Book pain for a book lover

Among the many woes that can befall a book lover, one of the worst, in my experience, is losing a book.

This happened to me recently - two weeks ago, at Easter. I had just received my Amazon.ca book order, which contained 7 books ordered with the gift certificate from my mother for Christmas. I had spent many hours combing through Amazon and my book list (from you, my dear Readers!) to narrow down the list to something affordable (the original book order I wanted more than doubled the gift certificate!!). On the Monday April 5, the books were delivered - and yes, I'll tell you what they were:

-The Cypher Garden by Martin Edwards


- The Last Detective - Peter Lovesey

- The Crossing Places -Elly Griffiths

- Finch - Jeff Vandermeer

- The Hotel Under the Sand - Kage Baker

- Rosemary and Rue - Seanan McGuire

- Soulless - Gail Carriger

I was amazed that Canada Post had even delivered books on a holiday Monday! but there it was, and I opened up my very late Christmas books and held my books lovingly, looking at each one of them, taking the evening to decide which one needed to be read first.

Martin Edwards' The Cypher Garden won that place.

I had to know what happened next to Hannah Scarlett and Daniel Kind - she the cold case DCI, he the historian retired to the lovely Lake District with his new girlfriend. So the next day, I took our youngest to the dentist for his very first visit. I'm blaming the news that this child, who is 5 years old, has 8 cavities, for what happened next. On the way home, still reeling from exactly how much this was going to cost and how on earth we were going to get him to go through 8 cavities being filled, I put the book on the seat next to me. And got up, and got off the bus, and as it drove away, I knew what I had done.

"My book! I left it on the bus!" I think I said a few unprintable words, then realized someone's five year old ears were pricked up, and had to try to calm down. "It's just a book," I mumbled all the way down the hill. "It's ok. I can buy a new one." But it wasn't, was it, my Gentle Readers? Bound up in this book was the love that my mother had sent the gift certificate with, and the hours spent singling it out as one I needed to get asap, and the love of this new mystery series that I have to read all the books of now (thanks to Geraniumcat and Book pusher who blogged about Martin Edwards recently). I had read the first chapter, and I had taken the day off work because of the dentist visit, and after I dropped Graham off at daycare, I had the rest of the day set aside for reading The Cypher Garden. It felt like a loss, and it still does.

I am of course going to buy another copy, as soon as I can. Unfortunately Chapters the Canadian book superstore here isn't carrying any Edwards - I drop in every few days just in case there is a miracle - and the local mystery store just closed, who was carrying him. That leaves a special order, except I haven't been to Collected Works since January as it's a special trip and I haven't gone out much this year. So I've taken to staring at my husband, who still has his Christmas book certificate to use, and saying : "Are you ready yet? have you done your order?' so that I can add my book along and not pay extra shipping costs.

Yes, we did call the bus company lost and found, but no one turned in the book. I console myself with thinking that maybe someone picked it up and is happily discovering the joys of mysteries, and especially Daniel and Hannah and the Cypher Garden mystery.

It still hurts a little, though.