stories from the book shelf scan

Callie at Counterbalance reflects on a subject that hits close to home: book snobs and the lies they tell.

I know several bloggers of all stripes (lit, design, music, etc.) who don't list certain books in their "just read" or "currently reading" columns. Sandra at Book World (who has just made a lovely shift in her blog from covering books to covering writing and books about writing) mentions that she would never place these books about writing in her left-hand column. Instead of gasping at her declaration, I thought: my god, I do the same thing...

My next thought was: well at least I don't pretend to have read books that I haven't. That seems a far worse offense. Or is it? Isn't the shame -- for those who haven't read something they feel they should & those who've read something they'd rather not advertise -- and the hiding of said shame, equal on both sides? I wonder. While I continue to probe this question & my own guilt (no doubt induced by a brand of crazy that only my christian school education could provide), I reserve the right to leave these aforementioned read-but-not-going-to-admit-it books off my public "Books I've Read List."

Guilty. Guilty. Guilty. I am actually trying to meet a somewhat difficult goal for someone with two jobs - 52 books in 52 weeks - and when I delve into the occasional self-help book because let's face it, I need help, I don't list it! What kind of help is that? And boy, do I check out other people's book shelves. I've yet to end a friendship over it, but one friend's Nelson DeMille collection haunts me. I thought I was at least off the hook for lying about things that I haven't read when I realized that just the other day I was asked if I had read a particular classic, and I replied, "Parts of it." Parts of it?? Where do they publish parts of a novel? Did I travel back to the nineteenth century and read it in serial form? For that matter, am I in the habit of beginning books and not finishing them? Not even. Ah, I have seen the lying book snob and the lying book snob is me.