Traveling Book Project
The goal of the Aegis & Owl Book Project is to provide an exciting little travel-log of where Aegis and Owl books have been, and to find out how far they can go! If you're lucky enough to find a Traveling Book Project book, please make a blog entry and tell us the story of how it got to you!
I am absolutely fascinated by how far the simplest things travel in this world of ours. Just sitting here at my own desk and looking at its visible contents alone, I see a microcosm world tour:
linen bookbinding thread from Ireland
scented ink from France
a nineteenth-century mother-of-pearl straight pen, which has travelled not only space but time as well, from Victorian England
likewise, an antique Victorian travelling inkwell, which has passed 120 years and crossed an ocean before coming into my posession
a stapler made in Taiwan
two hole-punches from China
a tea-tin from Colorado, and another from California; both of which long gave up their supplies of tea but were so pretty they have been pressed into other service
a picture frame from Vermont, holding a picture of my Boston-born, Wisconsin- and Seattle-raised husband, taken by a Seattle photographer
a roll of tape made in St. Paul Minnesota, whose label bears the amusing juxtaposition of a Scotch plaid with an American flag above the label, "Made in USA"
a small Moleskine notebook from Italy, with a little note from Kyoto, Japan tucked into its back pages
a brass hand-mirror from India
a pad of paper from Beaverton, Oregon
a silk coin purse from Japan
There is also a small collection of foreign coins, and I can only imagine how many hands they might have passed through before they arrived in mine: an Austrian schilling which predates the European Union; an Olympic-year Canadian loonie; 100 yen from Japan; a 50 English pence piece, with proud Brittania on the reverse; a 1948 French franc; a maple-leaf Canadian penny; a russian 50 kopek piece.
I like to think that I'm well-travelled, but looking around I find myself not half so much so as the simple little everyday objects around me!
With this in mind, I should like to discover how far some of my dear books might travel, given a bit of opportunity. So, last Christmas, I started the Aegis & Owl Traveling Book Project. I made some special copies of my books, and sent them off into the world during a visit to relatives on the East coast. All had instructions to write the reader's city in the back, e-mail me, and pass the book along. One was donated to the military lounge at the Detroit airport during a layover there, one was left in a deli in New York City, and one was given to a young woman in the Minneapolis airport just as she was about to board a flight for San Francisco. All have codes in the back, so that the readers can track them -these three books pre-date this web-site, so if you find yourself reading one of them, it would be particularly exciting to everyone if you would report in!
Hand-made books are very time-consuming to make, as well as rather expensive for me to produce, so I'm sure, dear readers, that you can appreciate the investment these traveling books represent to me. I make them all myself, from start to finish, and the money to buy all the materials that go into them (paper, cloth, satin ribbon or bookbinding thread, etc.) comes out of my own pocket. If you find one, please treat it with care, and pass it along after you've read it.
f you find an Aegis & Owl Travelling Book Project Book:
1. Read it
2. Write your city's name on one of the special pages in the back of the book
3. Make a blog entry on this web-site. You're free to include as few or as many details as you like. You can simply put the book's tracking code and the name of the city where you found it:
(Example: D2W -1 Olympia, WA)
Or, you can write a whole little story about how the book came into your posession and what your favorite parts were:
(Example: D2W -S1 Olympia, WA
Hi, I'm Pat! I found this serial version of A Dream On Two Wheels in a coffee-shop near the Olympia farmer's market. At first I didn't quite believe I could really just take it, but after I started reading it, I couldn't put it down :) Shona was my favorite character (a hot chick who carries razor-sharp implements of destruction on her person at all times? Come on, what's not to like?!), but I can't wait to see if Mike gets away from the dalhounds! When I'm done reading it, I'm going to pass it along to my friend in Portland.)
Thank you so much, and happy reading!
-S.C.