Our bookshelves at home! |
One of the rarely-mentioned joys of visiting hotels is having a good old nosey at their book swap/exchange area and seeing what gems they have. You can tell a lot about a hotel’s clientele just from the quality of the books on offer, as well as gaining a fair idea about the mix of nationalities.
In Portugal this summer, the book swap area in the Martinhal Hotel was in their computer room. It had dozens of books available and they were mostly English, reflecting the percentage of British guests at the resort. I’m making huge assumptions here but there were less supermarket 3 for 2 stickers plastered on them, as is the case in the cheaper hotels we’ve stayed in, and far more Waterstones’ labels. You could roughly gauge the dads’ books from the mums’ books (if the couples were anything like us) and if there were any naughty novels, I had a habit of trying to guess who, around the pool, was likely to have been the previous owner, before borrowing the well-thumbed copy myself.
We always take a whole pile of paperbacks on our two-week summer holiday if we know we’re going to be lazing about. Husband Dougie gets through a huge amount of shoot ’em up thrillers-for-boys, particularly if the hero is a forty-something, intelligent spy with a penchant for classy cars. I tend to go for a mixture of travel books (often based on the country we’re visiting) and some easy chick-lit-but-with-some-substance novels. Once we’ve rattled through our chosen books, we have a daily visit to the hotel library to try something else, often nipping back to swap again after ten minutes if it doesn’t immediately grab our attention.
This year I found two authors, both new to me, whom I might never have been drawn towards at home. The first was Kate Atkinson, a thriller writer with an ability to construct sentences which are pithy and very, very funny. The book I found was Started Early, Took My Dog, featuring a private detective, Jackson Brodie, who appears in some of her other novels. An absolutely cracking book from an author who wasn’t on my radar at home but is now.
The other was The Wilding by Maria McCann. An unusual historical novel about a 17th century cider-maker. Beatifully crafted prose, a highly-original concept and an old-fashioned mystery to boot. Thank you to whoever left that one on the shelf.
Of course my worry is, now that people are getting into their Kindles and ebooks, what is going to happen to the hotel ‘library’ where I spend many happy hours mooching? Will they disappear? It’s starting to become difficult to wander round a pool and not be able to work out what nationality people are and whether their taste in literature is of interest. That’s part of the joy of people-watching on holiday and it’s in danger of dying out. I’m fretting already.
Have you found any interesting finds in a hotel’s book exchange? And while I’m on the subject, what have you been reading this summer? Any authors to recommend?
I haven't read a physical book for a while now. My bookshelves are full so I've resorted to downloading free books for my Kindle. It means they are all old and out of copyright but I've been enjoying exploring the authors of yesteryear.
I haven't had much experience of hotel libraries and haven't come across any cracking books either, I'm afraid.
The English section of the local library is full of Barbara Taylor Bradford. Nuff said.
@Sarah – Maybe you could just take some of the excess books off your shelves and drop them into random hotel lobbies…just to keep me happy 😉
Love Kate Atkinson, have read all of her books, not familiar wth Maria McCann will have to look her up.
My pick-up on holidays was Traitor's Kiss by Seymour.
Trish, are you suggesting that I Get.Rid.Of.Books?
*faints*
😀
@Mac n Janet – Thanks for commenting, nice to 'meet' you! You're ahead of me with the Kate Atkinson – can't believe I didn't know she existed before.
Will have a look at your tip, Traitor's Kiss.
@Sarah – Oh silly me, what was I thinking haha!
Aha, but that's why I love my Kindle you see, it's just like the hotel library in some ways… Apart from books that I specifically choose, like Sarah said there are so many free books that you do read some things that you wouldn't normally choose to! Will keep an eye out for Kate Atkinson, she sounds good! Emma 🙂
I never knew hotels had such things. Shows how often I travel doesn't it?!
@Emma – But if you don't leave any books in the hotels, what will I have to read?! 😉
May have to do this ebook thing too. I have a Sony e-reader which was my dad's and haven't done anything with it yet.
@Steve – not just hotels. At the campsite in France last year they had a huge selection; three or four shelves for each nationality. My favourite thing to do on holiday…well, after nicking the shampoos and soaps.
I find with hotel libraries that they have lots and lots of women's books plus the usual regulars like Dan Brown and Frederick Forsyth which I've already read. So I take enough new stuff from home to get me through the holiday but inevitably finish them with a couple of days to spare then I pick up from the library a novel by Dick Francis that I haven't read before (well he written about 794) and usually finish on the plane home!
Have you tried anything by Robert Goddard? (suits both sexes).
@Troy – you're right, there are more 'women's' books left in the hotels. We tend to do the same as you do; take plenty of paperbacks with us then use the hotel for swaps at the end.
Yes, we both like Robert Goddard; good thrillers with decent writing. Haven't read one of his for ages so may give him another whirl!
Yes, I love a good poke around the book shelves too…as you say you can really tell a lot about the people who stay there. Like kate Atkinson too and i'm sure you've been introduced to David Sedaris.
Another Kate Atkinson (and David Sedaris) fan here…..have never really been a chick-lit fan. Once in Amsterdam in a brown cafe with friends, I found a copy of I Know this much is true by Wally Lamb which at the time was my favourite book…..I was so happy….I don't want to read it again because at different stages of your life your tastes change. Now I am 'into' great Irish writing (John MacGahern, Sebastian Barry) and a friend of mine keeps telling me to read Star of The Sea (an old book now I know but I missed it first time around)…and are kindles really good?
@About last weekend – Didn't know the name David Sedaris so looked him up and some of his titles do ring a bell. He sounds just up my street. Which book would you suggest to start with?
@Libby – Another David Sedaris fan – that's a definite if two people I like have suggested him!
Thanks for your other suggestions, Libby. Great to get some new ideas as I can get stuck with the same old stuff.
Maybe you and I should embrace this new technology, Libby. I have no excuse, there's an eRreader sitting on my desk but still not used it.
Our school has an annual used book sale and for some reason, even though I volunteer for the garage/jumble sale, parents insist on dropping books off at my house. It's been great browsing through the piles before I turn them in. I'm currently reading "String of Pearls" by Priscilla Buckley (sister of William F Buckley) which is about the news beat in New York and Paris decades ago. Before that I worked my way through "The Kennedy Women" which was very long but very interesting.
@Expat Mum – That's just it, isn't it! The enjoyment of sifting through other people's books; something you can't recreate in a book shop or a normal library.
Finding a good biography can be difficult; far too many are so full of detail it's like swimming through treacle. I read a good one about Judi Dench and got halfway through an Audrey Hepburn.
I'm also reading, on and off, Letter from America, the Alistair Cooke collection of his Radio 4 broadcasts. If you haven't ever read them, I think it would be just your sort of thing.