Literary rarities

by Bryan Argos

I am sure most of you guys there have watched the movie, "The Amityville Horror". Well, for everybody's information, the movie, which is based on a true story, is based on a book of the same title by Jay Anson. What most of us don't know is that aside from the book, "The Amityville Horror", there are two other authorized accounts of the continuation of the story. The first sequel to the book which is "The Amityville Horror 2" by John Jones, recalls the events following the escape of the Lutzes (the family haunted by an evil entity in the house in Amityville) from Amityville and how they were continuously haunted by the evil they thought they left behind. The third and final installment to the story is "Amityville: The Final Chapter". The last book is all about the continuing struggle of the family to get rid of the entity after it was exorcised by a priest in London in the second book and their final battle with the demonic entity after it tortured them for the past seven years. These three books are rare nowadays because they are off print already. I happen to have all the three books. I found all the three books in a span of two years and a couple of hour's worth of rummaging through several book sales in Roxas, Cebu , and Iloilo . All of the three copies are first issues and are all in good condition.

If we are intent on finding good reads, and we know where to find them, nothing can keep us away from the pages of our passion. I can pride myself with precious literary rarities that I found myself after going through hundreds and hundreds of books in book sales. You guys probably don't even know that there is a sequel to the popular "Mary Poppins" it is titled, "Mary Poppins Comes Back" by P.L. Travers. Then if you have watched the movies, "The Clash of the Titans" and "Krull" you should all know that these are based on books written by Alan Dean Foster, the writer of the fantasy, the Spellsinger Series.

These are the books that make the book sales fun. People go to book sales to look for popular authors and best sellers; I try to look for titles that you can't easily get off the shelves. Some interesting reads I have had are "The Gospel According to the Son" which is the story of Christ told in the first person perspective (by Him) written by the Pulitzer Prize winning author, Norman Mailer, and "Gods Mercy" which is the story of a man abandoned alone on an island with a talking chimpanzee after God struck the earth with a great flood leaving no survivors, written by another Pulitzer Prize winning author, Bernard Malamud. These great titles belong to my book sale collection of which I am truly proud of.

Then there is the philosophical fiction by Umberto Eco, entitled "Foucault's Pendulum". Television freaks would be very familiar with the Twilight Zone Series, well; I have two hard bound volumes of "Stories from the Twilight Zone" by Rod Serling, the original creator and writer of the stories used in the popular television series.

Oh, the book sales are heaven for me; sometimes I would stay there for hours not noticing that it's already dark outside. I would be completely absorbed in a world of my own. My efforts have turned out great finds, like the little known anthology of horror stories, the "Skin Trade" where Stephen King is one of the contributing authors, or the Clive Barker short story anthology entitled, "The Inhuman Condition".

I am very near to completing my Stephen King collection with books from book sales. I have the first paperback covers of "Carrie", the "Shining", "Gerald's Game", and "Misery", and many other King titles. I believe I am in the position to brag about my book sale finds because I want you guys to love reading as much as I do. Reading takes me places I have never been to before. It opens up for me, a world full of wonderful things that are products of the mind and the imagination. It widens my horizons and fortifies my cognitive foundation. Reading is both a pleasure and a treasure for us human beings, and people who do not read, or who are not interested in reading, are missing so much of the world concealed in the very pages of a good novel.

The rarities I have mentioned above make reading more challenging for each one of us. When we find something rare, there is this nice feeling of holding in your hands a precious relic as you flip through the pages, one by one, and savor every word of the story. When you are done reading the book, you then stare at it for quite a while and in your heart you know very well that your mind has had a dose of information most people will no longer be able to have, or will have to work so hard for - such a wondrous, orgasmic feeling.

I know that by writing this, my competition to these precious literary rarities will grow in leaps and bounds, but I don't really care, it just makes it all the more exciting; and it makes the rarities even rarer. Besides, if this account of my passion for reading claims to my side even just five, fresh, new readers, I will be truly, sincerely, happy, because deep inside I will have known that I have shared the beauty of reading to more people, and the greatest satisfaction that one gets from reading is not really how the story ends, but how life begins for the people who read the story.

Until next week! TTFN!

Be rational; be insane.every once in a while!

Next week naman greetings ha! Happy Three Kings to all of you! I love you all! Byers!