I go to Powell's often.   I love the store. I do most of my gift shopping there. Books are a loving gift.  

I bought four books yesterday, and I will share with you the first sentence of each.

1. "Dad always said a person must have a magnificent reason for writing out his or her Life Story and expecting anyone to read it." Special Topics in Calamity Physics Marisha Pessl
2. "The ghosts of the three children set up residence in the kataa next to the fishing rods and burlap sacks of potatoes, behind the shovels and rakes." People I Wanted to Be Gina Ochsner
3. "Midway along the journey of our life/ I woke to find myself in a dark wood,/ for I had wandered off from the straight path." The Divine Comedy Volume I: Inferno Dante
4. "Whan that Aprill with his shoures soote/ The droghte of March hath perced to the roote,/ And bathed every veyne in swich licour/ Of which vertu engendred is the flour;/ Whan Zephirus eek with his sweete breeth/ Inspired hath in every holt and heeth/ The tendre croppes, and the yonge sonne/ Hath in the Rame his half cours yronne." The Canterbury Tales Geoffery Chaucer