When Blackouts: A Novel by Justin Torres won the National Book Award for Fiction in 2023, I read a summary of the book and thought, oh, I want to read that. I went online to my library, put a hold on it, and learned that I was number sixteen. My wife then told me that she’d put a hold on it and was number seventeen.

Yesterday, I received a notice that the book was available for me. My wife, being nice, offered to pick it up when she was downtown. When I came home from my writing session, I asked her where it was.

“I’m reading it,” she replied. “But they told me that my copy is available, so you can go pick that up.”

Duped again.