The Curator: floppy paperback > everything

with photo evidence. Plus a new cult favorite movie and how the buddy read is going.

There is no greater pleasure than a floppy, housebroken paperback. On a floppiness scale of CD to pancake, I’m talking about the body of a two-year-old when you start applying sunscreen (they somehow become absolute jellyfish, no??).

I want my book to flop open to welcome me like a loving dog.

Say, you’ve had a long day. Take a rest here awhile.

My annotated copy of The Secret History is the reigning Queen of Floppy.

Go ahead. Rub the velvety thin pages between your fingers as you count the pages you have left in the chapter. Notice the size and style and spacing of the font and how it makes you feel (comforted? at ease? incited?). Check the cover art periodically for clues or hints. Mentally mark each section and give yourself an ambitious reading goal, only to fall asleep with it in your loosening hand. Wake up and mark your spot with a kitsch bookmark.

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At the risk of sounding like an elder millennial, I grieve the loss of physicality. Will any other generation know the pleasure of purchasing a compact disc with its filler songs and liner notes and carefully chosen artwork? Physical books are still alive and well, but I feel my reading experience slowly siphoning off into Digital Land in the name of convenience.

My enjoyment of a book is directly correlated to my reading experience. That shouldn't be a surprise, I whine about it constantly. I just feel different about a book I read digitally rather than “the real thing.” The visceralness creates an emotional connection that I frankly also feel for my Kindle but not the books inside it (Her vibes rn maybe I need to unpack this).

A sloppy Joe paperback contributes to that enjoyment.

Evidence.

TSH includes the UK edition (top) and the US edition (bottom).

Analysis.

The UK edition of TSH. Markedly unfloppy. That bend angle is what, a 10-degree flop?? Unacceptable.

And when I cradle it like a baby, my god, what would it take to actually read this thing? I would have to crack that spine like a glowstick. No thank you. (Cover is gorgeous, though, nice and matte.)

Now, the US edition. That shit is FLOPPY. While the cover may be abstractly unsettling, it is actually appropriate for the contents. The bend angle is so strong I had trouble capturing it. We are at least a 50-, 60-degree flop?

When I hold the spine and let it go, it’s so floppy I can open it at any point and the thing stays open and welcome. The spine? Can outlast concrete.

Unfortunately for me, I love many of the UK covers and want to order everything from Blackwell’s, but they all come stiff as a board. I’ve had this same issue with Magnolia Parks, Beach Read, and my Taylor Jenkins Reid collection.

But I guess beauty is *sacrifice*.

Thank you for coming to my BED¹ Talk.

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READING 📖→

• East of Eden, obvi. Everything is slow as molasses for me right now (life gets in the way sometimes), so I’m only just finishing the first part (about 20% in).

  Martha
  and I have been DM’ing our thoughts. Being forced to articulate what you think about a book while in it makes you way more observant. If you have any thoughts, respond here in the comments or over at the East of Eden Thread. What we found so far:

  • Everything (life) feels precarious. One wrong move, one bad season, and everything can fall apart.

  • The women suck, but we would too if we were “a farmer's wife in the 19th century with 100 children and no money” - amen, Martha!

  • But at the same time, are all women sexual deviants, insane, or so uptight they die scrubbing floors or in childbirth??? Waiting for one good female to show up, Steinbeck!

• Juggling a couple others because I wanted something non-classic but the East of Eden and The Age of Innocence reads have me in their grips. The Ministry of Time is slow going, and I was trying to read my ARC of Horror Movie before the pub date June 11th so I may hop on that one this weekend even though I will be on a sunny vacation.

• ALMOST DONE with Grant County!!! I had to find the last (terrible) audiobook not narrated by Kathleen Early, and once it's done, I am on to the best - Will Trent. Wish me luck.

BUYING 💰→

Games for vacation. I got this one and this one. I think the adults will love them.

WATCHING 📽️→

The Love Witch. I might need to make this my whole personality. The potions, the eye makeup, the seduction, the Tarot, the murder. Samantha Robinson, as witchy vixen Elaine, looks like Lana Del Rey and sounds like Vanessa Hudgens. The movie is an anachronistic mix of 1970s B horror, Wizard of Oz technicolor, and modern woodsy California that has you constantly wondering where the f*ck am I?? The opening feels like an ode to Psycho, and the entire film explores & subverts traditional gender roles. If stuff like The Rocky Horror Picture Show is your jam, you, too, will fall in love with The Love Witch.

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NEW BOOKS 📚→

• A debut novel about “family, legacy, bloodlines, culture, and inheritance” sounds exactly like the messy family drama we all need this summer.

• I tend to stay away from big celebrity book clubs, but this one is also a sweeping family drama and coming-of-age story set in a 1980s small town, so I’ll allow it.

• It feels like the year of the memoir, but this one is about “workaholism [and] the addictive nature of ambition,” which sounds like free therapy to me.

BOOKS IN MY SHOPPING CART 🛒→

• Elena Knows by Claudia Pineiro

• Solenoid by Mircea Cartarescu

• Woodworm by Layla Martinez

BOOK NEWS & RESTACKS 📰→

• A new Hunger Games book was announced, and everyone has lost their minds (and panties) over a Haymitch Abernathy origin story. I also loved this interview with Collins on her thoughts about dystopia and the state of the world.

• Samantha Irby might be the funniest person on Substack

• This strangely uplifting article about self-enhancement propaganda.

AND CATS 🐈‍⬛→

Just two babies being babies

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LET’S CHAT 👻→

• What is your favorite format to read in? Do you love hardbacks, paperbacks, Kindlebacks? Or maybe you are format-neutral. Good for you.

• What are you reading, and is it any good?

• Are you going on vacation this year? Where? Let us live vicariously through you!

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In Case You Missed It 🖤

The Curator: the book of the century

Wanderers by Chuck Wendig

The Curator: the books & TV that raised us

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See you around the bookshelf!

Natalie

1. Books, Entertainment, & Design