To the left is a cover scan of the book I'm reading now. It looks bland, a little boring, perhaps. Definitely, way too vanilla. You can't even get a good idea of what's inside. Anyway, before I start deconstructing clichés about judging books and their covers, let me tell you I picked this up a while ago from my dad's library and I'm really glad I did. The book is Four Good Plays to Read and Act, edited by Herman Voaden (it's a book of plays for high school students published in the 1940s). Inside are four plays: My Heart's in the Highlands by William Saroyan, Cavalcade by Noel Coward, Pride and Prejudice adapted by Helen Jerome, and The Fall of the City by Archibald MacLeish, which is pretty good stuff. However, there's more. The coolest thing about this particular book (besides that it's over fifty years old and in really good shape) is that it used to belong to my mother. Back when she was in grade eleven. Before she became a Mavin. Actually, before she even met my dad and obviously way before I was ever dreaded thought of. All the way through the pages are her handwritten notes -- scribbles in margins, crossed-out phrases, comments, interjections -- the usual things high school students write in their books. And that's what's really cool -- having a window into my teenage mother's mind. I can't wait to see what she had to say.