$1 Treasure

Yesterday, after escaping the first heatwave of the year into the New Museum to see Paul Chan's great show called "7 Lights" (Flickr), we happened to run into outdoor book sale. In the sweltering heat people were filling cardboard boxes with books to buy. Who says nobody reads anymore? It might have helped that each book was only one dollar.

It was a sale for a good cause. Amongst the donated books I found one by a favorite author of mine: H.G.Wells. I have actually only ever read his classics, but just had to buy this one. It is a first edition of "Mr. Brittling Sees it Through" from 1916, the year it was first published. It must have been a bestseller right away, since it was reprinted ten times within two months. Another nice detail: according to the adds included at the end of the book, an edition like this would have cost about $1.50 at the time. So I got it fifty cents off after more than ninety years!

On the photo you can see it was still 83 degrees when we got home (thats 28 Celsius). Inside.