Book Swap

Mattie is not just a hot babe with a law degree. She's also a reader and so a few weeks ago when I got an invite to a girls' night/book swap at Mattie's, I replied with alacrity that I would be there.

Of course, timing is everything (or at least a whole lot) and I had taken several grocery bags of give-away books to the library not all that long ago and didn't have on hand any that I needed to part with, so I applealed to David. I mean, you can't go to a book swap empty handed, can you? Of course not. David asked me if this was a "I read this but don't expect to read it again" type thing or a "Please get this out of my house" type thing. The former, of course. He supplied me with a couple of hardbacks that I could hold carry in while holding my head up, I picked up some gluten-free ginger molassas cookies, and off I went.

Mattie had assembled both a great room full of women - there were about 13 or 14 of us altogether, about half lawyers* - and a delightful repast. We unloaded books, loaded plates and filled glasses, and gathered in the living room, chattering away. The ensemble was comprised of different women that Mattie knew from different groups, so I met several new people and retained about 8 or 9 of all the names (including my own, luckily).

(By the way, for those of my dedicated readership who believe that any gathering of women will naturally result in lingerie modeling and pillow fights, go ahead, apply that here. Who am I to ruin your fun.)

We used the now-standard gift exchange technique of having numbered slips of paper and having the person with slip number one choosing first, slip number two choosing second, etc. The books were introduced and I heard a some variations on "I wanted to like this because [another person] did, but .... ehhhh" or "I liked but I'm not going to read it again" or (my favorite) "It's a well-written book with characters I just didn't like" or (in my case) "David knew that I needed a contribution. They could be fabulous, they could suck." Mattie had primed the pump with several books from a co-worker which were introduced as "From a woman at my office. She says it's a good beach read."

Extra points were given for books with gold embossing on them indicating that they won the Whitbread Prize or the Pulitzer or something similar. Points would have been taken away for Oprah's Book Club, but none of them had that distinction. We were all pleased to notice that the books covered a wide range of subjects and that there were no duplicates, although there were a couple by the same author, like "Le Mariage" and "Le Divorce."

The one that really caught my eye (huge surprise here) is called "1215: The Year of the Magna Carta." It is (all together now-----) a history book about the early 13th century. With an index. And I coveted it. I asked if I could see it for a minute and when handed it, I smiled cheerfully and said "Now try to get it back!"

Luckily I drew #2, so after #1 picked some other book (smart girl), "1215" became mine. Mine. It is my book. After that the rest was gravy. I felt just like the girls in the All-of-a-Kind family when they were given books that they could keep forever instead of returning to the library lady the next week.

After one selected a book, one put one's number back in the champagne bucket we were using as a hat and after everyone had selected one book, we drew numbers again. In compliance with the law of conservation of gloating or whatever, I was #13 for the second go 'round. We had three full go 'rounds and then a general melee (insert wine-fueled hair brushing and pillow fighting here if necessary).

Kate asked if it was acceptable to take home more books than one brought and I said that I figured Mattie's goal was to end up with as clear a coffe-table as she began the evening and that I came with two and was leaving with six, so anyone who wanted to was free to sneer. No one did. All the books found new homes, we had a great time, we met new people**, and we got some cool new books to read. And if we don't like these new books, we'll just do another book swap in a few months.

And here's the cool Good Reads website that one of the women at the party (who's name I've managed to forget) sent to Mattie who sent it to me.




*Or as Kate divided us "the legals" and "the non-legals."

**Among the women I met was Stacey. When I found out that she and Jennifer had done a show together, we played Theater Twenty Questions until we knew a bunch of people in common. Stacey was in "City of Angels" and "Ruthless!", so we know a big bunch of people in common.