I hate it when that happens. I just hit something on the keyboard that deleted this. Start again.
I, too, cannot say enough about local civic organization cookbooks, especially for novice cooks who might live in areas where exotic ingredients are not readily available. I've bought them (there are 3 I think) in Hawaii, at ethnic festivals (my go-to-Greek resource) and a dozen or so places in between.
I went upstairs to just look at my extensive collection and of the books, the most worn out are "All Along the Danube" by Polvay (a collection of eastern European recipes), "Le Guide de la Cuisine Traditionelle Quebecoise" that I pull out every time I make tourtiere, even though I've settled on my own recipe, just to refresh my thoughts (I bought it in French to challenge my little gray cells, but it is available in English), and Jane Butel's Hotter than Hell. It just kills me that I can't find my all time go-to Italian cookbook, maybe it fell apart and died. It was something like the Rogmalis, I think from an old PBS series.
These are cookbooks I've used to death, to the point where I seldom use them any more because they're somewhere imprinted in my brain. But if you pick them up and let them flop open, they will open to a recipe I've used to death, the pages smeared and spotted, and notations on how to change the recipe -- double, halve or eliminate -- all over.