When I Judge a Book by its Cover...

When I judge a book by its cover, it means I want to show off a fabulous new book with a beautiful cover, in my huge sets of bookcases that dominate my living room. I love real books. I won’t say I hate e-books, but I’ll only buy an e-reader when no more real books are printed. Given the number of people who also love real books, maybe we can stave off that awful day. I wonder if many people know this, but when you buy a real book and take it home to gloat over, it’s actually yours for keeps. When you buy an e-book, you’re actually only buying the right to read it… But, hey, let’s not go into all that. Let’s stick to real books.

This post was inspired by my annual attendance at the Exclusive Book’s annual sale. (Exclusive Books is South Africa’s leading bookstore and cleverly align themselves with a coffee shop to add extra comfort to book-lover browsing) People love the sale because all the books are marked down, and it’s one way of stocking up on expensive items that might just break the budget. So, what did I buy this year? Aha! I generally pick non-fiction because they are usually hard cover. I also tend to read a lot of non-fiction for research into my children’s adventure series, and because I like history.

The Secret History of Giants by Ari Berk

I know giants are not strictly non-fiction, but ever since a light-fingered somebody walked off with my Book of Giants (no longer in print), I have wanted a replacement. I mean, what is a home without a book on giants? I already have Brian Froud’s Faeries and The Book of Good and Bad Faeries, so definitely a giant replacement was on the cards. This is what the blurb says: Ancient Greece had its Titans, the Celts their Green Knight, the Bible Goliath—and for those who know where to look, signs of these legendary hulking creatures still abound. Now comes a hugely engrossing chronicle of giants since antiquity, from their role in forming mountains and causing earthquakes to the mysteries of their sacks (watch out for hitchhiking humans); from their means of employment (how did the Druids built Stonehenge?) to an extensive map of places around the world where giants may likely be found. Exhaustive and lushly illustrated, this enormously valuable resource is sure to fascinate all who open its covers.

Special features include: sundry flaps, booklets, and gatefolds; a lavish foiled and embossed cover (and it is lavish!); an elegant tassel (very elegant!) dangling from the spine.

Babylon: Mesopotamia and the Birth of Civilization by Paul Kriwaczek

Civilization was born eight thousand years ago, between the floodplains of the Tigris and Euphrates rivers, when migrants from the surrounding mountains and deserts began to create increasingly sophisticated urban societies. In the cities that they built, half of human history took place. In Babylon, Paul Kriwaczek tells the story of Mesopotamia from the earliest settlements seven thousand years ago to the eclipse of Babylon in the sixth century BCE. Bringing the people of this land to life in vibrant detail, the author chronicles the rise and fall of power during this period and explores the political and social systems, as well as the technical and cultural innovations, which made this land extraordinary. At the heart of this book is the story of Babylon, which rose to prominence under the Amorite king Hammurabi from about 1800 BCE. Even as Babylon’s fortunes waxed and waned, it never lost its allure as the ancient world’s greatest city. Engaging and compelling, Babylon reveals the splendor of the ancient world that laid the foundation for civilization itself. (I can’t wait to get stuck into this!)

 House of Wisdom by Jonathan Lyons

Although I see this book received mixed reviews on Amazon, I’m willing to give it a chance. The blurb says: For centuries following the fall of Rome, Western Europe was a benighted backwater, a world of subsistence farming, minimal literacy, and violent conflict. Meanwhile Arab culture was thriving, dazzling those Europeans fortunate enough to visit cities like Baghdad or Antioch. There, philosophers, mathematicians, and astronomers were steadily advancing the frontiers of knowledge, as well as keeping alive the works of Plato and Aristotle. When the best libraries in Europe held several dozen books, Baghdad's great library, The House of Wisdom, housed four hundred thousand. Jonathan Lyons shows just how much "Western" ideas owe to the Golden Age of Arab civilization. Even while their countrymen waged bloody Crusades against Muslims, a handful of intrepid Christian scholars, hungry for knowledge, traveled East and returned with priceless jewels of science, medicine, and philosophy that laid the foundation for the Renaissance. In this brilliant, evocative book, Jonathan Lyons reveals the story of how Europe drank from the well of Muslim learning.

The Illustrated Anthology of World Myth andStory Telling by C. Scott Littleton (editor)

I was lucky enough to receive this wonderful anthology as a Christmas present. I have already dipped into it and it’s just wonderful. The blurb says: Myths are the timeless expression of the imagination born out of the need to make sense of the universe. Moving across the centuries, they resonate with our deepest feelings about the fragility and grandeur of existence. Mythology is a comprehensive, richly illustrated survey of the mythic imagination in all its forms around the world, from the odysseys, quests, and battles of ancient Greece and Rome to the living beliefs of indigenous cultures in the Americas, Africa, and Oceania. Looking at each major myth-making culture in turn, this book retells some of the most significant and captivating stories in a lively, contemporary style. Generously illustrated with more than 700 color photographs, Mythology brings you the vibrant stories that echo time and again in our lives.

Back to the covers: a gleeful giant peeking out of one cover, a Babylonian lion striding across a turquoise background, the delicate beauty of Arabian craftsmanship, and a winged Assyrian sculpture on a sandstone background, these books all merit pride of place in the looks department, and I am sure contain a wealth of knowledge!

by Fiona Ingram

Buy More Books!

Don't you just love the word "sale" when it comes to books? I confess that not being a shopaholic or a shoe addict, the word "sale" only gets me excited when it is pasted in big red letters on the doors and windows of a book shop. Living in South Africa means that my shopping choices are rather limited. The best bookshop in the southern hemisphere is an emporium called Exclusive Books. Every branch is truly an emporium. You can get books on such a wide variety of topics that eventually you want to fling your credit card at the cashier and scream, "Load 'em all up!" Sadly, book prices in this neck of the world are prohibitive, to say the least, so such antics are out of the question. Apart from being off the beaten USA/Europe/Asia track, South Africa's currency and duty on book imports does not favor the avid reader. That's why people like me wait for the Exclusive Books Summer Sale when books go for half, nay, even less than a third of the shelf price.

I don't know why I pretend to avoid the sale when inevitably it finds me. I turn a corner and there are the tables laid out in the mall, nowhere near the actual store, but sneakily placed between the unsuspecting will-be-buyer (me) and the supermarket. How can one avoid casting a longing, hungry glance at the covers so delectably displayed. What's worse, a single book quickly becomes two, three, even four or five as one trawls the tables, eyes sliding over the tantalizing cover copy... Even worse is when assistants rush up to relieve you of the burden of six coffee table books and offer to look after them at the impromptu till so that "Madam can shop comfortably." Sigh - how quickly do Madam's arms fill up!

This year I was restrained. Sort of. Listed below are my three (yes, such is my will power, only three!) tomes. Why did I choose these titles? My children's book series is based on ancient mysteries and secrets so I made for the historical ones. The dictionary? Well, one can never have too many dictionaries in the house, and having something on literary characters appealed to my sense of the quirky in life. I have not read any of my purchases yet, but this is what awaits me!

Millenium by Tom Holland

I must admit I did not find Perisan Fire an easy read, and I think this will be the same kind of journey, but compelling cover copy forced my hand... Of all the civilizations existing in the year 1000, that of Western Europe seemed the unlikeliest candidate for future greatness. Compared to the glittering empires of Byzantium or Islam, the splintered kingdoms on the edge of the Atlantic appeared impoverished, fearful and backward. But the anarchy of these years proved to be, not the portents of the end of the world, as many Christians had dreaded, but rather the birthpangs of a radically new order. MILLENNIUM is a stunning panoramic account of the two centuries on either side of the apocalyptic year 1000. This was the age of Canute, William the Conqueror and Pope Gregory VII, of Vikings, monks and serfs, of the earliest castles and the invention of knighthood, and of the primal conflict between church and state. The story of how the distinctive culture of Europe - restless, creative and dynamic - was forged from out of the convulsions of these extraordinary times is as fascinating and as momentous as any in history.

Chambers' Dictionary of Literary Characters sounds fascinating. It offers over 6500 entries and even if I did not finish reading the Harry Potter series, I can catch up on everyone in this book! On a serious note, there are some big literary names in here from the classics as well as the fun stuff.

'This is a great plum pudding of a book stuffed with interesting titbits, pithy summaries, tantalizing tastes of those novels you've always meant to read' -- Reference Reviews

Now for the hero part! One of my most loved books as a child was a book on Greek and Roman myths and legends. I read it countless times. Which explains this purchase.

Heroes: A History of Hero Worship - the title says it all. Beginning beneath the walls of Troy and culminating in 1930s Europe, a magisterial exploration of the nature of heroism in Western civilization. In this riveting and insightful cultural history, Lucy Hughes-Hallett brings to life eight exceptional men from history and myth to explore our timeless need for heroes. As she re-creates these extraordinary lives, Hughes-Hallett illuminates the attractions and dangers of hero worship. This is a fascinating book about dictatorship and democracy, seduction and mass hysteria, politics and culture, and the tensions between being good and being great.

Phew! Can't wait to get stuck in.