The Book I'm Reading: The Naked Sun by Isaac Asimov

I finished reading The Caves of Steel on New Year's Day. Before it, I'd read The Robots of Dawn and Robots and Empire, so naturally I was planning on having The Naked Sun next, to complete the R. Daneel Olivaw "series"--though (obviously, if you're an Asimov fan) not in the proper order. No problem, though, as I'd acquired The Naked Sun some time ago from Half-Price Books. I put The Caves of Steel back on the bookshelf and grabbed my copy of The Naked Sun. It wasn't until the next day when I picked it up for a nibble that I noticed. Problem. It wasn't a copy of The Naked Sun. It was a second copy of The Caves of Steel. 

Well. How had I managed that?

I immediately went online to see if any of the local bookstores had a copy. Nope, nope, nope and nope. Uh oh. I had been reading an Asimov every day for over four years, and I didn't want to miss a beat. I had other Asimovs I could switch over to, but The Naked Sun was the one I wanted.

I went to the LFPL website. The good news: they had a copy of the book (just one, though)...and its home was a library branch not too far away from me. The bad news: it was out. SERIOUSly? Yep. Ah, more good news: they had an e-copy. Only one, but it was available. I got it, commenced to read.

But I really wanted a book book.

I thought about putting in a request for that copy that was out, but (1) no telling how long that would take in our new fine-free world and (2) if somebody else was reading Asimov, I didn't want to rush them or take it out of their hands. Sigh. So I kept on with the e-copy. 

Fast forward three days. 

Friday is the day Joe and I go to The Great Escape. Joe was still chatting up The Girls (his favorite pastime) when I'd finished harvesting the new crop of comics, so I thought I'd have a(nother) look at the shelves of paperback books that had recently been put out. As I did, I wondered, "Is there any chance that I'd find a copy of The Naked Sun here?" I didn't think so, as I'd been through these stacks of books a half-dozen times already, and there was very little Asimov to be found, but I thought, " You know, the Universe often has my back on this kind of thing, so let's have a go at it."

A minute or two later:

Ahhhh. Thank you, Universe. 

Oh, I also feel that I should note that Asimov's covers are almost always TERRible, so I was really happy to get my mitts on this super cool old copy of the book.