# What non-religious book would you place in hotels ?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [May 8, 2011, 5:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168 "2011-05-08T17:18:06Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)
#### Post date: [May 9, 2011, 6:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/21 "2011-05-09T18:38:20Z")
> [@Freudian\_Slit](#):
>
> Samuel Delany’s _Hogg_.
This made me instinctively look for the “Like” click.😃
I second ‘Bathroom Reader’ but you’d have to replace them at least 5 times per month because guests would take them. (Cite: I probably would.) This would be a problem in fact with most books that are interesting to a broad audience, especially if it wasn’t nutshell sized.
I have worked at hotels that had lending libraries. The books were usually good quality and either donated by employees and patrons or left in rooms and screened to make sure there were no coverless “Chinchilla Diseases and How to Treat Them: 1968 Edition” type stuff and ideally light quick reads (e.g. Grisham, Danielle Steele). It was used fairly often, and if the books weren’t returned no biggie.
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### Author:  [@robert\_columbia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/robert_columbia)
#### Post date: [May 9, 2011, 8:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/22 "2011-05-09T20:12:36Z")
Perhaps something relevant to the local area or state?
So in Mississippi the hotels could have The Adventures of Tom Sawyer, and Virginia hotels could have The Red Badge of Courage or another Civil War book, and Illinois could have some of the writings of Abraham Lincoln or something.
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### Author:  [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)
#### Post date: [May 9, 2011, 8:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/23 "2011-05-09T20:15:09Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#):
>
> The CRC “Bible” doesn’t actually do that. It just tells you the Facts of LIfe – melting points, boiling points, ionization potentials, X-ray lines. You know, the important stuff.
But I meant, isn’t that the kind of info you’d want to have on hand while you were actually doing chem/physics?
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### Author:  [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)
#### Post date: [May 9, 2011, 8:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/24 "2011-05-09T20:30:25Z")
> [@Elmer\_J.Fudd](#):
>
> I think propaganda (or at least marketing) is kind of a criteria for distributing free books to almost every hotel and motel in the country. If the hotels had to pay for them (rather than a group like the with an agenda like the Gideons) I don’t think very many rooms would be provided with any kind of reading material.
Exactly so. The [Gideons](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gideons) are the ones who place Bibles in hotel rooms; their intent is to have it there for someone who might find themselves curious, or in a moment of crisis. It’s fundamentally a passive form of evangelism.
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### Author:  [@Spoons](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spoons)
#### Post date: [May 9, 2011, 8:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/25 "2011-05-09T20:43:43Z")
> [@Sampiro](#):
>
> I have worked at hotels that had lending libraries. The books were usually good quality and either donated by employees and patrons or left in rooms and screened to make sure there were no coverless “Chinchilla Diseases and How to Treat Them: 1968 Edition” type stuff and ideally light quick reads (e.g. Grisham, Danielle Steele). It was used fairly often, and if the books weren’t returned no biggie.
I stayed in such a place once. The “library” was a few shelves in the bar/lounge, and a sign said to help yourself. Many of the books were indeed light: popular novels and whatnot; but there were a few non-fiction as well (sports, history, nature, etc.). I thought it was a great idea!
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### Author:  [@tdn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tdn)
#### Post date: [May 9, 2011, 9:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/26 "2011-05-09T21:00:29Z")
_Everybody Poops_
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### Author:  [@MsRobyn](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MsRobyn)
#### Post date: [May 9, 2011, 11:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/27 "2011-05-09T23:46:12Z")
One of the major chains (IIRC, Hilton) used to put a book of contemporary writing in its rooms. This was back in the late 1960s or early 1970s. My parents stole the copy from their room; the book floated around the house for a while. This was also back when hotels used to give you free stationery and postcards.
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### Author:  [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)
#### Post date: [May 10, 2011, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/28 "2011-05-10T00:17:07Z")
> [@Thudlow\_Boink](#):
>
> But I meant, isn’t that the kind of info you’d want to have on hand while you were actually doing chem/physics?
I’ll bet you’re the kind of person who never reads the Encyclopedia. Or the dictionary.
Hey – that’s another book to put there – **The Dictionary**.
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### Author:  [@romansperson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/romansperson)
#### Post date: [May 10, 2011, 1:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/29 "2011-05-10T01:09:23Z")
An almanac would be great. I love miscellaneous facts. 🙂
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### Author:  [@Docta\_G](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Docta_G)
#### Post date: [May 10, 2011, 2:41am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/30 "2011-05-10T02:41:38Z")
_Twilight of the Idols_—Friedrich Nietzsche
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### Author:  [@Sampiro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sampiro)
#### Post date: [May 10, 2011, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/31 "2011-05-10T03:48:38Z")
> [@MsRobyn](#):
>
> One of the major chains (IIRC, Hilton) used to put a book of contemporary writing in its rooms. This was back in the late 1960s or early 1970s. My parents stole the copy from their room; the book floated around the house for a while. This was also back when hotels used to give you free stationery and postcards.
Conrad Hilton was a famous egomaniac and had copies of [his autobiography,](http://www.amazon.com/Be-My-Guest-Conrad-Hilton/dp/0130715980) which he had no problem identifying as one of the greatest stories ever told, in all of the rooms. They stopped soon after he died.
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### Author:  [@Knorf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Knorf)
#### Post date: [May 10, 2011, 6:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/32 "2011-05-10T06:20:54Z")
_À la recherche du temps perdu_ by Marcel Proust.
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### Author:  [@Panurge](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Panurge)
#### Post date: [May 10, 2011, 8:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/33 "2011-05-10T08:52:16Z")
_Gargantua & Pantagruel_ by Rabelais. If something smaller is needed, perhaps _Candide_ by Voltaire.
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### Author:  [@Lsura](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lsura)
#### Post date: [May 10, 2011, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/34 "2011-05-10T14:49:39Z")
> [@ShibbOleth](#):
>
> _The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy_ might be useful.
I came into this thread to say this. 🙂
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### Author:  [@kopek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kopek)
#### Post date: [May 10, 2011, 3:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/35 "2011-05-10T15:11:13Z")
Starship Troopers
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### Author:  [@Elendil\_s\_Heir](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Elendil_s_Heir)
#### Post date: [October 24, 2011, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/36 "2011-10-24T01:33:57Z")
One of Cecil’s weighty tomes, the latest _World Almanac_, or Tolkien’s _The Hobbit_ (which would be an appealing tale for most travelers, I should think).
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### Author:  [@SSG\_Schwartz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SSG_Schwartz)
#### Post date: [October 24, 2011, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/37 "2011-10-24T01:40:53Z")
I suppose _The Shining_ would be in poor taste?
SFC Schwartz
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### Author:  [@Lynn\_Bodoni](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lynn_Bodoni)
#### Post date: [October 24, 2011, 1:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/38 "2011-10-24T01:45:02Z")
> [@CalMeacham](#):
>
> I’ll bet you’re the kind of person who never reads the Encyclopedia. Or the dictionary.
>
> Hey – that’s another book to put there – **The Dictionary**.
Heh. When I was in fifth grade, I loved to go to the classroom dictionary and look up words. In fact, my teacher eventually told me to ask before I did so, and she’d look up the word and tell me the definition. Part of the fun was opening the dictionary at random places and reading a random entry.
Now, of course, I have Wikipedia.
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### Author:  [@grama](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/grama)
#### Post date: [October 24, 2011, 2:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/39 "2011-10-24T02:17:10Z")
Why does it have to be a book there in the first place…?
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### Author:  [@silenus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/silenus)
#### Post date: [October 24, 2011, 2:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-non-religious-book-would-you-place-in-hotels/581168/40 "2011-10-24T02:21:45Z")
**Brewer’s Dictionary of Phrase and Fable.**
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