The Best Gift Books

All through December, we were recommending and selling (and buying) books that people would be receiving as gifts. The gift givers were all pleased with their choices, and we had fun wrapping many gifts while imagining the delight with which they would be opened and read.

Now, the question is: What books were you given that you are excited to read (or have already read and loved)?

Here's my answer: All of them! I was given two Mark Bittman cookbooks--How to Cook Everything and Kitchen Express--which I've dipped into already and look forward to using often, and two wished-for books for the baby's growing library--The Christmas Magic and Waiting for Winter.

However, the best book, simply because it was just the novel I needed to immerse myself in the day after Christmas, was Hunting and Gathering, by Anna Gavalda. This book has been recommended to me several times by a bookseller friend of mine and also by a customer. I'd been thinking of giving to myself for Christmas but before I could do so, a wonderful friend gave me a copy, without even knowing that I'd wanted it! It's absolutely wonderful writing, an engaging story about four outsiders living in Paris who find each other and form a family. I actually haven't finished the book yet, but only because I don't really want to--I want to keep reading about these people and their lives.

I hope you're all enjoying some good books, and would love to hear about them!

Happy Reading, and Happy New Year ~

Sandy