THE THIRTY-FIRST BOOK

THIRTY WRITERS ---THEIR MOST 

     CHERISHED BOOK,

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Here is a most-unusual book for you book-lovers

and students of writing---a compilation of thirty

well-known writers--- each of whom has given

us his/her own story about a favorite book...and 

why.

The title is "Bound To Last," ed. by Sean Manning.

Immediately on seeing this book, and realizing the

cleverness of its premise, and seeing that it was 

"on sale," I called and ordered three. The lady said:

"Um..the computer shows there is only one left."

"I'll take it," I said hurriedly.

(It must be said here that I could've done without 

some of the blue language from three or four writers.)

All through this captivating book, as I read it, I kept

thinking: "Why I could do this...just like these people.

After all, I am a reader...and...a writer!" If..if..I only

knew what my favorite book is...

For you see, I have twenty shelves (not counting

boxes) of books in my office, garage, and shed--- an

estimated 3000 volumes---the reading of a lifetime.

A good many of these of these are fully noted in the

back fly leaves: the highlights of the books by page

numbers.

I may have a hundred favorites. How could I have ONE

favorite? I like Caro's books, McCullough's books;

I like Lynne Olson's "Troublesome Young Men," Leif

Enger, Carlo d' Este, and Victor Klemperer's World War

II Diaries: "I Will Bear Witness: The Nazi Years," Vols.

One and Two. One of the great experiences of life

was reading Patrick O'Brian's twenty historical sea

novels.

I love Mary Oliver's "A Thousand Mornings," and all

her books! I learned a lot from "The Apple Trees of

Olema" by Robert Hass. I have the life and poems

of Sylvia Plath. In our library---leather-bound,  are "Final 

Harvest," by Emily Dickenson, "Poems" by Marianne

Moore, "Selected Poems" by William Carlos Williams,

"Poems," by Edward Arlington Robinson, and a whole 

volume of Longfellow.

"I'll just pick a book," I decided, "and become writer 

 number thirty-one."

But first I looked at some of the unusual favorites 

chosen by the thirty writers. Why, a good many of 

them I'd never heard of! Books like: "Mason and Dixon," 

by Pynchon. (A daunting writer in the Faulkner-class, 

I'd been told.) Then,"Mythology" by Edith Hamilton, "The 

Collected Stories," by William Trevor, and "For Whom 

The Bell Tolls," by Hemingway.(Well, there's one I knew!)

Other favorites of the thirty writers seemed a bit strange

to me, like: "The New Professional Chef: Fifth Edition,"

"The Viking Portable Dorothy Parker,"and "Believe It Or 

Not," by Ripley. Who ever heard of "The Crying of 

Lot 49?" (Not I, that's for sure!) Then, there  was a

favorite book of one writer, titled "Dungeon Masters

Guide."

So with those books in mind, I just picked one of MY

favorites, with perhaps as equally-an-unusual-title

as theirs! My selection: "Between Silk and Cyanide,"

by Leo Marks (son of the famous owner of the

equally-famous London rare-book shoppe at 84 

Charing Cross Road!)

Unlike a good many hooks of the thirty writers: my 

selected book---has never been torn, yellowed,

stained by spilled Dr. Pepper, left out in the rain,

or splashed on by chlorinated water at poolside

while watching my child swim!  It has no mustard

or mayo stains on it, and I haven't had it since I was

a child. I haven't read it twenty times and it is not

coming apart. I do not keep it in a Zip Lock bag

due to its fragility.

It does have sentimental value, in that my Beloved

Editor bought it off a sale table at Page One and 

gave it to me for  Father's Day, fifteen years ago.

I have read it three rimes...and love it.

I love it for many reasons:

---I grew up in WWII, admired the British and have

never forgotten what a "d-----close run thing" that 

WWII was (Quoting Wellington on Waterloo).

---Leo Marks, a young genius, in 1942, joined-up

to fight...but the British recognized his genius in the

fields of cryptography and codes and re-assigned

him.

---He was put in charge of training and parachuting

attractive young women spies into occupied France.

It is heart-rending to read of those that were lost---

executed by the Germans, when these women were

volunteers and did not have to go.

---Leo Marks writes with a considerable amount of

self-effacing humor, and with great skill... which 

stood him in good stead after the war, when he 

became a Hollywood writer.

---84 Charing Cross Road Booksellers, as noted,

was famous in its own right as a world-wide source 

of rare books.It was a place frequented by the famous. 

Books were written and a movie was made about the 

store, owned by Leo's father.

---A most-memorable time comes at the end of the

war, when Leo's operation is closed down, all the

secretaries are gone---his building is being

emptied...many loyal spies have survived the war..

and are safe, and mostly back in civilian life.

He is sitting  in his dismantled office, smoking cigars 

with one of his male agents and they are reflecting 

on it all...and they are remembering those who paid 

the ultimate price...

The reader is left with a deep feeling of sadness,

emptiness, and nostalgia, as he realizes the 

magnitude and cost of the effort of this one operation 

of WWII, out of thousands of efforts...and the regrets 

or the loss of these fine women.

And then he remembers that Hitler's aspirations

cost the world seventy millions souls...all because

of his madness.

Now, add another favorite book to my list: "Bound 

to Last," edited by Sean Manning.

*********30*******

BY MIL

01/15/14