Book Surprises

or, unexpected treasures

by Carolyn Clare Givens

Rachel handed me my birthday present, nicely wrapped in red paper. “Bet you can’t guess what it is,” she said.

I took the flat, hard, rectangular package from her and tinged my tone with wonder. “A book!”

She laughed, then told me her kids were trying to guess which book before she left the house. “They guessed it was Promise!” she said. “I told them you already have that one!”

It was, in fact, a book. She’d given me Jane Austen’s Bookshelf, a memoir of a rare book collector who went searching for the books that influenced Austen.

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I wandered the stacks at John K. King Used & Rare Books in Detroit the week of my birthday several years ago. Used book stores are a particular kind of fun—and a particular kind of stress—to me.

I love finding previously undiscovered treasures on the shelves, but I also can never quite remember which books of a series I’m missing.

That day in John King, I found a first edition of T. S. Eliot’s Four Quartets. It sits on my shelf now—next to the copy I throw in my backpack when I want something lightweight (in a physical sense, not a metaphysical one) to travel with.

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One year on Christmas morning, I opened a package from a friend that had shown up under the tree. My sister grinned as I tore away at the paper to find new copies of Elizabeth Goudge’s previously out-of-print Eliots of Damerosehay trilogy.

There’s a photo she took of my face when I realized what I held—it’s commingled surprise and delight, my mouth wide open and my eyes looking straight at her. My sister had coordinated with our friend to find and present the books, knowing they were one of my favorite series and I didn’t own them yet.

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In 2001, my parents gave me The Lord of the Rings trilogy box set as a Christmas present. I’d borrowed the first book at the end of the summer and worked my way through it over the course of a busy semester. When I got home for Christmas break, my sister and brother-in-law and I went to see the new movie, and then a few days later I opened the trilogy.

I read The Two Towers and The Return of the King in the week between Christmas and New Year.

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After reading M. M. Kaye’s mystery novels, I decided I wanted to purchase all of them in their hardcover editions—released as a set in the 1980s under the monikers, Death in _____ (each one a location, as they’re set all over the world).

I’d found five of them, but Death in the Andamans (my favorite) had eluded me in the used bookstores—even when I remembered my list of what was missing.

One day I walked in to a Salvation Army secondhand store and glanced at the bookshelf. A pristine copy of Death in the Andamans was there, ready to be taken home for just a few dollars.

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My high school English teacher (yes, I had several, but Ms. Schneider is the one I reference most, so she gets the main title) gave me a copy of Sanditon, completed by “Another Lady” as a graduation gift. I hadn’t known that Austen left an unfinished novel and found myself adventuring into another Regency world still unexplored.

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There’s something to be said for book surprises—whether they be gifts or unexpected encounters.

Ambre Sautter of Reshelving Alexandria recently wrote in introduction to her birthday book list:

“Very, very few people ever gift me books for fear of buying something already on my shelf, and I don’t think anyone has ever actually asked what books would be on my dream list.

Here’s the funny thing, duplicate books have genuinely never bothered me.”

I appreciate this take (and her admonishment to write a note in the front of the book to make it an “EOEV copy: Edition of Exceptional Value”). A book gift is a delight—an opportunity to share something you’ve enjoyed with a friend—and a rummage through a used bookstore might just turn up an unexpected treasure, even if you do find yourself back at home with an extra copy of Brother Cadfael’s Penance because clearly you hadn’t updated the note in your phone the last time you were trying to complete your Cadfael series at a used bookstore.

What’s been your favorite book surprise? Tell us in the comments!

May 30, 2026 - Carolyn C. Givens author event at Nooks in Lancaster, Pennsylvania
June 3, 2026 - Bandersnatch Books Pop-Up at Garden Spot Village in New Holland, Pennsylvania
June 30, 2026 - Release of Seichō Summer by Bethany Faulk
July 31, 2026 - One-Day Writing Camp for middle school and high school
Summer 2026 - Release of Loved Not Wisely by Katherine Ladny Mitchell

Preorders are OPEN for Seichō Summer! Don’t miss your chance to be among the first to get your hands on this one—order now!

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“So please, oh PLEASE, we beg, we pray, Go throw your TV set away, And in its place you can install, A lovely bookshelf on the wall.”
–Roald Dahl, “Television,” Charlie and the Chocolate Factory