About

The first chapter of Italo Calvino's If on a winter's night a traveler, a lovely meditation on reading, describes many types of books. I first read this list in September 2013 and "Inexplicable Curiosity, Not Easily Justified" has been lodged deeply into my brain ever since. If nothing else, this site is a collection of curiosities, without offer or expectation of justification.

Sections in the bookstore

• Books You Haven't Read
• Books You Needn't Read
• Books Made for Purposes Other Than Reading
• Books Read Even Before You Open Them Since They Belong to the Category of Books Read Before Being Written
• Books That If You Had More Than One Life You Would Certainly Also Read But Unfortunately Your Days Are Numbered
• Books You Mean to Read But There Are Others You Must Read First
• Books Too Expensive Now and You'll Wait 'Til They're Remaindered
• Books ditto When They Come Out in Paperback
• Books You Can Borrow from Somebody
• Books That Everybody's Read So It's As If You Had Read Them, Too
• Books You've Been Planning to Read for Ages
• Books You've Been Hunting for Years Without Success
• Books Dealing with Something You're Working on at the Moment
• Books You Want to Own So They'll Be Handy Just in Case
• Books You Could Put Aside Maybe to Read This Summer
• Books You Need to Go with Other Books on Your Shelves
• Books That Fill You with Sudden, Inexplicable Curiosity, Not Easily Justified
• Books Read Long Ago Which It's Now Time to Re-read
• Books You've Always Pretended to Have Read and Now It's Time to Sit Down and Really Read Them

Based on William Weaver's English translation. In the original Italian they might evoke different feelings. The nature of authorship in translated works is a good question for another day.