Book Report

On Christmas Eve I was sitting in a chair at Square Books leafing through a $50 hardcover bio of Mahler which I DID NOT BUY. I read about Mahler and his wife Alma visiting a New York City opium den as a lark, in the company of a "detective with a loaded revolver"! Then I looked at an "Ethnobotanical Dictionary" of "Native American Food Plants" which I also RESISTED BUYING. BECAUSE I HAD NO MONEY. I noticed that my famous recommendation shelf had sold its 39th volume: ANGELA SLOAN by James Whorton, Jr.