We were all of an age, though I more so, talking about how we remembered book lore. I argued for webs of proper nouns, especially names because they are more easily checked for misspellings, and connected by moving information. Reader Steve mentioned Jonathan Spence’s book, Matteo Ricci’s Memory Palace, in which each of many rooms in the palace houses a subject. I haven’t read the book, but this seemed a useful device for assigning meaning to my connected facts.
Fig. #40+. How about granite bricks/blocks to house the subjects of one’s mind, especially as the b/b’s are varied in size, placement, and color but each necessary to the wall’s standing. I love this rock wall in Tenants Harbor.
Then, Eureka! (That is a little librarian joke.) I remembered the Dewey Decimal System. As a long ago library cataloger of books, I knew well Melville Dewey’s classification system for all of 1876’s knowledge which he divided up into 100 subject/parts. Could Dewey parts be like subject rooms? An aside: Dewey was a strange, if clever, man. For instance, he placed the subject women in the high 300’s between folklore and holidays, instead of with men in the low 300‘s. This particular ninniness was changed in later editions, but psychology is still a subset of philosophy.
I’m ordering Jonathan Spence’s Matteo Ricci’s Memory Palace. I love Jonathan Spence. I don’t know of an introduction to the peculiarities of the Dewey Decimal System or any other classification scheme, but each has them. Any suggestions?
Why read? Reason #4: Readers make good conversation last longer and continue later.
or 
, I forgot Elizabeth Peter’s Amelia Peabody series set in Egypt’s early 20th C. pyramid country (RB has 
), and visiting archaeologist Eric regaled all with tales of the black pharaohs on the “other side” of the Nile, in spite of my several loud “ahems” because RB had no books on the topic. All of this was such fun. The boating couple chose Annie Dillard’s 
and John McPhee’s 
and suggested we start a salon. The front porch looking over the harbor invites magical conversations.
, and created a new genre: dysfunctional family chick lit.
is our favorite Jack Reacher novel.
) and Reacher make comparisons difficult. Thinking fast of other edgy detectives who chafe at working “inside the box,” I was shouting “How about Ian Rankin’s Rebus (e.g. 
), or C.J. Box’s Joe Pickett (e.g. 
)” as the boaters were escaping down the walk. They shouted, “Next summer,” and waved.
is better than 
because First-mate Chase’s report was self-serving.
.
(chosen from the family exchange) and is the second person to recommend it for Roseledge Books. Good water-travel book, great tsunami. She’s also reading Julia Spencer-Fleming’s 
, the late August book club choice.
which is about deciphering the puzzle in the pattern of a centuries-old garden in Italy. I love it when a book makes me look differently at something I thought I knew enough about. There’s always time for Judge Deborah Knott’s North Carolina adventures in Margaret Maron’s latest, 
. In the wings are Per Petterson’s 
(it has a Norwegian voice, says my Norwegian friend who liked it a lot) interspersed with Daniel Silva’s latest Gabriel Allon adventure, 
that has additional stories titled “The [something] of Betsy Lane” and “Town Poor.” Roseledge Books has three editions of CPF (our locally-claimed classic), but none worked. He’s off to a St. George Historical Society potluck and talk about the Poor Farm of St. George. Maybe SOJ used as a model that very (now defunct) Poor Farm behind the handsome, renovated farm house across from George the Potter’s.
Banville, John. 
(Wyoming environment) or (Senator) James Webb‘s 
(Vietnam).