Under my hashtag eileenreadsbooks on Facebook, I occasionally place Notes to my acquisitions as the library progresses. Here are selections in reverse chronological order from January 1, 2024 which is when I began inputting them on this blog. To see older book acquisition Notes, go to Facebook and look up the hashtag. Acquisitions from July-September 2025 are HERE; April-June 2025 are HERE, Jan.-March 2025 are HERE, October-December 2024 are HERE, July-September 2024 are HERE, April-June 2024 are HERE, Jan.-March 2024 are HERE.
11/14/25
Mark Young is a treasure among contemporary poets, editors and publishers. He’s also witty. I just relished his new collection, FROM THE CAVE’S JUKEBOX, and post a prose poem example below. Thanks to Sandy Press for sending.
I’m also grateful to Ateneo de Manila Publishing for the Manolete Mora book, as well as Station Hill Press and John Godfrey for John’s latest, PRETTIER GRIT. I appreciate publishers and writers thinking I’m worthy of free books 😊
These and other books join my library-in-progress; I show latest acquisitions below. Some might wonder why I am buying old books. Apart from how good literature doesn’t expire, I am also acquiring to replace some books from my library that was burnt or smoked by a wildfire. With my library’s target of 15,516 books (a number that replicates the number of books lost to a wildfire), this latest crop means 1,389 books down, 14,127 books to go!
11/2/25
Just acquired a new addition to my collection of macrominiature books (books no larger than 4 inches): MOTHERDYING by avant garde artist Michael Lentz. It’s published by the wonderfully innovative Isolarii. I’m pleased to see that collection grow (also with the modern editions of Hanuman, another macrominiature book publisher). The Lentz, along with other recent acquisitions enter my library-in-progress. With the library’s target of 15,516 books (a number that replicates the number of books lost to a wildfire), that’s 1,380 books down, 14,136 books to go!
10/27/25
Reading over the past week has been fantastic. I’ve identified one of the top two favorite novels I will have read for 2025 (I know the year’s not yet over but it’s unlikely another novel will generate more enthusiasm from me). I’ve read 35 novels so far this year and the superb MODERATION by the brilliant Elaine Castillo—such a wide-ranging mind!—engaged me more than most for reasons that will appear in a future review. (I review books not based on what others assign but based simply on what I liked reading; I’m sad that I can’t review everything I like.)
In poetry, I was blessed to receive a copy of Burt Kimmelman’s new poetry book A Door, A Window. I always enjoy Burt’s minimal masterpieces; I post an image of my favorite poem from his book.
Burt’s and other recent acquisitions are of course welcome into my library-in-progress. With the library’s target of 15,516 books (a number that replicates the number of books lost to a wildfire), and with deducting one publication that was donated to a local Little Free Library, that’s 1,374 books down, 14,142 books to go!
10/13/25
I’m surrounded by understatements and the deadpan, including the Linda Ty-Casper memoir I’m reviewing and now these just-read books that look to join what will be among my Best Reads for 2025. Korean poet Oh Eun is new to me but clearly masterful; see his poem excerpt below with that wonderful image of piano playing and how that thumb and pinky become “limits to the expanding world.” I’ll show the back cover which describes well this collection of Shyun Ahn’s translations of Oh Eun’s poems. I also feature a brief excerpt from Scott MacLeod’s Shikataganai which refers to a Japanese philosophy of acceptance. Scott’s book is hard to excerpt and perhaps what I show doesn’t adequately manifest the charm, humor, and deceptive sense of effortlessness that the book as a whole creates—but it’s charmingly witty. I’m glad to have these books in my library.
So with said library’s target of 15,516 books (a number that replicates the number of books lost to a wildfire), that’s 1,367 books down, 14,149 books to go!
10/6/25
Received latest anthology to include one of my poems, the very timely THE NATURE OF OUR TIMES. It's also the third book I'm reading by/edited by Filipino authors to commemorate Filipino American History Month (FAHM). It'd be hard to highlight a particular poem from what's nearly a 400-page anthology, so my highlighted one is chosen for a personal reason. I show Paula J. Lambert's poem because it takes off from the idea of the weight of a soul. It's a concept so intriguing to me that it made it into my new novel GENESIS. Paula doesn't explain her reference (nor does she need to) but I'll share this excerpt from GENESIS because maybe others will find it interesting:
'... the word “soul” evoked Duncan MacDougall’s so-called “21 grams experiment.” In the early 1900s, the physician hypothesized that souls have physical weight, and attempted to measure the mass lost by a human when the soul departed the body. MacDougall identified six patients in nursing homes whose deaths were imminent... When the patients looked like they were close to death, their entire bed was placed on an industrial sized scale that was sensitive to within two tenths of an ounce or 5.6 grams. There were problems with measuring the mass change of six patients at the moment of death, for example insufficiently adjusted scales. But one of the six subjects lost three-quarters of an ounce, or 21.3 grams. While MacDougall said more testing was required before any conclusion, The New York Times broke the story about his experiment. The scientific community rejected MacDougall’s results but the concept of the soul having weight, in this case, 21 grams resonated enough to be popularized through movies (including “21 Grams” starring Sean Penn, Naomi Watts, Charlotte Gainsbourg, Danny Huston and Benicio Del Toro), songs, a television series, a documentary, and even an issue of the manga Gantz.'
I also share as an image below the first page of Phillip Levin's Foreword to THE NATURE OF OUR TIMES because the topic is important.
THE NATURE anthology, along with recently acquired books (thanks to latest gift-givers Aileen, Scott, harry, and my favorite Communist Sonny San Juan who sends JERUSALEM because it's a "latest hot spot"), goes to my personal library-in-progress. With its target of 15,516 books (a number that replicates the number of books lost to a wildfire), that’s 1,366 books down, 14,150 books to go!
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