Double Booking
 

After the runaway success of "Tailgaters", I thought you might like to know of this week's diversion in the Washington Post.

Style Invitational Week 971: Double booking — put two books under one cover.

Come up with a double book with a humorous connection; the first title must be an actual book, while the other may be your own fictitious title or a second real book. Feel free to add a short description if that enhances the humor. (Closing date: May 21)

Here are the examples they give:

Front cover: The Very Hungry Caterpillar
Back cover: The Very Full Robin

Front: The Hobbit
Back: The Bobbitt, a shorter tale

Actually, I think it's more amusing to use two real titles. Here are a few that I've come up with ... but I'm sure you can do better.

The old man and the sea/The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (... both of them spinning a line)

Bleak House/Cold Comfort Farm (... after them, the Hilton doesn’t seem so bad)

Little Women/Great Expectations (... great things come in small packages)

Summoned by Bells/Ring for Jeeves (... now we know for whom the bell tolls)

Venus on the half-shell/A farewell to arms (... she was fine with Botticelli - she never should have gone to Milos)

Anna Karenina/Trainspotting (... so that’s why the Moscow train was late ...)

Moll Flanders/’Tis pity she’s a whore

Flush/Goodbye to All That
Flush/All's Well That Ends Well
Flush/The House at Pooh Corner

Sorry. Feeling rather lavatorial today

Flush/The Turd Man

Sorry. Sorry

Number 3 made me laugh, John. (Perhaps you should have placed it second?)

Journey Without Maps/Why Are We In Vietnam?

The Mill on the Floss/White Teeth

I love that last one (floss/teeth), Brian.

FRONT: Eat Yourself Beautiful: The Ultimate Guide To Health And Beauty From Within
BACK: Eat Yourself, Beautiful: The Ultimate Guide To Using Commas

Basil, you gave me my second good laugh of the day.

Neat, Roger.

FRONT: Watership Down
BACK: Rabbit, Run


FRONT: Origin of the Species
BACK: Planet of the Apes


FRONT: Jude the Obscure
BACK: The Invisible Man

A Tale of Two Cities
Down and Out In London and Paris

Moby Dick
We Didn't Mean to Go to Sea

“Down and out in London and Paris” by George Orwell
“In and out in London and Paris” by Frank Harris

Mockingjay
The Great Gatsby


(Maybe a little too cryptic...)

The Nine Tailors
The Tailor of Panama
- and then there was one!

Dial M for Murder
Dial M for Murdoch
- some initial reflections (Won't disorder your shelves)

Q
Z
- solve the unshelvable!

The Journey
The Worst Journey In The World
- Can you belive it?

Flame Trees of Thika
The Fire Next Time
- a conservationist credo

Brian, maybe Henry Miller would be more familiar than Frank Harris for that joke? (Good joke).

You may be right, Roger, but the problem is, did Henry Miller do any serious screwing in London?

Anyway, back to Frank Harris:

My Life and Loves/Hard Times (... old Frank was always getting up [to] something)

Bambi/The Deer Hunter

Damn! They're films, not books! That's why I posted them on (and then removed them from) the other thread.

Have I forgotten to take my pills today?

Bambi is a book, is it not?

Brideshead Revisited/ The Faerie Queene

Yes, "Bambi" is a book, but "The Deer Hunter isn't." On the other hand, do they know that at the Washington Post?

Your own pairing might perhaps have the comment "Put out more fags" ...

No, I don't think so. My son just read Gatsby in high school. Or spark-noted it, I should say. (Yes, that's a verb now.)

Gee thanks! Another thing to get addicted to.

On the Road - Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
The Perfect Storm - Gone with the Wind
The Moon is Down - The Sun Also Rises
The Bible - From Here to Eternity

Probably no one will get this (unless you're a Boston area resident and/or a folksong buff):
Travels with Charley - A History of the Massachusetts Bay Transit Authority

The Young Lions - Cat's Cradle

FRONT: The Book of Revelation
BACK: Short-Term Investing Made Simple

FRONT: A Dance With Dragons
BACK: Treating Third Degree Gluteal Burns

FRONT: Good Night Moon
BACK: Pull Up Your Pajamas and Go to Sleep!

Actually, there is at least one book called The Deer Hunter.

Ha! I typed that one out earlier but deleted it.

Great minds...

No problem Marion - I can "tell you a story of a man named Charlie" and no doubt it's still "a scandal that the people should pay and pay" - but can you follow me to...

No Mean City
and
Lanark
- - strange tales of savage lands (Edinburgh Evening News)

A nice divertimento.

Don

Front: I, Claudius
Back: Ich und Du

Front: Continental Drift (Russell Banks)
Back: Enormous Changes at the Last Minute (Grace Paley)

Front: Wuthering Heights
Back: Withering Hollows (fake)

The Name of the Rose - Billy Budd

Billy Budd/ Petts Bottom

Alas, the second one isn't a book, just a place near me. James Bond lived there with his aunt. Who said Ian Fleming didn't have a sense of humour?

There are, however, books called Bottoms Up and Bottom Up. The second is a sociological tome. And George Melly wrote a volume of autobiography called Rum, Bum and Concertina. Very good it is, too.

My Life, by Bill Clinton
Kiss the Girls, by James Patterson

Unfortunately, the first one is definitely not a book.

Front: The Blair Witch project
Back : Cheri [by Colette]

(... OK, what’s Cherie been up to now? And why the sex change?)

FRONT COVER: The Book of Senior Moments

BACK COVER: The Book of Senior Moments

Front Cover: How to choose Occasional Furniture.

Back Cover: The Periodic Table.

Funny, Jayne.

Christopher, that doesn't seem to be a real book, but it's funny.

Funny, Jayne.

Front Cover: The Help

Back Cover: How Clean Is Your House?

There's also "The Deerslayer".

Front: Far from the madding crowd
Back: 100 years of solitude

Love in the Time of Cholera
The Plague

The Lord of the Rings
Biography of Alexander Graham Bell

Should you submit them with the authors' names?

I think that Pat said over on Facebook that she would find it helpful if you indicated whether or not the second title is real or invented. The first title, of course, must be real. Just do what makes sense so that Pat can both get the joke and see that you've followed the contest guidelines. To that end, I would say that you could supply the author's name, perhaps in parenthesis, if it's not obvious, though I imagine she will vet each title on Amazon before choosing it as a winner.