Story recall: special bookstore

[sagiphile]

Hi,

This is another one of those threads asking for your help remembering a book, short story, or televsion show.

If I can't find a title or reference to this story, I'm going to write it myself.

I recall a story about a man traveling. He comes upon a small isolated town with a bookstore.

The bookstore is strange. People are standing, almost catatonic, reading the same passages over and over.

He asks the proprietor of the story what's going on. The small man explains that these books tell the reader the best day, or moment in their lives. These people are catatonic because they want to relive that day, savor it, as long as they can.

The proprietor asks the traveler if he'd like to read about his own "best moment." It's a red pill / blue pill choice. It plays upon Nietzchean concepts of eternal recurrance -- Do you accept and find that you've lived your best days already, that it's all down hill from here. Or do decline, and let lifes adventures come as they may?
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If anyone can help me recall a title I would very much appreciate it. In the USA we had shows such as "The Twilight Zone" and the "The Outer Limits." Not sure if they went international or not. The short story could certainly be from a TV or literature.

Thanks,

 

[Brian G Turner]

Hi sagiphile and welcome to the chronicles network.

I'm afraid I'm not familiar with the story, but it does sound intriguing - genuinely hope one of the other members can answer for you.

 

[Diatomite]

Sounds quite like Twilight Zone, but a quick browse through http://www.scifi.com/twilightzone/episodes/index.html (see also http://www.twilightzone.org/index2.html) did not find it.

For Outer Limits you could try http://www.innermind.com/outerlimits/guides/olepgs.htm or http://www.innermind.com/outerlimits/guides/ol01.txt or http://www.scifi.com/outerlimits/

Glad you asked the question because I did not know about those sites.

By the way, both were shown probably world-wide. I saw them in Glasgow in the early sixties.

 

[sagiphile]

In my quest I wrote to Harlan Ellison. Asked him if it was one of his stories. He replied, which was very nice of him, and told me the story is indeed one of his called "The Cheese Stands Alone." It can be found in a collection of stories published in 1981 with the title "Stalking the Nightmare."

 

[littlemissattitude]

Pretty cool. I'm not surprised that he answered, though.