A Collector's Lot

So, for many years I have been in denial about my collectoriness.

I do admit to being a true squirrel when it comes to books. I can't resist them. The piles in my bedroom are so large that when the cat goes mountaineering and knocks a few down, the floor shakes. The cat looks puzzled. Well, it's usually dark, but I imagine she looks puzzled. Bless.



What's that? I hear you cry.

I was first introduced to the work of Philip K. Dick when I was working in London and commuting to and fro from Deepest Darkest Kent via Victoria Station. In back of the station, there was, but alas is no more, a remainder bookshop the name of which escapes me. I spent many an hour there while waiting for a train, or waiting for the Huge Crowds to subside, poking around the bookshelves and picking up bargains.

It was there that I bought a copy of Greg Egan's "Quarantine", one of my favourite books of all time. It was there, I'm pretty sure, that I ran across Alice Gomme's huge collection of traditional British children's games. And it was there that I picked up the first volume of Philip K. Dick's collected short stories: "Beyond the Wub".

I read PKD short stories on the train. I read PKD short stories on the Tube. I carried them between Kent and London, London and Kent. I never read them at home. They kept me sane on my commutes. Sometimes I think they saved my life.

As soon as I finished one volume, I bought the next. A more sensible squirrel would have bought the lot to ensure none escaped, but I didn't, and I was lucky--each was there when I wanted it. I consumed five chunky volumes of short stories, took a deep breath, and sighed. There were no more.

Fortunately, there were novels. A lot of novels. More seriously weird fodder for the sqrl brain. Not as good as the short stories--some of them frankly unreadable--but all strange. All full of ideas to set the neurons flickering briefly back into life.

And then...what? For years, Dick dropped out of my awareness. I still had the short story collection. I still had what novels I'd picked up here and there. They were all kept on their Very Own Special PKD Shelf. But I was no longer actively pursuing his work. Life had interfered.

The work of other favourite authors suffered in the same way. For years, I had bought the hardback edition of the latest Pratchett novel for my husband, either for Christmas or birthday, as things fell. We were short of money. The tradition faltered, then failed. Pratchett has his own shelf, too.

Then, a few years ago, a friend introduced me to GoodReads. A side effect of membership was the ability to list my PKD collection and look affectionately at it. Then I noticed the gaps.

So, how hard could it be just to get copies of all Dick's novels? All I wanted was reading copies, after all. First editions? nah. Signed copies? who cares. Just copies I could read and stick on the Special Shelf and enter on GoodReads to prove what a fangirly sqrl I really was.

Hah. If any of you have ever attempted to buy Dick's complete oeuvre, you'll know how naive this was. Some of those books are hard to find. And expensive! Some have never had a paperback edition. Some lurk on eBay, only to be snatched away when you bid by Some Evil Person With More Money.

*bites claws over ongoing eBay auction*

You can view my progress here :).

Believe it or not, my copy of "The Broken Bubble" came all the way from NEW ZEALAND. It's an ex-library copy and has perhaps been dropped in the bathwater at some time in its career. And I'm grateful for that, because I never could have afforded it otherwise.

Other books were bought for small amounts on eBay or Abebooks or Amazon or Alibris (what is it about online booksellers that attracts them to the letter A? Anyone?). Sometimes, the postage cost more than the book. Imagine, however, my dismay when my copy of "The Crack in Space" arrived and I discovered it was the same book as "Cantata-140". A true collector would have known that! So I couldn't be one. Right?

"The Man Whose Teeth Were All Exactly Alike" stretched my pocket, as I bought it new the moment it came out. Just had to have it. Ahem. Shiny!

Each book has its story, although I confess I can't remember all of them.

When I got my copy of "Lies, Inc." (shiny! Gollancz!), I found that the novel had a long and complicated history. So, just out of interest, I started looking into getting each different version. The original "The Unteleported Man", as first published in "Fantastic" magazine, later republished by Ace and Magnum. The Gollancz edition featuring additional material by John Sladek. And so on. I didn't intend to compete fiercely on eBay for an Ace Double, or spend more money than was sane on "Fantastic" (that's its cover above, if you're still wondering). That's the sort of thing only A Collector would do.

Ahem.