Yesterday I was responsible and returned some things to my local library before I owed them money. Yes, they were confused, too.

I was hoping to pick up a book I’d just heard about over the weekend and that the website suggested could be found at my local branch, but it was nowhere to be found. Obviously I couldn’t harass each patron to demand that they hand over the novel I wanted, so instead I picked up some other, more spontaneous choices:

• Blockade Billy by Stephen King — A baseball novella that will be, I believe, my first King ever. (God, I hope it’s not too scary!)
• Heat by Mike Lupica — I didn’t have any of the other kids’ books on my to-be-read list written down but remembered there was a sports book on it. As it turns out, this isn’t it, but I’m still looking forward to reading this baseball book from a Connecticut writer.
• Major Pettigrew’s Last Stand by Helen Simonson — This novel has been on my radar since my friend Erik wrote me about it back, oh, probably last winter. I’m eager to start it. Maybe this weekend…
• The Last Olympian by Percy Jackson — I was torn. I thought about re-reading the first four novels in this series before picking up the final one, but then I remembered this was the first time I’d seen Book 5 at the library since it came out last year and quickly added it to my pile.

I still have a few other books out from an earlier library jaunt, so expect a few more book reports as this week goes on.