Cheap Reads

To start off my bike ride today, I made my way up to Oracle Junction on Delaware Ave in Kenmore. If Buffalo were the size of a real city—not in population but in land size (only Miami, Boston, and San Fran, off the top of my head, are comparable in land size)—then Kenmore would certainly be a part of Buffalo. (And so even though I was technically in the suburbs I didn’t feel like it was cheating. And yes, this is something I have to justify to myself.) The stretch between Kenmore Ave and just north of Mang Ave is as much as city streetscape as any of the other notable streets in Buffalo with its many storefronts that come to the sidewalk and require parking in front of the stores or on side streets, allowing for a structural consistency that is not broken up by annoying parking lots. And though I have no official stats to back up this statement, I wouldn’t be surprised if the stretch actually has a higher occupancy rate than any of the other streets in Buffalo. It certainly appeared to be the case.

For all the attention that Rust Belt Books gets for being Buffalo’s great used bookstore—always voted the winner in the Best of Buffalo polls—despite not having hours posted and often being closed when I ride down to it at a time I’ve seen it open before (weekday between 6-7pm), Oracle Junction easily has it beat, even if you don’t take advantage of calling it “OJ.”

Used books—hell, books in general—should be amongst the cheapest commodities in our economy, passed on as much for the money to be made (of course money has to be made) as much as the information being exchanged. But Powell’s in Portland charged at least $5 for used paperback books; Rust Belt charges seemingly no less than $3 for most; Oracle Junction charges $1 (sometimes $1.50).

And today they were having a 1/3 off sale.

Though it does not have the immediate availability of some more modern writers—I’d’ve immediately bought any Bukowski, having finally recently discovered him, had they had any of his books—my brother, who let me in on the OJ secret and frequents the place far more than I do, has said you can find them if you look hard and frequently enough. They do however have just as an extensive, if not more so, collection of most of the writers collectively called the Classics as Rust Belt at the previously said cheaper rate.

So just in knowing that I was paying less I was more eager to give a book or two a chance that I wouldn’t otherwise think twice about not buying for a few bucks more. I walked up to the counter with 7 books and as I handed over the $6 to pay my $5.40 bill, the owner gave back the dollar and kept the five saying that was good enough.

It just kept getting cheaper. (And I guess so do I.)

In contrast, from there I road over to Main St. to check out Talking Leaves, the only independent new bookstore that I know of in Buffalo (I could be wrong and wouldn’t mind if I was). I had in my hands a copy of Wittgenstein's Mistress that I’ve really wanted to read for some time. But it was $12.95 (plus tax in Buffalo). And even though that was, by new book standards, a very reasonable price, I had seven books in my bag that I had just bought for $5, not to mention a stack at home of unread books that I bought for $.50 apiece a couple months ago as well as the book I was currently and eagerly reading that I had just been given for free (thanks Sarah).

This all compounded by the fact that I have been sluggish in my reading habits as of late. Reading is not something I look to do to kill time and keep me entertained—I hardly have a moment where I don’t have something I want to do—but instead only something I do to be inspired and influenced by. But I’ve only read two books and two longer short stories since the beginning of July, mostly because I haven’t needed inspiration from any foreign source lately, but also because so many books seem to be so accepting of the idea that work is a necessary part of our daily lives and would have served only as unwanted distractions that would have kept me from working on this idea of my own.

So even though I really wanted that book, I couldn’t justify paying that much for it. It didn't have anything to do with Talking Leaves charging too much. New books just cost too damn much. I’ve gone this long without it I’m sure I can continue to do so.

That’s an attitude that could keep a hell of a lot more people out of debt. And maybe even drive down prices of a lot more things (for those interested in such thoughts).


For now at least, there's still Oracle Junction for me.