New book day

There’s no better day than new book day. Unless new book day falls on clean sheet day and then it’s practically magical. Lucky me, both fall on my today.

I love a brand new book. Unopened by anyone else. Crisp pages, unbent corners, spine still rigid and uncreased. New books have a feel to them. A special heaviness that comes from words not yet rummaged through. New books have a crisp clean smell, like fresh ink and a new pad of paper. Or a back to school section of the store.

I have in front of me my new book. One I’ve waited for and eagerly anticipated. Cemetery Dance by Douglas Preston and Lincoln Child. I bought it with my shiny new B&N gift card. A Mother’s Day gift from my son. He knows the path to my heart is paved with books. He is my favorite child. Today anyway, don’t tell his brother though. He’ll be my favorite child tomorrow. I like to switch it off, keep them on their toes.

My new book still has it’s cover on it. I’ll remove it when I start to read. Otherwise it gets all grimy and sometimes torn. This book’s a keeper. When I’ve read and reread it it will go up on my shelf with the others in the series. A rare honor. Very few books make my shelf.

I won’t open my new book yet. I’m savoring it. I’ve waited two days to go back and get it. It only came out today. I’m waiting until the house is empty and I can lose myself with old friends I met years ago in the first of the series. I’m sure they’ve changed. Gotten older, gotten smarter but they’re like friends to me because we’ve shared so many hours together.

I’ve always loved new book day, from the time I was a child ordering my books through the Scholastic sheets my teacher would hand out, all the way up until today. Some women love shoes or purses, I love books.

New book day. It seems like such a minor thing but to me it’s a celebration. I could read the ebook or hit a site on line to read but to me it’s not the same. New book day isn’t just about the reading. It’s also about the anticipation followed by the purchasing and of course, the enjoying. The curling up and slowly cracking open the book. It’s the sound the spine makes as you leaf your way to Chapter One. It’s the smell of untouched pages and the licking of your finger to turn to the next page. The diving head first into a story and tuning out the world around you as you turn page after page.

So tonight I won’t be watching tv or gabbing on the phone. I’ll be laying in my clean sheets and hanging out with Aloysius Pendergast and Lt. D’Agosta and loving every minute of it. It’s new book day, what’s not to love!