Larry

Although I do my utmost to encourage others to use public libaries, I am guilty of neglecting them myself. The main problem I have is that the books have to be returned! I'm ashamed to admit I tend only to visit libraries to check out the withdrawn stock (which does provide money I suppose).

Just finished my eighth encounter with Keith Waterhouse. The Bucket Shop (1968) was his fourth novel and not quite up to the standard of the previous three (This Happy Land and Billy Liar are particularly great). It's all a bit too familiar. The hero is a decidedly unheroic philanderer and proprietor of an unsuccessful junk shop. He moves from one casual affair to the next and at one point (rather like the hero of Billy Liar) finds himself stringing along two women at the same time, besides his wife. It's very nicely written and often very funny but feels a bit dated now. Kingsley Amis was the chief exponent of this kind of thing but Waterhouse was at least his equal and probably easier to read (and less chauvinistic).

Sounds like you've got it all figured out so there's not much point my trying to deter you. Just make sure you never add Keep the Giraffe Burning by John Sladek to your collection. It's the worst thing I've ever read!

I was afraid somebody might ask me how many I've read! To be completely honest, I don't think I've read a thousand in my entire life (including kids books). One would naturally assume that I purchase as many as I do in order to satisfy a voracious reading habit. However, it's more a combination of boredom, a lifelong love of books and the luxury of having as much choice as possible (even to the point of being spoilt for choice) that has resulted in my having so many. Plus, once read I never part with them. I can't say I am an especially fast reader. In recent weeks I have read seven or eight quite skinny volumes, mainly just to increase my pitiful tally for the year so far. Fifty-six might not sound too disgraceful but with the amount of pressure I place on myself, I.e. by buying more and more all the time, I feel like I should always be reading more in order to justify having so many. Incidentally, I do actually enjoy reading. My relentless book-buying is not purely a mad compulsion. I'm definitely more a bibliophile than a bibliomaniac. As for the way they're kept, it's all a matter of necessity I'm afraid. To see them all on bookshelves would be like a dream come true. As it stands, everything is very orderly and I'm able to find what I want but ultimately books belong on bookshelves. Unfortunately I would need a place with at least two decent sized spare rooms to accommodate the amount of shelving required so I guess it's probably never going to happen.

Don't say that, Frankie. You'll only discover I'm a false prophet. Following my example will bring you poverty, frustration and constant fear for the well-being of the floorboards!

Strangely enough I can put my hands on anything I'm after...it just might take a while. You see, I haven't got a single book on a single shelf! (The 200-plus DVDs occupy the shelves) They're all in various boxes (about 45, mainly veg boxes) and drawers. I keep certain author's works together in a specific box or drawer, so I do have a system. Of course, it constitutes an inpromptu workput every time I try to retrieve something because it will invariably be in the box at the bottom that has six others stacked on top of it, or right at the back of the wardrobe, but I always get it. If I didn't have a system I'd never be able to find anything and it would be kind of pointless having so many (if it isn't already).

Just finished another very peculiar work by the highly original James Purdy, entitled I Am Elijah Thrush. The whole thing has a sort of dreamlike quality to it. I'm already struggling to recall much of it to mind. He was a very gifted writer and I was particularly taken with the dialogue in this novel. It's completely unlike anything written in the last century - more like something from several hundred years ago, and certainly preferable to the way we tend to speak in real life. Especially nowadays. It's all a bit warped but I'd recommend anything of Purdy's to a reader seeking something a little offbeat.

That shows an admirable restraint on your part. Please don't ruin it by following my example. I'd hate to see my mania used to justify reckless and gratuitous book-buying. May my example be a warning to you all!

I haven't posted on this forum for ages (more fool me) and I suspect this comment may have quite an impact! My book-buying mania is so completely out of hand, I cannot give an exact figure as to how many I own; not even to the nearest five hundred. About two and a half years ago a fairly rough estimation suggested I had four and a half thousand. That would suggest (on an even rougher estimate) I have between five and six thousand now. Yes, you needn't point it out, it's obvious even to me: I'm insane! I've recently started transferring my written catalogue on to spreadsheets so give me three or four years and I shall get back to you with a more definitive answer...by which time the collection will have grown even more and the ceiling finally given way (but for a few hundred in the attic, they're all in one room!).

Cakes and Ale is finished (and terrific it was too). Now I'm on to Herself Surprised, the first part of a trilogy by Joyce Cary, written in the 1940s.

I tend to use old train tickets as bookmarks and I also have an old bus ticket which I've been using for five years. It's one of those season ticket ones stuck on to a strip of card which the driver then stamps until it's full. Transport is so costly, I don't like the thought of simply abandoning one's used tickets. I feel I need to get my money's worth by giving them another function.

I have about 45 pages remaining of Cakes and Ale by Somserset Maugham. It is my third encounter with him, having previously read The Painted Veil and The Moon and Sixpence, both of which I was extremely fond of. He's incredibly easy to read, which may account for how long and successful his writing career was.

I got about three quarters of the way through To Kill a Mockingbird before finding there was a page missing. I couldn't locate a copy anywhere online (this was quite a few years ago) so I had to hold off until I could visit the nearest city, visit Waterstones and locate a copy. It wasn't hard to find one but unfortunately, being a new edition, the layout of the book was different to the one I'd been reading and the page I wanted wasn't where I'd expected it to be. Still, I managed to find it and read it. There's no way I could have just skipped it and the same goes for any book.

If he did, it was unusually optimistic by Orwell's standards. By his own admission, Nineteen Eighty-Four was as gloomy as it was largely because of the illness he was suffering at the time.

I'm 50 pages into the fourth part of Yukio Mishima's The Decay of the Angel, the final part of his quartet, The Sea of Fertility. I read the first three (Spring Snow, Runaway Horses, The Temple of Dawn) earlier this year and greatly enjoyed them, the second part especially. However, I opted to break off after part three and now four months have elapsed, which is a longer gap than I had intended. It isn't absolutely essential to recall all that happened in the previous parts (the story jumps forward quite a few years and thus far features only a few characters from the earlier novels) but I can't help wishing I'd resumed it sooner, when it was all a bit fresher in my mind. I'm sure it would have been beneficial.