As adults, we enjoy different written materials, from Hot Rod magazines that expound on the attachments of an experimental 400 hp motor car that runs on Black Flag bug spray, to the latest dirt in Hollywood magazines. More sophisticated readers read actual books. We read mysteries, thrillers, romance, westerns, etc., according to personal taste. More recently, reading has expanded to reading “e-books online” on Kindle and other electronic devices.
I collect vintage books. I buy them for the book jacket – something usually with gold gilt lettering or an embossed cover. I have vintage books that range from Faulkner, George Elliot, Dickens, Kipling, Jack London…to fascinating studies of Audel’s Answers on Refrigeration (1914)…but you should see the beautiful bindings! Some of them are utterly fascinating.
A vintage book I found interesting was Janice Meredith, A Story of the American Revolution, by Paul Leicester Ford (1899). It is the story of a nation at war. Imagine the British Army invading a small community of 673 farmers and shopkeepers. They “appropriate” 27 horses, 81 chickens, and 23 pigs, and threaten to hang any traitor who is loyal to George Washington. Everyone in town becomes an instant loyal British subject. The British army leaves. Six days later, George Washington rides into town. His army of 412 hungry men finishes off the remaining 4 pigs and 9 chickens. Everyone swears allegiance to the “rebel cause,” and Washington rides away. A month later, another contingent of British soldiers rides back into town, hunting a rebel spy. Everyone points north where Washington disappeared over the hill, dragging a pig at the end of a rope, and the town’s last three ducks in a sack tied to his saddle.
The loyalty of the people depended upon who was holding the gun that day. Throughout the story, the main character changed his allegiance several times to survive. There were no true British loyalists. There were no true, “so help me God, I’m a Yankee and proud of it” patriots. There were just hungry people trying to survive in the middle of a giant battlefield. The book was a fun romance as well as a historical novel. It gave insight into the mindset of what people had to do to survive during the American Revolution. This book is still available at Amazon.
As an author of 14 mystery novels, I wonder if my mystery books will be read and enjoyed 125 years from now? If you like cats, humorous mysteries, or a bit of paranormal, check out my books NOW on Amazon.
