062426 • Thrift Store Finds

The other books I picked up yesterday aside from the previously mentioned Shogun! The most consequential is the Brad Thor book, which is the new 2026 release, meaning that I am caught up! I have six or seven books left to finish my re-read of his books, although I’m at the point where I’m reading new ones as they weren’t released the first time I read all of his books.

What is great is that the one I finished last night was kind of by-the-numbers, but the last paragraph changed all that, and I had to start the next one immediately, and it is just great! It made up for the previous book which is only mediocre to me because I know all of the characters so well, and some of the repetitive aspects that Thor has to go through explaining things I already know after what, twenty-five, thirty books in? But he clearly fixed that here.

I was close to meeting Brad Thor a few months ago when he was a mile away from the Ice Ranch, signing books, but the time was too close to my game for me to go see him and have him sign a book. Maybe next time. Or, should I say, he would have had the honor of meeting me?

The “Affirmation of Faith” has been sitting at the 44th & Wadsworth ARC for more than a month, it is a nice, quality binding with excellent paper, so for two bucks I had to give it a home. Lots of things written by consequential people from the history of our nation in here that all critics clearly have never read before.

The book on Russia was one of two different books (So of course it must have come from the same personal library) but the other book had too much writing and underlining in it, and some light mold on the edges of the pages, so I put it back. I have enough books to have standards. Very interesting topic, it is a shame most people would never open this up.

The book on the Boer War by Churchill, I had to get because it is in new shape, and I bought the Folio Society versions of his Work War I and World War II sets last year. I also don’t know anything about the Boer war, although I have a few books on it.

Also: A re-release of the original version of RISK, still in the wrapper, and an M.C. Escher puzzle!

Moby Dick

Nerd Alert: I was having lunch with Dad today and made the decision while eating to order the Easton Press leather-bound edition of Moby Dick that I’ve had my eBay eye on when I got home. It can be had for twenty bucks before shipping, because they made so many of them. That is the cheapest one on eBay.

So, on the way home, we stop at the Arvada ARC, and what do you know? The leather-bound Franklin Library edition of Moby Dick was right there, for fifteen bucks! I saved eleven, including shipping, according to the latest eBay listing!

The Franklin Library looks to be close to Easton Press quality, so that will work. They don’t publish anymore, sadly.

I’ve been reading nautical books over the summer. The Count of Monte Cristo was very loosely part of that as Edmond Dantes was a sailor in the beginning of that book.

I did jump back into my other fiction reading project, rereading the Vince Flynn / Brad Thor / Kyle Mills books, and I’m almost forty deep into about fifty or sixty volumes there, although they are smaller and easy to read. The good thing about rereading these is that when I get to the end of either series, there are newer books that have come out that I’ve never read but have continued the adventures of the characters I’ve gotten to know so well. Great stuff.

And it is amazing how much easier it is to read after finishing The Count of Monte Cristo.

Thrifts Don’t Check, They Just Tape Shut

There was a Buy-One-Get-One-Free in the games at the thrift store. I wanted this U.S. Army version of Monopoly, of which I’ve never seen before and likely would never see again, but of course, they always tape the boxes shut, so I couldn’t check it. And, of course, I get home, and it has some clothes and card games in it… no cool Monopoly game. A wise man told me to always cut that tape and inspect before purchasing, but I failed to do so and look at this. I was blinded, perhaps, by the really neat Axis & Allies game I picked up last week.

However, the puzzle I picked up with this for the BOGO turned out to be the actual find… 4000 pieces, and all in the bag, unopened! That made up for the Monopoly disappointment.

The Count of Monte Cristo • Finished!

I finally finished The Count of Monte Cristo, the 1,061-page translation that isn’t easy to read. There’s a version I recently acquired that has been translated into contemporary English, which is the version most people read. However, I discovered that there were different translations only after I was already deep into this one. I couldn’t turn back because, when I previously attempted to read this book, I got to page 365 (a number that will be remembered in infamy for me), and I couldn’t just stop again.

I did find two errors in this big book (I’m showing only one here). They can put out a book with maybe a million words in it, get all but two of them right, and I’m the smart guy who’ll point those two out to the world.

To be quite spoiled, I now have three versions of this book: the Barnes & Noble edition that I just finished, which is a mass-produced, quality volume; the Easton Press copy, which is of even better quality; and the standard Penguin Classics edition, which is the most readable but doesn’t come in a quality format like the other two.

It was a good thing to read, beyond the story itself, because this book was an actual challenge. Most books I read cover topics I find interesting or tell stories that flow easily, but this one was tough. Not bad, just tough. It didn’t flow as easily as a Brad Thor or Vince Flynn book. People simply talked differently almost two centuries ago, and the societal customs, currency, and other details always made the reading more challenging. But I’m ready to get back to other things now.

I was going to jump into War & Peace (the Easton Press copy), but I’m going to take a break from that kind of massive challenge. It’s hard enough just to get through regular books, much less something like that. I’m not exactly a speed-reader!

This is the third 1,000-plus-page book I’ve read in the last few years. The other two were John Toland’s biography of Hitler and Ian Kershaw’s biography of Hitler—or at least the first half of Kershaw’s, anyway.