient.) I was then further inspired to re-read some of my favorites.

Strange, perhaps to some, I have owned 10? or so books by Ms. Weale, some for years which I have never read. I like to think of that as both an example of my ability to delay gratification and as a way of stockpiling reading material against the possibilty of a disaster. Maybe the book industry will go belly-up, for example, and then I'll need all these books I've been hoarding for years and years. It's not as crazy as you might first think, with book readership down, that worst case scenario could happen! The books that I have been reading for the first time, are all early novels, written in the 60's. Reading books from this era has reminded me of the Dell Shannon 'Luis Mendoza' mysteries which are set in the 60's. I might have to start re-reading them next. I love when the book references the cost of things. For example, in a Luis Mendoza mystery--really wealthy widows (they're frequent characters for some reason) make like 600 bucks a MONTH. Whew. That's livin' the high-life, isn't it? I also like it when the books have the characters wearing hats or gloves it such a contrast to our current casual style. I digress, as usual. Anyway--reading these early romance novels by Ms. Weale, with their references to women's liberation have made me wonder. When did the women's movement start? I thought it was the late 60's at the same time as the sexual revolution. But even the book written in 1960 makes reference to women's equality with men. Oh, rats...I'm going to have to look this up.

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