Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: WEDNESDAY, August 23, 1995                   TAG: 9508230032
SECTION: EXTRA                    PAGE: 1   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: BEN BEAGLE
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

DON'T MAKE ME GET OUT THE SHOVEL

I know, we get into these things in the first place because because we are El Cheapos and like to get three books for a dollar, plus shipping and handling.

I offer the following letter for use by all of you now down-trodden by book clubs. I hope it will make you free men and woman again - and that you will never have to worry about sending in those little cards on time when you don't want the editor's selection.

"Customer Service Department

"Any Book Club

"Anywhere, USA (but probably Pennsylvania)

"Dear Sir or Madam:

"I have just returned from a useful session with my psychiatrist. I have been seeing a lot of him since I began writing you three months ago in an attempt to cancel my membership.

"He says my fear that I may get an 18-volume set of untranslated Russian poetry that I didn't order - $325 plus shipping and handling - is probably caused by a searing childhood experience I don't want to remember.

"He said my admission that I secretly disliked my sister's raincoat back in the 1930s is certainly significant.

"I haven't told him I always wanted to hit my cousin in the face with a shovel.

"I'm better now, although I still have dreams in which I get books I don't order - `Going Over the Edge Nicely: How to Die with A Little Class' or `At Last: The Ancient Ruins of Tetragonia Give Up Their Secret.'

"In following my shrink's advice to get rid of hostility, I must say here that I do not now, nor have I ever, given a damn about Tetragonia and that how I go Over the Edge is my own bloody business.

"And I wish I had hit my cousin in the face with a shovel, and I'm going to to tell my psychiatrist that at my next session.

"I remain convinced, however, that my only hope to be sane again is to get the hell - excuse a little hostility dumping here - out of your book club.

"You told me on two occasions I was free.

I thought I was out until I got a letter saying that "The Strange Habits of the Great Congo Eel" was not available and to pick something else. Nonmembers don't order books, especially that kind of book. I cried for three days.

"I hope this letter will be the last I'll have to write. If not, tell your security people to watch out for a crazy old dude [or broad] with a shovel."