March 5 - Books on View

Today was my first visit to Books on View, which is basically the overflow space for the very large Russell Books a block over on Fort Street. I didn't know what it was going to be like (all calendars? romance novels?), but I was seriously pleased. Basically it's where non-sellers from Russell go to languish, I gather, but since I don't buy fashionable books, I'll do just fine over there. Today, for example:

• ed. Walter Levy and Christopher Hallowell, Green Perspectives: Thinking and Writing about Nature and the Environment ($4.99 - a terrific reader in the field of nature writing, with selections from 1850 to 1993)
  
• Michael Pollan, The Omnivore's Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals ($9.99 - brand new, from a huge pile, and it's this month's book club selection)
  
• Frank Stewart, A Natural History of Nature Writing ($9.99 - a pioneering text on nature writing's evolution, from 1995 but with an uncracked spine)
  

I escaped with only these three because I was trying to keep my volume down. The university bookstore called yesterday to say that Dan Philippon's (eagerly anticipated) Conserving Words has arrived, so I'm already on the hook there....