MemberABVR(he, him, his)

6,836 Books 10 Collections 238 Reviews 31 Recommendations

Collections: All collections (6,836), Your library (2,837), Wishlist (458), To read (829), Currently reading (4), Read but unowned (2,768), Paused (8), Sale & Swap (63), Weeded (826), Status Uncertain (15)
Tags: @Garage (1,268), science fiction (1,025), American history (839), read 1990-2003 (770), popular culture (754), 20C (563), mystery fiction (562), @Office (532), @Living Room (531), @Bedroom (508), World War II (468), thriller fiction (446), read in grad school (427), military history (409), history of science (409), 19C (399), British history (367), film history & criticism (353), read in high school (351), read in college (348), space travel (337), history of technology (333), aviation history (292), maritime history (232), historical fiction (229), science (206), military aviation (192), American culture (184), STS (182), Massachusetts (181), naval history (181), geology (166), society (166), Martha's Vineyard (160), cultural history (158), DNF (152), technological disasters (151), British literature (151), private detective (151), American politics (147), read pre-high school (136), naval fiction (134), fantasy fiction (134), biography (132), military fiction (131), reference 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Groups: Boats and Sailing, BookCrossers, BookMooching, Books in 2025: The Future of the Book World, Combiners!, Crime, Thriller & Mystery, Current Events, History Fans, History of Science/Technology/Medicine, History: On learning from and writing history, Hobnob with Authors, Legacy Libraries, Librarians who LibraryThing, Librarything Series, Non-Fiction Readers, Science Fiction Fans, Science!, Unique Library Thing Book Group, Used Books, Writer-readers
Joined: Nov 12, 2005

Real Name

A. Bowdoin Van Riper

About My Library

My LibraryThing catalog is mostly books on history, science, technology, and popular culture, along with a lot of classic science fiction, pre-1920 British poetry, maritime history, mysteries & thrillers. There are also clumps of books about language, mass media, constitutional law, baseball, archaeology, yacht racing, and Antarctic exploration, among other things.

My catalog includes all the books I've read from 2004 to the present (tagged "read in 20XX") and some of those I read in in 2003 and earlier. The books I read pre-2004 are tagged with "read in ________" tags that indicate (approximately) when. The older the category, the less complete the coverage.

My collections are of the "what it says on the can" variety, with two (possible) exceptions:

Weeded books are ones I found interesting enough to own once, got rid of without reading them, but (because of that initial interest) still feel a connection to.

Sale & Swap books are ones I currently have posted for sale on Amazon Marketplace or available for trade on BookMooch or PaperbackSwap; they're in my possession, but don't feel like part of "My Library."

I also maintain an entirely separate LT account (user ID: Silverheels) as a sort of secondary wishlist -- a way to keep track of books that I'm not immediately interested in reading or buying, but want to remember are out there.

About Me

After 22 years as a history professor, I'm now 9 years and counting into one of those second acts that F. Scott Fitzgerald said don't exist in American life. I work for the Martha's Vineyard Museum, as reference librarian, pinch-hitting archivist, journal editor, in-house historian, and one-person Department of Interpretation. Born and raised in southern New England, I'm back there after -- living in my childhood (summer) home -- after 27 years spent in the Midwest, Mid-Atlantic, and South: an unreconstructed Yankee who loves the sea, the snow, bay scallops, and good clam chowder. For the demographically curious, I . . . was born in 1963, am the son of a teacher and a social worker, am 6' 3" tall, am left-handed, attended public schools, have a PhD (University of Wisconsin--Madison, 1990) drive an aging Subaru Outback, sail a vintage 21-foot racing sloop, and have owned seven Macintosh computers since 1987.

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