# Overheard in Barnes & Noble **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [September 2, 2003, 4:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/overheard-in-barnes-noble/199070 "2003-09-02T04:09:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 8\ **Page:** 5
**Author:** ![Cardinal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cardinal/32/4000_2.png) [@Cardinal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cardinal)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2003, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/overheard-in-barnes-noble/199070/81 "2003-09-07T18:55:57Z")
> [@](#): > > I don’t get it. So, in the Louvre, the paintings are bigger. And… of better… quality? What is so laughably inferior about the books? Having hung around some actual artists (not anyone famous, but people serious about their work) and an art history prof, I can tell you that there is a feeling out there that pictures of paintings are not art. IIRC, they are so far removed from communicating the experience that having a print of a painting is almost like not having seen it in the first place. ---
**Author:** ![poiema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c5a1d2/32.png) [@poiema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/poiema)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2003, 7:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/overheard-in-barnes-noble/199070/82 "2003-09-07T19:14:42Z")
i went into my local b&n not too long ago and asked the sales clerk if she could help me find something along the lines of tony parsons or mike gayle or nick hornby. i made sure to tell her that they are all british writers who write funny books about everyday life. i also told her hornby wrote high fidelity and she said right, she had seen the movie. i assumed with that statement she would know something about what i was looking for. well, she proceeded to walk me over to the fiction area and handed me a copy of fight club. “her you go,” she said. “i think this might be something you would like.” good grief. ---
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2003, 7:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/overheard-in-barnes-noble/199070/83 "2003-09-07T19:16:02Z")
It could of been worse. She might have handed you Dave Barry. ---
**Author:** ![poiema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c5a1d2/32.png) [@poiema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/poiema)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2003, 7:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/overheard-in-barnes-noble/199070/84 "2003-09-07T19:18:59Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by asterion \* > \*\*It could of been worse. She might have handed you Dave Barry. \*\* oh gosh! i hadn’t thought of that!!! ---
**Author:** ![DeepPurple](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ecae2f/32.png) [@DeepPurple](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DeepPurple)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2003, 8:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/overheard-in-barnes-noble/199070/85 "2003-09-07T20:02:20Z")
**Poiema** , don’t leave us hanging! Did you find someone else to read? my story, a co-worker took a phone call, the caller wanted a “Taoist Map”. I had no clue, we knew the caller didn’t mean it as a title, we checked the Taoism area, hoping something would jump out at us. Turns out, the caller wanted a map of Taos, NM… ---
**Author:** ![poiema](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c5a1d2/32.png) [@poiema](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/poiema)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2003, 8:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/overheard-in-barnes-noble/199070/86 "2003-09-07T20:13:00Z")
hahaha **deep purple** , i actually ended up going to the library instead and browsing til i found something i wanted to try. 🙂 always better to go free than to pay for something you’re not sure about! i got ex libris and thoroughly enjoyed it. totally different from what i was looking for, but it was also nowhere near fight club. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![hello32499](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/cc9497/32.png) [@hello32499](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/hello32499)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2003, 10:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/overheard-in-barnes-noble/199070/87 "2003-09-07T22:31:36Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Wang-Ka \* > \*\* > I’d kind of neglected to tell her the details. She’d heard of LOTR, but thought it was ONE BOOK. > \*\* LOTR is ONE BOOK! It was published in three parts, but is considered by the author and publisher as one book. Just pick up any of those large leather bound versions and read the first two sentences of the preface. ---
**Author:** ![Master\_Wang-Ka](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/master_wang-ka/32/3325_2.png) [@Master\_Wang-Ka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Master_Wang-Ka)\ **Post date:** [September 7, 2003, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/overheard-in-barnes-noble/199070/88 "2003-09-07T23:21:52Z")
I guess I should restate myself. Yes, I know, it was written as one continuous story… but I have an omnibus edition. All three books in one rather large hardback. Until she picked up an interest in LOTR, she assumed this was the only kind of edition in existence. It was the only copy of LOTR she’d ever seen. She didn’t realize that it was, in fact, a “trilogy,” or broken down into three separate covers, and consequently, didn’t expect FOTR to end the way it did. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/overheard-in-barnes-noble/199070.md?page=4)