Good morning, Hank, it's Tuesday!

So Sarah and I have about 3000 books in our library, and they are all great and I value them all very much, but today I would like to share with you the most valuable books in our library.

By the way, I'm defining value as their monetary value multiplied by the number of tears I would cry if I lost the book, so if a book is worth $100 and I would cry 10 tears if I lost it, that's 1000 points.

Okay, so I don't really collect fancy first-editions, but I do have some, and the most financially valuable book in our library is probably this first edition of Slaughterhouse-Five. Sarah got this for me many years ago and it's now worth, like, $2000, which makes it stressful to even touch. That book is really close to my heart, partly because I ended up in Kurt Vonnegut's hometown, living and working in his very long shadow, and partly because when I read it in 11th grade English, it helped bring me to life as a reader.

I also have a first edition of Octavia Butler's Parable of the Sower, which I got for $65 and is now worth quite a bit more than that. I love the cover design of this book so, so much. But also it's, like, one of the most important American novels of the last 100 years, so it's pretty cool to have a first printing of it.

Okay, two more fancy rare-ish books: first, this gorgeous first edition of Annie Dillard's Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, I think about this book almost every day. And the end papers are phenomenally beautiful, and I know you're not supposed to read fancy books but this one isn't worth that much money 'cause it's not in good condition, so... it's also my reading copy.

Then there's this first edition of Mark Twain's Christian Science, this is a late Twain book dedicated to absolutely eviscerating religion in general and Christian Science founder Mary Baker Eddy in particular. I have very complicated feelings about the book, so much so that I wrote my college thesis about it, and then my parents gave me a first edition of it as a graduation present. So while it would only sell for, like, $60, it's worth much more than that to me. 

Speaking of which, all of the most valuable books in our library are not financially valuable, they're just irreplaceable. Like this copy of Toni Morrison's Sula is worth about $2, but I have been reading this particular book since 2004 and it has all of my, like, marginalia, which is alternately cringe-inducing and lovely for re-reading.

Then we have this copy of Sarah's book You Are an Artist, I love this book and use it all the time to help me think creatively, but this particular book is valuable to me because Sarah signed it and the inscription is lovely.

So you know how most writers use, like, Strunk & White's style guide or the AP style guide, or whatever? I use Instruction Booklet, written by my college professor Perry Lentz. It covers everything from, like, em-dashes to the difference between "lie" and "lay" and it is my writing style guide, like, I have large swathes of it memorised.

Side note: over the years you may have heard me say "the social order" instead of "society" - that is because of Instruction Booklet, where Lentz argues very persuasively that "society" as a word obfuscates hierarchies and inequalities that are better captured by the phrase "the social order".

Alright, it's time for the most valuable book in our library, which I think would retail for about $7, but I would cry a million tears if I ever lost it, it's The Spring and The Fall, a book co-written by Sarah Urist Green and me.

So when we got engaged, Sarah gave me this book, which contains every e-mail we wrote to each other during the year and a half between when we became friends and when we started dating.

Last year, one of the Project for Awesome perks was a podcast Sarah and I made called "Like Letters", where we analyzed some of these e-mails, and we're gonna do it again for this year's Project for Awesome.

I just love reading through this book with Sarah. It's just so wonderful to have this document that charts how we fell in like with each other, and then in love with each other.

So yeah, don't print your e-mails, except occasionally do print them, because this is my most valuable book by a very wide margin.

Let me know in the comments what your most valuable books are - Hank, I would've included one of your books, except in going through my copies of them I realised you've never signed one for me. I'll see you on Friday.