An Eccentric, Scholarly, Wistful (and Funny) collection of the bygones and the left-behinds in the frenetic pace of the human race. From the inevitable dodo to chivalry, from Dungeons&Dragons to Brylcreem. To read and to ponder over.

RELEASE NOTES:

To be released at the Boston BookCrossing Meetup - at the Algiers, Harvard Square, Cambridge MA on the 11th of march 2008, at 7.00 p.m.

Picked up at the Boston Bookcrossing Meeting (March). Will record my reaction as soon as I get the chance to read it!

I had a real love/hate relationship with this book, which is why it took me a year and a half to finish it (after picking it up over 8 years ago...). There are times when the author seems so completely self-involved and enamored of his own intellect that he forgets there is a reader at the other end. There are more instances, however, of sardonic humor and moments that remind us that nostalgia is indeed the rust of memory, not its steel. This isn't a book to read cover-to-cover in one sitting, but instead to be taken in small doses. The cross-referenced "entries" are a plus, a tongue-in-cheek nod to the idea that this would ever really be a reference book.

In some ways, it is true--we are defined by what we have lost. And lest you think this a frivolous book, the last three entries solidify its street cred as a philosophical examination of our existence.

I will have to release this one someplace special.

Left in the library.