Vanessa Blakeslee​
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The Reclamation Agent

            About the job title, you ask—what will be your duties? The first task of a Reclamation Agent (or “RA” for short) is to obtain a library card at as many branches as possible where you qualify: city and county libraries, schools, colleges. Check out your benefits if you’re an alum. Aim high—the larger the library, the better, but don’t discount the smaller, more local branches also. In fact, we often make greater progress with rural locations. Do your research. For instance, do you know any American citizen can get membership at the Library of Congress? Surprising, isn’t it? Look up the libraries and secondhand stores in your ZIP code. Make a map.
            Next, mark your calendar for which libraries you’ll visit and when. Remember the “Rule of Threes”—to check out at least three titles per visit, three times a month, at a minimum of three locations. That way, you should hit the necessary metrics without raising alarm bells. We don’t want to draw attention to your accounts, so no taking out ten books at a time, okay? You’re just an ordinary borrower who loves to use the library. Make sense?
            Next, the books. We supply the list, and again, we suggest that you search for authors sporadically—that is, don’t hit the “Religion/Philosophy” shelves all at once, but maybe one visit, you check out, say, The Cost of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer, which is likely near another on your list, The Imitation of Christ by Saint Thomas Aquinas, but you skip that one for now—better to say, wander over to the “Home and Garden” section to search for The Encyclopedia of Country Living. If too many titles go missing at once—well, you get the picture.
            But most importantly, stick to the list. You’ll notice some authors and titles simply say, “R & D”—that means, “Remove and Dispose.” This is the common designation for books by C.S. Lewis, for example—the guy was just a literary monster, you can’t go from the Children’s section to “Inspirational” without running into his books. If you could remove one Lewis per trip, you’ll barely be making a dent, but lots of dents eventually form a big crack, so don’t lose heart! Those, you can pitch into trash cans or dumpsters, we don’t care—they’re like weeds, so act accordingly. This was our protocol for the Laura Ingalls Wilder Reclamation Focus, and the strategy worked remarkably well. Five years later, and the average person would have a very difficult time finding one of those “Little House” novels. No matter how popular the author or works, reclamation is more than an achievable goal.
            Not so for some of the others. The rarer kind. Vedas, Qur'ans, the Tao Te Ching, but especially old Bibles and Torahs, the kind that families used to pass down from the last century or two—those are beyond a doubt our most serious reclamation asset. You’ll most often find those in the secondhand bookstores that adjoin many of the smaller city and county libraries. Did we mention that? You’ll be given a budget to spend there, to hunt down titles from the list as well. Now these, you’ll see marked differently on your list, as “Remove and Reclaim.” Old Bibles, prayer books, hymnals, but also books on herbs and medicines—the Foxfire books from the Old South are a prime example—never are you to destroy those. Such books, whenever found, are to be immediately e-filed and sent in the pre-paid media mailers you’ll be given to the address at Central Reclamation.
            The penalty, should you have been found to have kept any of the titles targeted for reclamation, is a felony of up to ten years prison time for the “R & D” copies, and for “R & R” books, twenty to twenty-five years to life. So, you understand that this is a matter of the most serious kind. That said, please don’t worry or be too nervous—yours is a truly patriotic mission and know that we wouldn’t be able to carry out our objectives without you. Only the most loyal and democratic of citizens are chosen—we watch, and we’re very careful about that. But still, we must make you aware of the consequences, should you be tempted to stray.
            Finally, when you’ve brought home your titles, you simply double and triple check your list and categories—those by Hemingway go here for disposal however you see fit, but look out, because those by his contemporary, Dos Passos, a lesser known but passionate figure we’d now classify as an outright domestic extremist—those titles must be mailed back. The Dos Passos “USA Trilogy” is especially inflammatory and dangerous—you can see why such books must be removed and kept in safe storage. Most would make rather boring reading for audiences today, trust us!
            How will you carry this out without getting caught, you ask? We suggest you check out a few harmless titles for your own pleasure, something entertaining that doesn’t raise suspicion, along with the targeted books, and return your own choices on time, of course. As for those on our list—"The List for North American Reclaimed Reads”—when the late fines pile up or the library calls you, asking after the missing titles, you’re just a “forgetful borrower.” You’re terribly sorry but you take out so many books, as anyone can see, and you’ll pay the fines right away (again, we’ll help you with that), but you simply have no idea where those couple of books slipped off to. The library will mark them as missing, perhaps place a re-order, perhaps not, but these days those troublesome originals, the ones still in circulation that haven’t been amended to be less offensive, etc., will eventually disappear completely. Soon, only certain citizens will have permits to check out books, in fact—and some of the books, such as those here, won’t be permitted to be in the possession of anyone at all.
            This should all be done as casually and quietly—but also quickly—as possible. 
            These are our goals, lofty we know—but we’re committed to them. And as long as we can count on the patriotism and commitment of ordinary folks such as yourself who step up to the task, we’ll get there, sooner than many think. Remember, this position is classified; to everyone else, the “Reclamation Agent” doesn’t exist and you, you’re a busy lover of books and forgetful borrower, no more, no less. No more questions—we’ll take care of the rest. 

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Vanessa Blakeslee’s latest book, Perfect Conditions: stories won the Foreword Reviews’ INDIEFAB Book of the Year Award for the Short Story (2018). Blakeslee is also the author of Train Shots: stories and Juventud, a novel, both of which received prizes and accolades. Her writing has appeared in The Southern Review, The Paris Review Daily, Kenyon Review Online, Joyland, The Smart Set, and many other places. She has been awarded grants and residencies from Yaddo, The Banff Centre, Ledig House/Writers Omi, Sitka Center for Art and Ecology, the Individual Artist Fellowship in Literature from the Florida Division of Cultural Affairs, and many more. Blakeslee has taught for the MFA in Writing programs at Goddard College and the City University of Hong Kong, and currently teaches at the University of Central Florida.