Wish Fulfillment

A few weeks ago, you may remember that I drafted a small Wish List of underrated young adult fantasy titles that I'd love to own and read sometime. 

Well, I decided to track down and purchase some of those books sooner rather than later. Taking advantage of some tempting sales going on at one of my new favorite online book retailers, I gave in and bought the following books:

• Firelight by Sophie Jordan
• Hemlock by Kathleen Peacock
• Bones of Faerie by Janni Lee Simner
• Monstrous Beauty by Elizabeth Fama
• Written in Read by Anne Bishop

I can say with great pleasure that it looks like I have a lot of mermaids, dragons, faeries, ghosts, shapeshifters, and all-around general magic in my near future.

Have you had any fantastical book hauls lately? Do tell.

Linked up here and here.

Oops, I think I did it again...

Don't judge me, but I may have downloaded even more graphic novels off of NetGalley. They are just so easily and freely acquired, I couldn't help myself.

• Strong Female Protagonist by Brennan Lee Mulligan and Molly Ostertag 
• C.O.W.L. Volume 1: Principles of Power by Kyle Higgins, Alec Siegel, and Rod Reis
• The Wicked + The Divine by Kieron Gillen and Jamie Mckelvie 
• Pride and Prejudice (by Jane Austen) Adapted by Stacy King 
• Orphan Blade by M. Nicholas Almand and Jake Myler 
• Shutter Volume 1: Wanderlost by Joe Keatinge and Leila del Duca 

...I said don't judge me.

Linked up here and here.

Best Kept Bookish Secret

Incoming book alert! Check out all of these unused books I purchased for only $30 (excluding Maggie Stiefvater's Blue Lily, Lily Blue).

From top to bottom:

• Tamora Pierce's Alanna: The First Adventure
• Sharon Green's Silver Princess, Golden Knight
• Leah Cypress' Mistwood
• Amanda Hocking's Switched, Torn, & Ascend
• Leigh Bardugo's Shadow & Bone
• Kiersten White's The Chaos of Stars & Mind Games

Where'd they all come from for such a low price, you ask? Alright, friends. I'm about to let you in on a very juicy bookish secret-- one you will most definitely thank me for. I only just discovered it recently myself, but you better believe I wasted no time in taking advantage of it.

It's called Book Outlet.

They sell discounted books offered at 50-90% off the original list price. Book Outlet's books are marked down so low because they are from a publisher's excess inventory. The books are unused and in excellent condition, unless they come from the Scratch & Dent section-- my personal favorite section. The Scratch & Dent books show some signs of handling or scratches, but they are structurally sound, overall. The best part is they are even cheaper. Like $2-3 for a hardcover cheap.

The only downsides would be cost of shipping and length of time it takes to ship-- but even so, it was cheaper to order those titles through Book Outlet than it was to order them through Amazon with Prime 2-day shipping. Trust me, I checked first before placing the order.

You're welcome.

And just for the record, I was not paid for this post, and I have no affiliation whatsoever with BookOutlet.com other than the fact that I use it and love it.

Have you heard of Book Outlet before? Am I the last one to be in the know? What were your experiences like? If not, do you plan to use the site in the future? I'd love to hear from you.

Linking up here and here.

Library Booksale Haul

I've gone to a few library booksales this year, and I've learned that they are a treasure trove for ladies lit. (my replacement term for chick lit.-- still not a great substitute, but I really dislike the term "chick lit."). I'm torn between loving and hating the fact that they're overwhelmingly pink.

• Sarah Dunant's The Birth of Venus
• Alexander McCall Smith's The No. 1 Ladies' Detective Agency
• Fannie Flagg's Daisy Fay and the Miracle Man
• Ceclia Ahern's P.S. I Love You
• Sophie Kinsella's Confessions of a Shopaholic
• Janet Evanovich's One for the Money
• Joyce Carol Oates' Blonde

Not a bad haul for a buck a piece or less. Now if only I could read them as fast as I buy them...

Used Bookstore Spoils

This past weekend, I traded in some books at the used bookstore, and I came home with some lovely (and inexpensive) finds that have been begging to get crossed off my wish list for months now. Behold:

• L.M. Mongomery's The Story Girl
• Avi's The True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle
• Gail Carson Levine's Ella Enchanted
• Dodie Smith's I Capture the Castle
• Julie Kagawa's The Iron King
• Alyson Noel's Evermore

And don't they just look oh so pretty stacked together like that?

Incoming!

Picked up some new used books this weekend. They've been on my wish list for ages now.

• Annette Curtis Klause's Blood and Chocolate
• Claudia Gray's Evernight
• Diane Wynne Jones' Cart and Cwidder and Drowned Ammet
• Patrick Ness' The Knife of Never Letting Go
• Kelley Armstrong's The Summoning

• L.M. Montgomery's The Blue Castle
• L.M. Montgomery's Mistress Pat
• L.M. Montgomery's A Tangled Web
• Ann Rinaldi's A Break with Charity

Yes, I'm running out of shelf space, but that only drives me to be more creative with the way my books are stacked. As Tim Gunn might say, "Designers book lovers, make it work!"

GEEK Out! Le Geek, C'est Chic

I had a major book nerd moment at the bookstore a few days ago. A kind of moment only rivaled by those observed at trekkie conventions or Comic Con.  A nerd moment probably comical to others to watch, but very profound to me.

I found THE book. My own personal Holy Grail. A book I thought I'd never, ever find...

Valentine's Day

My sweet, sweet boyfriend got me an incredibly generous Valentine's Day gift this weekend-- a gift card to my favorite local used book store. He knows better than to pick me out books himself, even though he did buy me a beautiful Easton Press leather-bound copy of Dickens' Great Expectations to hide the gift card in. He also hid the gift-card-hiding book on my bookshelf for me to find, and I hate to admit that it took me an embarrassingly long time to find it.

So, now I get to have fun fantasizing over which books I might use my gift card towards. I'm thinking the following are a few potential options:

• Margaret Mitchell's Gone with the Wind
• Fyodor Dostoyevsky's The Brothers Karamazov
• Brian Selznick's The Invention of Hugo Cabret
• Susan Cooper's Over Sea, Under Stone
• Kate Beaton's Hark! A Vagrant
• J.R. Ward's Black Dagger Brotherhood 
• Susanna Clarke's Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell
• Charles Bukowski's Ham on Rye
• Frank Herbert's Dune
• Anything at all written by Tennessee Williams 

Jeff, if you are reading this, thanks again, my love! You are the best.

Hi. My Name is Rosie, and I am a Biblioholic.

I fell off the wagon this weekend and purchased some more books during a sale at my local used bookstore. I hear the first step to recovery is admitting you have a problem, but I don't think I have one, really. I suppose I'm not actually on the road to recovery after all. And I'm okay with that.

Top to Bottom: John Green's Paper Towns Audiobook, Sharon Creech's Love That Dog, Ransom Riggs' Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, William S. Burroughs' Naked Lunch, Paula McLain's The Paris Wife, & P.D. James' Death Comes to Pemberley

Graphic Novel Haul: Autumn 2012

The past three months have been very good to me in terms of inexpensive graphic novel finds. Half of this haul hails from my favorite used bookstore. The other half comes from a local bargain outlet store, where the books were as low as two for $1, and none of the books I purchased were over $3. Can you blame me for losing control of myself? The answer is no, no you cannot.

Here they are all stacked up. Um, I didn’t realize how many I bought until seeing them amassed like this. I just contemplated taking a pledge to myself not to buy anymore graphic novels until all of these are read, but that’s a promise we all know I can’t keep.

Back to the books. Let me break it down for you:

• Raina Telgemeier’s Drama
• Miss Lasko-Gross’ A Mess of Everything
• Martin Rowson’s The Wasteland
• Marjane Satrapi’s Chicken with Plums
• Richard Sala’s Peculia
• Matt Groening’s Futurama Adventures

• Adam Sexton’s Shakespeare’s Macbeth: The Manga Edition
• Richard Appignanesi’s Manga Shakespeare: The Tempest
• Jordan Mechner’s Prince of Persia
• John Matthews’ The Chronicles of Arthur: Sword of Fire and Ice
• William Shakespeare’s Macbeth (the ISBN on this gn is linked to the original work. Why? I don’t know.)
• Darren G. Davis’ Ray Harryhausen Presents: Wrath of the Titans
• Chuck Dixon’s Dean Koontz’s Frankenstein, Volume 1: Prodigal Son

• Sergio Aragones’ Louder Than Words
• Aline Kominsky Crumb’s Need More Love
• Steve Niles’ Daughters of Fly in my Eye
• Michael Barson’s Agonizing Love: The Golden Era of Romance Comics

• Rex Michael’s Fangbone! Third-Grade Barbarian
• Rex Michael’s The Egg of Misery: Fangbone, Third Grade Barbarian
• Stefan Petrucha’s Nancy Drew #15-21

The beauty of graphic novels is that they take a few hours to read tops, so it really won’t take me long to get through this glorious mountain of sequential art. ...Fine, yes, that's what I tell myself to allay the bookhoarder guilt. What of it?

Linked up here, here, here,and here. 

Newest Arrivals

Over the past few weeks, I've acquired a substantial amount of new and used books. Some are giveaways, some gifts, some products of self-indulgent book-binging... and all mine, mine, MINE! Observe:

These three hailed from  the used bookstore to knock a few books off the ol' wishlist. 

And these gorgeous graphic novels are also all from the used bookstore. Can you tell I feel considerably less guilty over buying books when they are purchased from the used bookstore? I justify these guilt-free splurges several ways: 1) They are significantly marked down from their retail prices, 2) It is my personal duty to the community to patronize local brick-and-mortar bookstores, and 3) These books used to have a shelf they once called home, and they need me to adopt them because their days of readability are not yet over.

In this pile, the first book was a gift from a co-worker who highly recommends the series after learning I haven't read anything of the steampunk genre yet, and the second is a gift from my mother for a long day of travel.

These beauties were all won in GoodReads' First Reads giveaways. Though I think I am going to cool-it with the giveaways as I don't have any particular interest in some of these books other than that they were free.

And last but not least (by any means), these were all purchased with a birthday gift card! I put that generous gift card to excellent use, as you can see.

Though it probably goes without saying, I openly admit that I am a full-fledged bibliophile, and I make no apologies.

Linked up here and here.

The Best Kind of Mail

In my continuous and steadfast crusade against the downfall of paper media, I do solemnly swear that I will only buy print books; however, sometimes this must be accomplished via the internets as opposed to going to a brick and mortar bookstore. I do my very best to support my local bookstores, though I can't deny it's fun to receive packages full of books on my doorstep.

In the past week, I've received three of said book packages from W.W. Norton, Gray Wolf Press, and Hachette Books respectively.

I was lucky enough to win both Don Lee's The Collective from W.W. Norton and Ted Sanders' No Animals We Could Name from Gray Wolf Press in two Good Reads First Reads giveaways.

Major bonus that they aren't ARCs or Galleys, which is usually what a person wins in a First Reads giveaway. No Animals We Could Name is a shiny perfect-bound paperback, and The Collective is a hardcover! Both have beautiful cover art, too. I can't wait to feast on these two books. I just have to finish my Random Reads challenge first, but I'm halfway there.

The third package I got in the mail from Hachette Book Group contained the three items I've been drooling over admiring from afar on Chronicle Books' website. I finally bit the bullet and bought them thanks to the incredible sale they were having for Family and Friends: 35% off and free shipping. The sale is going on until July 24th, so you have a few more days to check it out.

I have been pining away for years over Grady McFerrin's This Book Belongs To bookplates and labels. And, I can officially say that they are everything I imagined them to be. Hmm.. that sounded pretty dramatic, but it doesn't make it any less true.

Being the Shakespeare lover that I am, I jumped all over this gorgeous specimen. Feast your eyes on the beautiful, modern illustrations by Caitlin Keegan.

And lastly, I bought the Carpe Diem Journal. I figured it could possibly motivate me to meet all those small goals I set for myself and then promptly forget about because life gets in the way. Plus, it's pretty.

Look at them all together in perfect harmony. It's a sweet coincidence that their colors all complement each other so nicely.

Now to find the perfect bookshelf to place my spoils. That's always half the fun, at least if your name is Rosie. So, how about you? Get any new books lately?

Linked up here and here.

A Book Spree, a new stack, and some musings...

I went to Mr. K's last night to check out the big sale going on there this weekend. I managed to snag some really great books for prices low enough to make me ridiculously giddy. I've always liked to buy my books new, but I have become quite the used books convert during my last few pilgrimages to Mr. K's. I also feel it's my personal responsibility, as well as the community's, to patronize any and all local independent book stores.

Here's a picture of my newest stack:

This may or may not be another symptom of my bibliophilia, but I love to know what motivates people to pick-up/read/buy their books. Is it because a trusted friend told you that you'd like it? Was it a GoodReads suggestion? Are you addicted to that series/author/genre? Even the most trivial reasons interest me. It's my belief that there are no wrong reasons to read a book as long as you take something important away with you from that reading experience. Is your English teacher forcing you to read it? Trying to impress your hipster friends? Convincing your love interest that you have the same tastes? I might giggle at you, but hey, I'm an advocate for reading the written word. If you are reading at all, good for you.

So, why did I pick up these particular books, you ask? Here's the breakdown:

• Cassandra Clare's City of Lost Souls (The Mortal Instruments Book 5)
  I will probably elaborate further on my experience with this series some other time, but for now I will just say I read the first four, and my curiosity is piqued.
• Tina Fey's Bossypants
  I don't read biographies/autobiographies on the regular, but I'm a huge Tina Fey fan, and I heard great things about her memoir and wanted to check it out.
• Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis 1&2
  Always an avid graphic novel reader, I've known about and wanted to read Persepolis for years now. When I found the first 2 books in lovely condition for about $5 a piece, I had to have them.
• Natalie Babbitt's The Search for Delicious
  So, I've slowly been making my way through the books I should have read in my adolescence, and I figure this book is one of them. Babbitt's Tuck Everlasting was the first book to make me truly think. That book blew my ten-year-old mind. Therefor, this little hardcover gem called out to me.
• Creech's Bloomability and Hate That Cat
  No idea what either of them are about. Never heard of them. I just know that my undying loyalty to Creech has grown even stronger since reading and loving Heartbeat a few weeks ago. Here's hoping these two books are just as good.

It looks like I will be adding more books to my summer reading list, putting even more pressure on myself to read all of them in the next few months. Oh well, there are worse goals to have, right?