Books.

I own hundreds of books. I have bookcases all over the place, and books up the stairs because I have run out of space for any more book cases.
Am I a book hoarder, you might ask yourselves?

When I moved here twenty-five years ago I came with about fifty books, some of which I had already read, but I had by then discovered the fact that some books are very much worth re reading.

But since I can go through five books in a week when the mood takes me, they didn’t last very long. This was utter catastrophe. English books were impossible to buy in France in those days, so I read them over and over again. I can now quote the opening sentence to far too many books, and not just Rebecca.
And the last sentence of  The Sun Also Rises. “Isn’t it pretty to think so.”

I didn’t have a computer, so no chance of Amazon, which I didn’t know even existed.

In truth, I went to England to visit my children with the only intention of buying books, but they don’t know that. And at three hundred pounds a throw for ferry fares, these were very expensive second hand paper backs, although I did inadvertently pick up a couple of First Edition Hard Backs, which I will never part with.

Intermarche in Pontivy eventually got around to displaying about six up to date titles which I would gaze at longingly, but at the equivalent of ten pounds a throw I couldn’t afford more than one of those. Oh the agony of deciding which one.

It was a long time ago, and things have changed. Other expats gave me books, and I went to Amazon for the real goodies.
I now have every book ever written by Nevil Shute. Every book written by Elizabeth George. And every book written by Diana Gabaldon in The Outlander series. Plus a few more. Too many to mention now. But all worth rereading. I will never again be without a book to read.

But I will never forget the agony and the fear of never having a new book to read.

I sometimes think of The Pioneers who went out into the Western Hinterland with nothing much more than a Bible. No wonder they knew their Scriptures.

Actually, I know a few quotes from The Bible, Old and New, but that is more to do with my Grandmother and a desire to soak up words.
That is what it is really all about. The passion for words. Even if they are the words of other people.