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Member: jenenglish

Library548 books — see library

Reviews37 reviews — see reviews

Cloudstag cloud, author cloud

TagsClassics (367), Fiction (310), American Literature (177), Children's Literature (145), British Literature (118), Series (53), Great Books (49), Contemporary Classics (44) — see all tags

GroupsGeeks who love the Classics, Read YA Lit, Vintage children's and young adult books

About me Life keeps me too busy to read most of the time, but I am able to sneak a few pages here and there. Mostly I work & cook and watch tv...same as the rest of the world I guess.

About my library I decided to read all "the classics." Although as a child I raided my dad's bookshelf on a regular basis, reading Moby Dick, some Steinbeck, and other well-regarded books, I missed out on a lot of the classics. So I have now taken it upon myself to make my own assigned reading list.
Half-Price Books was a welcome discovery, and my to-be-read list keeps growing, as does my mini-library. I tend to buy old paperbacks so I can afford a lot of books at once, and I have a preference for books that are old, yellowed, and filled with writing.
I especially love old books with gift markings in them---my latest additions are some weathered hardback Dickens books that have "Mary L Carpenter from Aunt Sue 1896" written in the front cover. I love that these books have probably graced many shelves, sitting through such events as the womens suffrage movement, both World Wars and such. The pages are yellowed and brittle, but they are treasured.
I joined paperbackswap.com and various other book swapping sites, but mostly just to get rid of a few odd books lying around the house and pay bottom-dollar for books I still need in my collection. At garage sales and library give-aways I pick up a lot of books I'd never read (Sweet Valley High? Anyone?) just so I can trade them for books I really want. Of course, those will never show up in my library here since I'm hoping to trade them off quickly. But please check out my shelves on the swapping sites---I'd be happy to strike a deal if you're interested in any of the books I have listed there.
Most of my own for-keeps books are "unswappable" as I make a point of selecting old & damaged copies...ones I find have character, but that's fine with me, as I don't intend to give up any of my wonderful reads. The only problem I've run into is that really old books don't have ISBNs or even LC #s, making it rather tedious to catalog them here.
I'm afraid my personal reviews of books are lacking in true literary critique, but I'm not trying to sell these stories to anyone. At most, I'm simply stating my opinion, and perhaps someone out there will find my words useful.

Also onBookCrossing, BookMooch, FrugalReader.com, MySpace, PaperBackSwap, Title Trader, WhatsOnMyBookshelf?

Membership LibraryThing Early Reviewers

Real nameJen

LocationAustin, Texas

Favorite authorsNone specified

Account typepublic, paid

Connection NewsConnection News

URLs http://www.librarything.com/profile/jenenglish (profile)
http://www.librarything.com/catalog/jenenglish (library)

Member sinceMay 6, 2007