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So, a few days ago I locked my keys in my car at a gas station. While waiting for the locksmith (read: guy with floppy metal thing and unnecessarily large truck) to arrive, I wandered across the street to a used book store I had been meaning to visit for a while. This story ends with me finally getting my hands on a copy of Lost Boys, and what with it being half-price and all, the whole ordeal only cost me $51!
You had best not disappoint me, Card. You wouldn't like it when Jiminy is disappointed.
Btw, for all interested parties, this post took me like 20 minutes to make. I am more tired than a merciful God should allow, and I edited the structure of my story a good 4 or 5 times, and it would've been more if I hadn't lost my fine motor skills somewhere along the way.
You're a kind of awesome that I'm thinking of right now and it's surprisingly petulant yet coated in mellifluousness.
Posts: 527 | Registered: Aug 2004
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Sometimes bad things (locking keys in car) work out to good things! (finding the book)! Woot! That was definately worth it!
FG
(so - how much of that was the cost of the locksmith, and how much was the cost of the book? Paperback or hardback?)
Posts: 9538 | Registered: Aug 2003
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The locksmith was $48 or so. It probably would've been cheaper for me to just buy whatever that floppy metal thing was. Or to figure out the strange number pad that is under my driver-side door handle. Or to keep my spare keys in some place that is NOT 80 miles away. Or to, you know, not lock my keys in my car. But Unckie Orson hasn't let me down before, and I hear Lost Boys is his "most personal" work, so it should be interesting. (It's paperback, by the way.)
Petulant? Your MOM is petulant. I am nothin' but 15 layers of honey with a chewy nougat center.
Posts: 88 | Registered: Apr 2005
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Huh. Our local Barnes and Noble has, like, 20 copies of Lost Boys in $6 paperback form whenever I go in...
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
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Crazy. Neither of the Barnes & Nobles I tried had it, Borders didn't have it, Walden Books didn't have it, and none of the other random places I checked had it. There's something fishy afoot.
And yes, the strange number pad has the potential to be quite awesome. But I can't find the factory-set code that I need to know to do anything with it, including set my own code. I got the car used, and they didn't give me the code. So I need to get myself down to the dealership and whine me up a storm.
Posts: 88 | Registered: Apr 2005
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Yea it's hard to find some of his non series books in bigname bookstores. I found my copy of Lost Boys in the used section of a small bookstore and my copy of Wyrms in a used bookstore. I was really surprised when I went into a Mediaplay today and saw Lost Boys as well as Maps in a Mirror (which I bought).
Posts: 2867 | Registered: May 2005
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Maps in a Mirror is one of the three books I am currently reading. Lost Boys is the next story I'm due to read in that book. So I take it that one started out as a short story before it became a book just like Ender's Game did?
Posts: 339 | Registered: Mar 2005
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It's also worth noting that Lost Boys usually won't be found in the Science Fiction section of your bookstore; check the normal Fiction section instead.
Posts: 293 | Registered: Jun 2004
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The funny thing is, it occurred to me while at some store or another that it might not be in the Sci-Fi section, so I checked the normal fiction section at whatever store I was at at that time, but then I forgot about it, and never checked the normal fiction section of the other stores.
That sentence needs to be dragged out into the street and shot. But the chaos gives it a kind of beauty, so I'm gonna leave it like it is.
Posts: 88 | Registered: Apr 2005
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Lost Boys was a short story first. Nominated for a Hugo, but lost.
The whole point of the keypad on your door is so that you can memorize the code and never be locked out of your car again. It has saved my bacon lots of times to know the code.
In fact, I used to learn the codes for cars I rented, till Hertz started covering up the number in the trunk. Apparently people were memorizing the numbers, looking for the same car on the street later, and then stealing stuff out of them - or stealing the car. So once again, the creeps ruined it for the rest of us. Still, if you're locked out of a Ford rented from Hertz, you can call Hertz and they'll tell you the number so you can get in without calling a locksmith.
Posts: 2005 | Registered: Jul 1999
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Oh, I figured that was what it was for. The only hiccup was that, in typical teenage fashion, I didn't allow the number pad to become a pressing enough matter in my mind to actually look into it until my $48 was already safely in the pocket of the guy with the floppy aluminum thing. But about 10 mintues from now, I'm gonna start reading Lost Boys, and that wouldn't be the case if I weren't an irresponsible, lazy, drain-on-society hoodlum. So it's all cool.
Posts: 88 | Registered: Apr 2005
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Hey, Jiminy -- I took a cue off you (without locking my keys in my truck) and browsed through the books of a local flea market yesterday. Was VERY pleased to find a copy of Treason -- since that is one I have never been able to secure for my collection. (However, it was paperback, and I prefer to collect hardback, but at least I have ONE copy of it now).
I have not yet been able to read it, though, because as soon as we left the market, my oldest son grabbed it and began reading it (I was driving, so I couldn't), and he hasn't unglued his hands from it yet. That includes reading it through church bible study, through supper, etc. etc. -- it hasn't left his hands (he probably finished it last night after I went to bed).
He would ocassionally look up to say "this is horrible! This is a bad book!" but then go right back to being glued to it. So I interpret that as meaning it is as disturbing as some of the Maps in the Mirror stories (the characters or whatever strike him as horrible) but the book itself is apparently very riveting, since he wouldn't even stop to eat.
I can't wait to read it!
Farmgirl (the only bad thing -- one guy, in teasing him, tried to grab it from his hands, and in the process ripped the cover slightly. Made me mad-- I had just got it! Oh well.)
Posts: 9538 | Registered: Aug 2003
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Heh... I'm about 220 pages into Lost Boys now, and I'm starting to see what you meant by "don't read the cover." Halfway through the book, and the back cover synopsis still has spoilers.
Posts: 88 | Registered: Apr 2005
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I swear, the Half-Price Books by my house has a mind reader on staff. Everytime I go I look for a certain Card book- and it's always there! For example, on Monday, after rereading the Alvin Maker series, I was checking the book list on the front cover and discovered a book I hadn't read yet. So, Tuesday, I went in search of Lovelock and- I found it! I have 11 pages left (So, I'm not quite sure what I'm doing on the computer...)and loving it. It's not quite what I was expecting, but it's a colab, so..duh. ^-^;
Posts: 1215 | Registered: Apr 2005
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I bought my Lost Boys after having read it (several times) already, but I was so upset my the spoilers that I actually covere the *entire* back cover with duct tape. So now I have the dual advantage of being able to safely lend it out to OSC uninitiates AND accidentally leave it in the rain.
Posts: 866 | Registered: Dec 2003
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Ooh, that's a good idea. Were it not for the fact that I have a compunction against harming books (even when the cover synopsis is as shoddily written as this one), I might just do that myself.
I just wish they'd publish a version with either nothing but vague reviewer comments on the back, or a back cover that doesn't even hint at "supernatural" events. Don't sell it as a thriller; sell it as a family drama.
For anyone curious, the back cover simultaneously presents major spoilers and massively misrepresents the character of the book. One friend I tried to get reading it read the cover, and then refused because it didn't seem like his kind of book. I've tried to tell him that this is one book that should never, ever be judged by its cover, but he just won't listen.
Even the front cover has a tag line that is factually wrong about the content of the book.
Posts: 293 | Registered: Jun 2004
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I'm 420 pages in now. There are 100 pages left, and I am just now catching up with the back cover. What the givl were these people thinking? For the sake of my sanity, I have to refuse to believe that anyone could possibly misinterpret this story badly enough for that synopsis to make any sense.
And even with the spoilers and nonsense aside... "The Perfect Place to Raise a Family"? That is just cheesy.
Posts: 88 | Registered: Apr 2005
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quote:Originally posted by Jiminy: What the givl were these people thinking? For the sake of my sanity, I have to refuse to believe that anyone could possibly misinterpret this story badly enough for that synopsis to make any sense.
Thank you! Thank you! At least I know I'm not crazy in this respect. I feel... vindicated, somehow.
I can only guess that the synopsis was based on an outline that Card provided, rather than a read-through of the book itself. That synopsis makes me want to cry sometimes, because of how many people will miss out or be spoiled on Card's best work to date simply because that synopsis not only gives away major details that should remain hidden, but in doing so completely misrepresents the spirit of the book.
I demand a reprint! <insert obnoxious "harrumph" here>
Posts: 293 | Registered: Jun 2004
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Even though I phrased that request for a reprint as a joke, I actually would re-purchase the book if an edition came out with either a good synopsis or no synopsis at all. The latest release, although it has a different cover, still has the same synopsis (or one very much like it).
Posts: 293 | Registered: Jun 2004
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It makes me wonder if maybe the synopsis was written based on the original "Lost Boys" short story. I haven't read the short story myself, but it's a possible explanation. It would still be stupid, putting it on the back of the novel, but at least it would be a little bit sane.
That still wouldn't excuse the cheesiness on the cover, though.
Posts: 88 | Registered: Apr 2005
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Today I went into Half Price Books to get a job ap, and, since bookstores are dangerous to me, I wandered around and ended up buying things. One thing I found was Saints. Then, I wandered over to the hard-cover section, checked the SciFi there. There was a book called Ender's War. I was excited at first, thinking I found something different and unusual. Upon closer inspection, it seems it was actually an (0ld and worn out) book containing both Ender's Game and Speaker for the Dead. Since I have both books already, and generally only buy books to read or replace books I have read to tatters, not to collect, I put it back and continued my wanderings.
My question now is: was this foolish? Shold I rush back there and pay five dollars for this book?
Posts: 9 | Registered: Jun 2005
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I just got a hardback copy of Lost Boys, that was in really REALLY good shape, for $3 from my local used book store.
Posts: 6026 | Registered: Dec 2004
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SpaceAngel: it's a compilation produced by the Science Fiction Book Club. It's not particularly rare.
Posts: 37449 | Registered: May 1999
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I hadn't ever heard of it until awhile back, myself. Of course, from what I understand its an older collection......
Posts: 6026 | Registered: Dec 2004
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