Tomorrow.

Tomorrow is one of my favourite days of the year: it's the village fair, and the village fair has a massive book stall that takes up the entire church hall. The book are cheap, every year I'm still amazed when I hold twenty books in my arms and the man says, "Call it a straight £15". The selection is vast, too, with a marvellous classics section, and on Tuesday I was lucky enough to get a sneak preview: I went to chat with a friend who is on the parish council, and she mentioned the co-ordinator of the wonderful book stall, her colleague, was at work in the hall setting up. As I had a free half hour, I went down to offer my services. I can't say that I spotted any books I wanted because I deliberately did not look at the titles (it would have been against the spirit to get first picks and reserve). For the first "cycle" (for want of a better word), he wanted to put the best books out, so all I had to do was run my hand down the spine of the books to ensure they weren't cracked, and a quick glance told me if the books had reasonable covers. But there were thousands, quite literally thousands, in boxes. The shelves were already full.

I don't think it's unreasonable to say that about a quarter, if not a third, of the books I own come from the annual summer fair. Without cheap books, how could I read as much? I simply cannot afford to make regular trips to Waterstones (but I do indulge from time to time), and sometimes I have struggled a little to meet the rising prices of charity shops. This fair is where I bulk up, and this fair enabled me to get into the classics. In my teenage years, I picked out the "obvious" titles, like Jane Eyre, The Secret Garden, and the like, and through my twenties I found the less obvious, various Trollopes for example, and the somewhat obscure - Minor Elizabethan Plays vol. 2 (perhaps I'll find vol. 1?).

Who knows what I'll come home with, but this is the thrill, this is why I won't sleep tonight! Hunting through these shelves and piles and boxes for gems, a book I hadn't even thought of - perhaps in a week or a month or even a year I'll be begging you all to read it. This fair marks the beginning of summer, and it can provoke a new stage in reading as well with new discoveries. I have a small list of books I would like to find for my Greatest Reads list (His Dark Materials, Bird Song, Grapes of Wrath, A Prayer for Owen Meaney, A Suitable Boy, and A Confederacy of Dunces) and perhaps it might be an idea to think a little more of the books I would like to read, however I'm not terribly inclined to do so. This fair is about discovery, when failures don't matter because they were so cheap anyway. And the book stall will last until Monday, so plenty of time to go back for something forgotten.

So much potential! Will I find some Zolas? Some more Trollopes? The other Richardson book I can't remember the name of? Jeeves?! I don't know, it's just so exciting!

Tomorrow, then, I shall be meeting my favourite friends and I'll be going back and forward to the book stall, no doubt I shall have very sore arms come evening! I do like summer, and the fair is one of the main reasons why. I'll be hoarding my books for the winter!

So excited! I'll post over the weekend with my findings <3