the heft of a hardback

Several handsome new volumes of the Everyman's Library are being released in time for the gift-giving season, including collections of Alice Munro, Roald Dahl, & Joan Didion. So either buy one for a friend, or hint without shame about your own wish list. Alice Munro is probably the best short-story writer you're likely to come across, & this month it's a double treat, because "The View from Castle Rock: Stories" (Knopf) hits the shelves tomorrow as well. As for Dahl, I not only loved his children's books, but had a worn copy of his adult tales when I was a kid, & read it more times than I can count. (If he, Edgar Allen Poe, & Paul Auster could have a dinner party together, I'd sure like to hear that conversation.) Publishing Joan Didion's nonfiction in a single volume ("We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live: Collected Nonfiction") is a fine idea; it's a book I'd recommend without hesitation. Plus there's that irresistible ribbon bookmark in each Everyman tome. Given that I'm in the mood to reread "Slouching Towards Bethlehem" & am always thinking about California when winter approaches, photographs taken in Los Angeles will illustrate today's entry.
An update on Eden, for those of you who checked the Jonah House site & might not have seen the news in small type: her charges were dismissed last Friday.