First buys this August:

Solstice, by Joyce Carol Oates
Slowness, by Milan Kundera
The Pillow Friend, by Lisa Tuttle
H.P. Lovecraft's Favorite Weird Tales, edited by Douglas A. Anderson

All from a stack of sale books at a leading bookstore which is having an anniversary sale this month. I must've picked them all out within five minutes of entering the shop -- unplanned, impulsive, but very happy purchases!

Well I got my Amazon-parcel yesterday at last :-) and it contains 19th century classics:

Wilkie Collins: The Moonstone; Man and Wife
Charles Dickens: Bleak House
George Eliot: Middlemarch

Message edited by its author, Aug 2, 2007, 6:02am.

Yesterday my mother gave me Adorable Knits for Tots: just another step in her Project Wishful Thinking...

In the mail I received Hill Towns by Anne Rivers Siddons.
I have taken a vow not to borrow any more books or pay more than $1 for a secondhand one until I read 10 in my TBR pile!

"Team of Rivals" by Doris Kerns Goodwin, "Lost Illusions", by Honor de Balzac, and "Water for Elephants," by Sara Gruen. I'm reading all three, doing the two novels at bedtime and the non-fiction during the day. I would switch and do the second fiction during the day, but Team of Rivals weighs about 14 pounds... I can't read it in bed.

I went a little nuts at Half Price Books:

Inheritance of Loss by Kiran Desai
Too Loud a Solitude by Bohumil Hrabal
Riddley Walker by Russell Hoban
Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami
Caramelo by Sandra Cisneros

I also hit Costco and got Peony in Love by Lisa See and Plato and a Platypus Walk into a Bar by Thomas Cathcart and Daniel Klein. Okay, now I'm broke.

Mouse Noses On Toast from work.

And I'm going to the Strand Annex after work. I am sick, I am miserable, I live with a lunatic, I have no money and no apartment after the first, and I am going to go buy BOOKS, DAMN IT!

Well I bought The Island and Astonishing Splashes of Colour which was an LT recommendation at Borders last night and of course today I found another book I want called Last Town on Earth. My TBR pile will never shrink at this rate.

>>8 I recently finished Astonishing Splashes of Colour and thought it was a wonderful novel. Sad but hopeful, and beautifully written.

Clare Morrall's newest, Natural Flights of the Human Mind, arrived yesterday. I'm going to try to finish There Are Jews in My House before cracking it open, but it will be hard to wait!

I didn't buy any, but I did go to the library. I picked up Anna Karenina by Leo Tolstoy and I Know This Much Is True by Wally Lamb. I'm holding off on reading them right now; I'm going on vacation this Saturday and I need reading material for the trip!

An exact answer to the question, "What books came into your house today?" for Aug. 2/07:

The following book was delivered (Chapters Online) to my house today, but it's not for me. My younger son ordered it for my husband: Mackenzie King: Citizenship and Community.

Today, I received (also via Chapters Online) a copy of Madame de Stael by Maria Fairweather, but it was damaged, so I had to take it in to my local Chapters store. They're sending me a new one.

I also brought two books from my school library (I'm a teacher-librarian) into my house, as my mother wants to read them for her book club: The Five Books of Moses Lapinsky by Karen X. Tulchinsky--don't ask me what the X. stands for--and The Devil in the White City by Erik Larson. I'll drive them to
'me mhum's' tomorrow.

So there is your literal and exact answer!

Message edited by its author, Aug 2, 2007, 9:38pm.

--> 8 and 9

I finished Astonishing Splashes of Colour and liked it very much. I especially liked the way the author portrayed Kitty, the protagonist. Kitty tended to be rather crazy, but it was a lovely and understandable craziness.

I hope you like the book too, momom248.

A few days ago I bought Troll: A Love Story. It's a book by an author from Finnish Lapland who writes about a gay man who adopts a troll. Now that seems like an unusual story. So far, it's quite a fun read. More later...!

Message edited by its author, Aug 2, 2007, 10:15pm.

I finally received a phone call from the library to say my requests for The road and Middlesex were finally in! So that's my weekend reading.

--> 14

Ooooh! I LOVED The Road. Start with that one, judylou!

A few books I bought on a whim:

The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath
Life of Pi by Yann Martel
The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy
My Story by Dave Pelzer
Night by Elie Wiesel

All five books received a great deal of critical acclaim so I'm quite excited about reading them all, however, I'm rather unsure as to which book I should begin reading first! Any recommendations?

--> 16

The Life or Pi or Night. Both are equally as good - but in different ways.

Message edited by its author, Aug 3, 2007, 8:58am.

Came home today with:
Of Mice and Men by Steinbeck
The Great Gatsby by Fitzgerald
The Crucible by Miller
(preparing for the new school year)
Breathing Lessons by Anne Tyler
Independence Day by Ford
The Stone Diaries by Shields
The Stories of John Cheever
(plan to read all Pulitzer Prize Winners in Literature)
Between, Georgia
(for book club)

Book trade received in mail: A Wedding in December by Anita Shreve.
Spent time in a bookstore but resisted and did not buy anything.

I had an errand to run at the mall yesterday, and as per my usual, I couldn't stay out of the bookstore. Added to may already enormous TBR pile is The Blood Books, Vol. II by Tanya Huff and Cry to Heaven by Anne Rice.

I really need to stop buying books. I'm running out of room for them. Oh, well...

Lamb, The Gospel According to Biff, Christ's Childhood Pal by Christopher Moore
The Yiddish Policemen's Union by Michael Chabon
The Sundering (SFBC Omnibus) by Jacqueline Carey
The Coyote Road: Trickster Tales edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling

I needed retail therapy today due to a week of hectic work. I bought the following:

* Before I Wake by Robert J. Wiersema - This is recommended by a colleague. She said this book has similar style as Jodi Picoult's books.
* Bloodletting and Miraculous Cures by Vincent Lam

Message edited by its author, Aug 17, 2007, 10:23pm.

In today's mail: The Comforters by Muriel Spark (via paperbackswap.com)

The Innocent by Ian McEwan.

#21: seitherin: The Coyote Road sounds interesting!

Anyway, I scored a couple more books from the sale stack:

The Silver Bough, by Lisa Tuttle
Vintage Living Texts: Jeanette Winterson, by Margaret Reynolds

I received Tipperary by Frank Delaney from LT's Early Reviewers and Patty Jane's House of Curl by Lorna Landvik from PaperBackSwap. I am expecting (any day now) Chocolat by Joanne Harris and I, Elizabeth by Rosalind Miles from PaperBackSwap.

Happy Reading!
Jill

I just recently bought, started, and immediately finished Troll: A Love Story by Johanna Sinisalo.

OMG!!! This was a fabulous book! I couldn't stop reading it. If you're not afraid of gay fiction, love the absurd, want to read something hilariously funny, utterly gruesome, and wildly original, THIS IS THE BOOK!

Enjoy!

Message edited by its author, Aug 4, 2007, 8:27am.

I borrowed Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie from the library today, as it's the Posh Club choice for August.

#21 Lamb is hilarious! Now that I'm buying books again, I may buy that one just so I can have it on my bookshelf and reread it whenever I feel the need for a good laugh. It's that good! Enjoy!

Picked up 4 audiobooks from the library:

Artemis Fowl The Opal Deception by Eoin Colfer
Find Me by Carol O'Connell
Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austin
The Road by Cormac McCarthy

Black Mischief, Scoop, The Loved One, The Ordeal of Gilbert Pinfold by Evelyn Waugh
Edinburgh Days by Sam Pickering
The Best of Evil by Eric Wilson
Silver Cross Cottage by Karen Rounsville Everett

The first two were ordered online and the last two were purchased today at a local bookstore and the authors were there to sign them.

I picked up the new Jasper Fforde book, First Among Sequels. Looking forward to reading it

Friday night I bought Hypatia of Alexandria: Mathematician and Martyr by Michael Deakin. I've been anxiously waiting for this to come out, but I wasn't expecting to see it in a physical store. I was sure I'd have to order it, so I was quite pleased to find it just sitting there on the shelf like it was waiting for me.

I got tired of waiting for this book from the library and purchased it today: The Nature of Monsters by Clare Clark.

edited to fix touchstones

Message edited by its author, Aug 5, 2007, 8:17pm.

Sort of like potato chips, you can't stop with just one?

Today, I drove to a bookstore in a neighboring city and bought the paperbacks of Books One and Two of The Dresden Files ~ Fool Moon and Grave Peril ~ which I've been unable to find at the library or any of my local bookstores, and almost bought the other books in the series that were in stock as well. Then, on the way to the cash register, I saw the hardcovers of Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norrell and Killing Critics on the bargain shelves and picked up those too.

And this is a woman who has not purchased more than dozen reference books and maybe 10 novels over the past 20 years! I feel soooo free! :)

Casual by Oksana Robski

It's about the intrigues among the Russian nouveau-super-riche -- $50,000/day shopping sprees, vacations in Courchevel, beautiful villas with warming marble floors, dinners with caviar and Crystal, expensive cars outside, etc. The book is supposed to be very witty in Russian and was wildly popular throughout the country. i'm planning to take a crack at reading it in the original, but doubt i'll get too far (it's been awhile since i've used Russian).

Yay! I just got a copy of InterWorld, by Neil Gaiman and Michael Reaves, over my lunch break! =D

Dress Your Family in Corduroy and Denim.

Invitation to a Beheading by Vladimir Nabokov
Tortilla Curtain by T.C. Boyle
Possibility of Being by Rainer Maria Rilke

All for less than $15. Half Price Books rules!

At yard sales Saturday, for 85 cents Cdn:

The Echo by Minette Walters
The Loved One by Evelyn Waugh
Waiting to Exhale by Terry MacMillan
The Puffin Book of Nursery Rhymes by Iona and Peter Opie

From the library:

Elmer Gantry by Sinclair Lewis
Great Tales of Horror and the Supernatural by Bill Pronzini
Candles Burning by Tabitha King and Michael McDowell

I just got my ARC of The Guardians by Ana Castillo, so that is now at the forefront of my reading list.

Received my Early Reviewers copy of Tipperary. Also brought home The Samurai's Garden, passed along by my sister.

Message edited by its author, Aug 6, 2007, 8:19pm.

A nice hard covered copy of Dress Your Family in Courduroy and Denim from the discount table at Borders. And, drum roll please, the much-awaited ARC of The Guardians.

This morning my mail carrier delivered a box from mybooks4less:
Killing the Shadows by ValMcDermid
Our Game by John LeCarre
Death at La Fenice by Donna Leon
Strange Affair byPeter Robinson
Final Account by Peter Robinson
Harmful Intent by Blaine Kerr
Final Witness by Simon Tolkien

Next, the UPS guy brought 3 books from amazon.com
Adult Bullying: Perpetrators and Victims by Peter Randall
The Resurrection of the Son of God by N.T. Wright
The Last Word: Beyond the Bible Wars to a New Understanding of the Authority of Scripture by N.T. Wright

Then I treated myself to a mini library crawl with late lunch at Panera. Read a cool short story by Dorothy L. Sayers while I ate. It's titled "The Man Who Knew How" and is in the Hillerman/Herbert collection listed below.

Picked up the following from Liverpool Library sale:
The Book of Fate by Brad Meltzer
The New Omnibus of Crime edited by Tony Hillerman and Rosemary Herbert.
Immoral by Brian Freeman
All the Dead Were Strangers by Ethan Black
Entombed by Linda Fairstein
One False Move by Alex Kava
Wild Justice by Philip Margolin

Final stop for the day was Manlius Public Library sale table which yielded:
Blood Tells by Ray Saunders
Condition Black by Gerald Seymour
No Safe Place by Richard North Patterson

All of the books from Liverpool and Manlius libraries are hardcovers in like-new condition (not ex-library) for which I spent a total of $10.00.

In sum, today did not suck!

Am up for suggestions about which of these I should read first, should you care to provide input.

Ohmigod, what a haul! I would not know where to start ... but would have lots of fun stacking, rearranging, and admiring that vast quantity of books on my shelves!

After another trip to City Lights Books, I picked up the following:

Asleep in the Sun by Adolfo Bioy Casares
Cronopios and Famas and Diary of Andres Fava by Julio Cortazar
A Tiger for Malgudi by R.K. Narayan
The Cement Garden by Ian McEwan
Ghost Map by Steven Johnson
The Septembers of Shiraz by Dalia Sofer

Received from Bookmooch The True History of the Kelly Gang by Peter Carey.

An almost new trade paperback copy of Time & again by Jack Finney from our local used bookstore. During the summer it's open every day & it was nice to see that it was crowded & busy because the sales are used to fund a local library which is still in the planning stages.

#44 You and I must be the same person. I got the exact same books, at nearly the same time.

Recent Purchases/Finds/Whatevers

Free From Work (Since today is my last day)
Spook Country
Who's Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?
Song Of Susannah
The Redwall Cookbook
A Mother For Choco
Show Way
Before You Were Mine
The Book That Jack Wrote

Purchased
Disgrace
Shadow Of The Wind
The Omnivore's Dilemma

Ordered From Amazon.com
The Gun Seller
Bizarro Starter Kit

And today to celebrate being unemployed and broke, I'm going to the bookstore!

From the charity shop yesterday and in v.g. condition -
Daughter of Fortune by Isabel Allende
They Came from SW19 by Nigel Williams
To the Lighthouse by Virginia Woolf
The Apple by Michael Faber

Message edited by its author, Aug 9, 2007, 11:25am.

Dover Books is having a five week 60% "Bargain Bin" sale. Each week a new set of books are introduced (the previous set are still available as well). The sale is in its second week.

Today I ordered:

A Ravel Reader
The return of the soldier by Rebecca West
The beckoning fair one by Oliver Onions
The Wyvern mystery by J. Sheridan LeFanu
A voyage to Arcturus by David Lindsay
Short Stories by the Generation of 1898
and the unabridged and unappended reproduction of of James Joyce's 1922 1st edition of Ulysses, originally published by Shakespeare and Company (Paris).

I qualified for free shipping too! :-)

I came home with two library books:

Instead of Education
Death and the Dancing Footman

The latter was recommended to me by a friend and fellow LT user; she liked my Rex Stout recommendation to her and in turn thought I might enjoy Ngaio Marsh.

Also, a gently used picture book arrived in the mail:

Three Questions by Jon J. Muth

Message edited by its author, Aug 9, 2007, 8:24pm.

After another trip to City Lights, these books leaped into my arms:

What Is Poetry? by Lawrence Ferlinghetti
A Coney Island of the Mind by Lawrence Ferlinghetti
In the Skin of a Lion by Michael Ondaatje
Lawrence Ferlinghetti Sits Down With Soheyl Dahi by Soheyl Dali
Breathing Space: How Allergies Shape Our Lives and Landscapes by Gregg Mitman

I received a delivery from Amazon:

Roasting in Hell's Kitchen by Gordon Ramsay
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, The Girls of Slender Means, The Driver's Seat, The Only Problem by Muriel Spark

I was intrigued by Muriel Spark because Ian Rankin mentioned he was influenced by her.

From the library: Ex Libris : Confessions of a Common Reader by Anne Fadiman. I'm so looking forward to reading her essays.

Yesterday, received as an advance birthday gift from a friend: After the Quake, by Haruki Murakami.

Today I got a first edition hardcover of Salman Rushdie's East, West from a second-hand bookshop. Should be a good read/break from my usual stuff I read, Neil Gaiman this ain't, but since it was a book of short stories, I couldn't resist. The Chekov and Zulu story is pretty good, quite dense and layered compared to what I'm used to. Getting used to the references to India as well.

Message edited by its author, Aug 10, 2007, 6:07am.

Recently, I've acquired Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J.K. Rowling, The Shop on Blossom Street and A Good Yarn by Debbie Macomber. All from online. I never seem to go to bookstores anymore.
Besides, I just love getting books in the mail, and the Macomber books were so cheap, I had to get them, even if I won't read them till December.

One of my co-workers came in today with a box of books to give I took The book of Illusions by Paul Auster, Rain of Gold and The Rule of Four (which I hear stinks, but hey, it was free what do I have to lose?)
Edited to add a forgotten book

Message edited by its author, Aug 11, 2007, 3:32am.

My amazon order came in with Eclipse by Stephenie Meyer, Thin Air by Rachel Caine and On the Prowl which is an anthology.

Had to make a return to Borders and of course couldn't leave w/o replacing that return w/ something else and then some. The Secret River and The Conjurer's Bird both I think were LT recommendations.

Oops. I walked into Powells City of Books on my break today and was FORCED to buy several books (they are just ruthless in that bookstore!):

A Month in the Country by J.L. Carr
Letters to a Young Poet by Rilke
The Yacoubian Building by Alaa Al Aswany
To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee (I'm way overdue for a re-read of this!)
A Place on Earth : a novel by Wendell Berry.

Preparing for vacation!

have a great vacation teelgee!!

Bought at Value Village today:

The Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
The Memory Keeper's Daughter by Kim Edwards
The Seven Daughters of Eve by Bryan Sykes
The Line of Beauty by Alan Hollinghurst
These High, Green Hills by Jan Karon

Yesterday I received Gap Creek by Robert Morgan thru Mooch.com

via paperbackswap.com:

The Queen of Whale Cay: the life of a great American eccentric by Kate Summerscale

I purchased a new copy of Little Women by Louisa May Alcott to replace my childhood copy. Today I ordered The Gravedigger's Daughter the newest novel by Joyce Carol Oates.She is one of my favorite authors, though her themes are often terribly dark and intense, as is her writing. I also ordered Water for Elephants by Sarah Gruen. I am eagerly awaiting the arrival of my UPS driver with my books.

Got one book through the post today: The Railway, which I'm looking forward to after depressaholic's recommendation.

Then I went to a discount book sale, and *tried* to be good, but they were all only £1 each...
Lonesome George, about the tortoise on the Galapagos (which may also appeal to the husband!)
Race Against Time by Ellen Macarthur because it was a lovely pretty hardback
The Master of Petersburg by J. M. Coetzee
The Accidental by Ali Smith
On Beauty by Zadie Smith
A Game with Sharpened Knives by Neil Belton
The Oxford Essential Guide to Egyptian Mythology
Around the world in 80 Dates by Jennifer Cox
The Mill on the Floss and North and South, because I was excited to buy Penguin Popular Classics for £1 each again, and not in the horrible cheap new green covers.

I'm not going to be allowed near a book shop for a while now I think...

(Edited for touchstone issues)

Message edited by its author, Aug 11, 2007, 9:44am.

I went to the bookstore to get a book for a freind and walked out with three books for myself. I have been wanting to get Philip Pullman's series, His Dark Materials for some time now (I collect children's books) and so I went home with
The Golden Compass
The Subtle Knife
The Amber Spyglass

I went to 3 thrift shops and had amazing luck for about $30

Manhunt James Swanson
The Emperor's Children Claire Messud
The Tenth Circle Jodi Picoult
The Price of Loyalty Ron Suskind
Last Orders Graham Swift
The Glass Castle Jeannette Walls
Breathing Lessons Anne Tyler
The Interpreter Suzanne Glass
The Last Empress Anchee Min
Gods in Alabama Joshilyn Jackson
The Thirteenth Tale Diane Setterfield

It was a slow Saturday for me. I went to the library and picked up The Thirteenth Tale and Malinche. I still have four other library books to catch up on.

Stopped at the Book Barn in Niantic, CT and purchased:

Under the Jaguar Sun by Italo Calvino
If on a winter's night a traveler also by Italo Calvino
The Solitude of Self: Thinking About Elizabeth Cady Stanton by Vivian Gornick
Squares and Courtyards: Poems by Marilyn Hacker
Hamlet's Mother and Other Women by Carolyn G. Heilbrun
Unremembered Country poems by Susan Griffin

This month I have bought:

The Friday Night Knitting club by Kate Jacobs
I knit so I couldn't resist it in the end.

At the University bookstore they had a pile of books 50% off and I saw Jane Eyre. I bought it, thought it was time to fix the gap in my classics reading. Strangely I have never 'had' to read this book for English though I feel I've had to read every other classic - including Wide Sargasso Sea The prequel to Jane Eyre by Jean Rhys.

My local Borders shop has changed it '3 for 2' book selection again. Of course there were more than 3 that I wanted so I frowned and finally figured out which three I really wanted. After that hard work I realised I didn't need these books and as I'm having my wisdom teeth out soon I should save my money and put the books back - arrgh!

Today at Borders I picked up Her Majesty's Dog Volume 6 which finishes off all the mangas currently out in that particular series and Devil May Cry by Sherrilyn Kenyon.

I received the following the other day, birthday gift from my boyfriend:

Year's Best Fantasy and Horror: Sixteenth Annual Collection, edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling
Year's Best Fantasy and Horror: Eighteenth Annual Collection, edited by Ellen Datlow and Terri Windling
Flights: Extreme Visions of Fantasy: Volume II, edited by Al Sarrantonio

And got the following from the sale stack at a local bookstore:

Several Perceptions, by Angela Carter
Shadow Dance, by Angela Carter

Message edited by its author, Aug 12, 2007, 12:30am.

I just picked up The Scandal of the Season: A Novel by Sophie Gee. It's historical fiction based on Alexander Pope's writing of The Rape of the Lock. Sounds like fun!

Message edited by its author, Aug 12, 2007, 11:50am.

I bought Forever Odd today, because for some reason I couldn't stop thinking about it.

This bookstore also failed to have The Eyre Affair or The Brothers K, the two books I am currently lusting over. Cruel world.

(wonky touchstones, why you gotta be so wonky?)

This past week I bought High Noon, Merle's Door, and Debating Calvinism.

Yesterday I stopped at a Value Village and got:
Family Matters by Rohinton Mistry (had a nice conversation with the check-out girl who highly recommended Mistry's Such a Long Journey)
Stones from the River by Ursula Hegi
The Crocodile Bird by Ruth Rendell

and today at a flea market I bought:
Range of Motion by Elizabeth Berg
and
Paula by Isabel Allende

Message edited by its author, Aug 12, 2007, 8:34pm.

Quincunx by Charles Palliser. Bought a good second hand paperback copy for $6.

Today I bought a limited edition hardcover of Neil Gaiman and Charles Vess's Stardust. It looks great.

After having almost no books arrive at my house in about a week, today yielded:

YOU CAN MAKE A DIFFERENCE (Cyoa, No 51)
Space and Beyond (Choose Your Own Adventure 4)
The Secret of the Plant That Ate Dirty Socks
Family Practice Review: A Problem Oriented Approach
Lecture Notes on Clinical Chemistry (Lecture Notes)
NMS: Psychiatry
Man Made: A Memoir
Tyrannosaurus Sue

I think two others arrived on Saturday

Gorgon: The Monsters That Ruled the Planet Before Dinosaurs and How They Died in the Greatest Catastrophe in Earth's History
Garfield rolls on

#2 Falkin:
I have the Moonstone but got distracted and have not finished it yet. The Woman in White is wonderful. I have read it twice and Masterpiece Theater showed A Woman in White in 2002. I am ashamed to say that I have watched it at least a half dozen times. Mansfield Park and Jane Eyre are two of my other worn out dvds.

Things got a little crazy at the library today. I went to pick up some books I'd put on reserve that all came in at the same time. Turned out there were more than a few ~ there were 10. Then, just for fun, I lugged my burden of books to the popular section to see what had come in since the last time I was there (a few days ago) and guess what was lurking on a shelf in the very back?!? HP and the DH!!! Well, it jumped straight into my arms, almost knocking me down (it is a rather large book), and as I staggered toward the checkout machine, 3 more waylaid me, forcing me to check them out too. I'll tell you, libraries can be dangerous places.

Books
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows by JKR
Three Novels of Ancient Egypt by Naguib Mahfouz
Lean Mean Thirteen by Janet Evanovich
The Cruel Stars of the Night by Kjell Eriksson
The Fall of Rome by Michael Curtis Ford
Dead Beat by Jim Butcher
White Night by Jim Butcher

Audiobooks to load on my iPod:
Dark Assassins by Anne Perry
Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen
Absalom, Absalom! by William Faulkner
the Woods by Harlan Coben
A Moveable Feast by Ernest Hemingway
The Sun Also Rises by Hemingway
The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

Edited to say:

*Bad touchstones! Refusing to load tonight. Think I overloaded the system?* :D

Message edited by its author, Aug 13, 2007, 11:49pm.

#55
Did you know that Maggie Smith aka Professor McGonagall (Harry Potter)
played Jean Brodie in the movie? I need to read the book and watch the movie
again.
Booksinbed:
We loved Devil in the White City

Today the Southern Living Christmas came in the mail. From Daedalus Books
we received:
The Wreck of the Batavia by Simon Leys
Magnificent Corpses by Anneli Rufus
Finding Atlantis by David King
Ada Blackjack by Jennifer Niven
Frozen Oceans by David N. Thomas
A Thousand Days by Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.

Picked up Lost and Found by Carolyn Parkhurst while shopping at Target.

Going on a road trip later this week and visited two libraries to look for Books on Tape/CD. Had to visit the secondhand table at one and the little secondhand store at the other. These books asked to be taken home:

The Crystal Cave by Mary Stewart
The Hollow Hills by Mary Stewart
The Last Enchantment by Mary Stewart
The General's Daughter by Nelson DeMille
If Morning Ever Comes by Anne Tyler
Dinner at the Homesick Restaurant by Anne Tyler
Murder in my Backyard by Ann Cleeves
and the best one:
Saturday by Ian McEwan, in like-new condition!

Books on tape -
Thank you, Jeeves by P.G. Wodehouse
The Assault on Reason by Al Gore
and for my travelling companion, who hasn't read it:
The Kite Runner by Kholed Hosseini

Mum bought The Invention Of Hugo Cabret for me today. It was a good book, I read it all today. It's a thick book, but a quick read.

Finally! Bought The Eyre Affair! The only copy, I might add. I feel validated as a human being.

Got Pattern Recognition (William Gibson) through the mail today from Bookmooch

#88 I really enjoyed Saturday. McEwan keeps getting more and more introspective as he ages, and it is showing in his characters. Loved On Chesil Beach as well.

Message edited by its author, Aug 14, 2007, 5:40pm.

I picked up an armful of picture books and a few adult nonfiction books at the library:

Never Too Late: My Musical Life Story
How Children Learn
How Children Fail
(all three by John Holt)
Unfinished Journey by Yehudi Menuhin
Parenting an Only Child

From paperbackswap.com:

Dishwasher: one man's quest to wash dishes in all fifty states by Pete Jordan

Seajack - he can come to my house and wash all the dishes he wants in Oregon!

#88 Dihiba ~ have a great vacation!

The Crystal Cave by Mary Stewart
The Hollow Hills by Mary Stewart
The Last Enchantment by Mary Stewart

I loved the Merlin novels by Stewart! Hope you enjoy them too.

I got Virgin Suicides - and I haven't even seen the movie. I got a hardback copy of The Diving Bell and the Butterfly. I loved this book, lent it to a friend, and never saw it again. Best of all, they were $2 each.

I got Robin McKinley's Deerskin at a book sale yesterday. Happy!

#92 I've read Amsterdam and On Chesil Beach by McEwan - loved CB, my favourite so far this year.
#96 Read the Mary Stewart books years ago (and I do mean many years) - probably as a teenager. It'll be fun to reread them.

I stopped at Value Village again last night, looking for books for my classroom. Didn't have time because they had a whole lot of novels for me there! And all like new:

Another McEwan (anyone read it?):

A Child in Time by Ian McEwan
Mrs. Dalloway by Virginia Woolf
The Sunday Philosophy Club by Alexander McCall Smith
The Birth of Venus by Sarah Dunant
The Stranger House by Reginald Hill

I have to stop doing this.....

dihiba, good thing this Value Village isn't near me in New England--I'd be there quite a bit--sounds like a great.

I haven't spent much time looking at the books at Value Village, but have saved a small fortune on used clothes there!

Through the mail from Bookmooch today: Stupid White Men by Michael Moore

#99 dihiba, what do you teach? I haven't yet read The Child in Time, but I've read some other earlier McEwan (The Cement Garden, The Comfort of Strangers) and I have The Innocent on audio but haven't listened to it yet. Touchstones aren't correct--not Harlan Coben! McEwan's style has changed quite a bit.

When you fininsh Mrs. Dalloway, try reading Michael Cunningham's The Hours.

Aug 15

From bookmooch

Ancient Environments (Prentice Hall Foundations of Earth Science Series)

Message edited by its author, Aug 15, 2007, 3:02pm.

A surprise from the husband - The Silent Twins by Marjorie Wallace. He said he saw it mentioned somewhere and thought it sounded intriguing. After reading the description on the dust jacket, I have to agree (silent, antisocial twins who develop an elaborate fantasy world and their own "secret" language and signals end up in a psychiatric hospital).

I am resisting the urge to put my other books aside to read this one immediately. But it's tempting...so tempting...

Cariola - I teach ESL (high school).
'Fraid I will pass on The Hours - it is one of my all time hated movies!!
My interest in Virginia Woolf - she lived and died near where my mother grew up. In fact, a distant relation married a Dalloway - she probably picked the name from the locals!
I am going to stay away from the Value Villages for at least a week : ).

From Goodwill today:

A Wrinkle in Time - a later edition than what I had when I was growing up, but I'm glad to have it. I just need to get the others.

The Last Battle - the final book in the Narnia series, of which I've not read at all, and also....this is the only one I have so far. haha.

I've been lurking in this group for a few days now. So hi.

I tried to go to the Gotham Book Mart today, but it was closed and doesn't say when it will reopen.

So I consoled myself by walking into the massive Barnes and Noble nearby and browsing books in air conditioned splendor. But I managed to resist, until I got it in my head to head on down to The Strand. Big mistake.

I am now the proud owner of...

Non-Fiction

A Billion Bootstraps; Leaving Microsoft to Change the World; Incendiary Circumstances; Not On Our Watch:The Mission to End Genocide in Darfur and Beyond; The Best American Sports Writing 2002; The Oxford Guide to Word Games; Reflections on the Revolution in France

Fiction

41 Stories; Tigana; One Day of Life; Hotel Du Lac

Edit: The touchstone for Not On Our Watch is still wrong. I tried to change it but it is reading as Night Watch by Terry Pratchett.

Message edited by its author, Aug 17, 2007, 12:44pm.

I. Need. To. Stop. Buying. Books.

American Gods
The Long Goodbye

I also had Medical Detectives in my hand, but my friend did an intervention and took it away. Now I'm annoyed with her. And myself, for asking her to do so.

ellevee--I'm chuckling because I too need to stop buying books and my friend has threatened intervention on me many times. Luckily she hasn't been with me at the bookstore--yet.

#108, gracer, Sometimes you can edit touchstones. If the one that appears says (others) after it, you can click on that and see a list of other possibilities, sometimes including the right one. And welcome!

I'm sorely tempted to go back today and buy that book on my own. I don't have a PROBLEM!

August 16

From bookmooch

The erotic traveler
Arctic Daughter: A Wilderness Journey
Touching My Father's Soul: A Sherpa's Journey to the Top of Everest
In a Time of Fallen Heroes: The Re-Creation of Masculinity
High on Adventure II: Dreams Becoming Reality (High on Adventure II)
Toward a Recognition of Androgyny

From paperbackswap

Desert Hiking

From Abebooks

The Art of Public Speaking

##106--Sorry you saw the movie instead of reading the book. Cunningham does an awesome job of mimicking the structure of Mrs. Dalloway in a contemporary setting.

#106 The Hours was one of those books I could not believe was written by a man - it so perfectly captured aspects of being a woman.

Then again, I thought the movie was amazingly well-done, and a wonderful look at depression, so there's that.

I got Blood Rites, Dead Beat, and Proven Guilty by Jim Butcher.

Ooooh, seitherin ~ I just love the Harry Dresden series!

Aug 17

Cold burial

I just got these--

The Old Devils by Kingsley Amis
Absurdistan by Gary Shteyngart
White Teeth by Zadie Smith
Experience by Martin Amis
The Wind-Up Bird Chronicle by Haruki Murakami
Never let me go by Kazuo Ishiguro
David Copperfield by Charles Dickens

I think I'm going to read the Kingsley Amis one next.

Message edited by its author, Aug 17, 2007, 6:13pm.

I just got back from the library, and I bought the following at the bookstore:
Girl with a Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier
Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden
1984 by George Orwell
House of Sand and Fog by Andre Dubus
The March by E.L. Doctorow
The Master and the Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov

I also checked out A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini

Yesterday I checked out Sign of the Seahorse (a picture book) from the library and received A Running Start (used paperback) in the mail. But today I actually went to the bookstore and didn't leave with any books.

I can't believe that I needed another retail therapy in the same month. I got these today:

* The Cheese Monkeys by Chip Kidd
* The Hero's Walk by Anita Rau Badami
* Little Children by Tom Perrotta
* The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time by Mark Haddon

Message edited by its author, Aug 17, 2007, 10:22pm.

>121 chanale: how did you do it??? leave the bookstore without any books??? You must share your secret with us.

teelgee - Psst. My secret is having a maxed-out credit card. ;) (My daughter likes to go to the bookstore to play with the trains, so the trip was for her.)

#119 Loved White Teeth, hated Never Let Me Go.

Got another package from Alibris.com today (well yesterday seeing as it's 2:42 AM over here) and two more of my John D. MacDonald came in:

Slam the Big Door
The Good Old Stuff: 13 Early Stories

Got these two books for an unbeatable price, and they're in a nice condition, looking forward to reading them!

#120 I've read several of these. I loved Girl with a Pearl Earring--Chevalier hasn't come close in any of her later novels. I am one of the minority who didn't care for Memoirs of a Geisha. To me, it read like an American white guy's fantasy of the life of a geisha. 1984--a classic; can't go wrong there. I really hated House of Sand and Fog. I had no sympathy whatsoever for the main character, Kathy. Most of the time I was reading, I was shouting at her: "Grow up! Stop being a wussy, dependent female! Stop thinking you're some kind of special case!" If she had acted like a responsible adult, none of the bad things that happen would have. I really hate that kind of woman in real life, so it was impossible for me to empathize with her.

Message edited by its author, Aug 18, 2007, 2:50am.

I found a really cute little used book store called Hooked on Books in Wildwood, NJ. I bought the following books...

Natural Born Charmer by Susan Elizabeth Phillips
The Emperor's Children by Claire Messud
The Torso In The Town by Simon Brett
A Salty Piece of Land by Jimmy Buffett
Lethally Blond by Kate White
A Tale of Two Sisters by Anna Maxted

Message edited by its author, Aug 18, 2007, 8:40am.

>127 Cariola - I'm not sure we were supposed to empathize with her. I thought the book was more about cultural differences and misunderstandings. She was awful - and was supposed to be, imo.

August 18

From paperbackswap

Mash goes to Montreal
So what are you going to do with that? : a guide to career-changing for M.A.'s and Ph.D.'s

From Bookmooch

The World As I See It
The History of Vampires
Project Blue Book

And an bookmooch angel book that i have to send to Canada

I hadn't meant to tell you this

>129 Yes, I know that Kathy wasn't supposed to be a very likeable character, but it's pretty hard to enjoy a book if you can't empathize at all with the main character. To some extent the book was about cultural differences--but it seemed to me more about a not very bright and very spoiled, self-pitying woman who wanted what she wanted, regardless of anyone else's needs or legal rights.

A lot of books came into my home today or in the last week.

Cesar's Way by Cesar Millan
The Cat Who Brought Down the House by Lilian Jackson Braun
Blaze by Richard Bachman
The Good Guy by Dean Koontz
Last Witness by Jilliane Hoffman
The Quickie by James Patterson and Michael Ledwidge
and
Lean Mean Thirteen by Janet Evanovich

August 20 from bookmooch

Garfield Loses His Feet
Garfield's Thanksgiving
Where else but alaska?
The unofficial gay manual
The Right Stuff
God's Equation: Einstein, Relativity and the Expanding Universe

I too had a problem buying books. My book cases got too crowded, my pockets were empty and sometimes the books were really dissapointing and then I was mad I had wasted my money.

So I use www.booksfree.com which some one mentioned on this site. I pay $13 a month for a 4 book membership - meaning I get 4 books at a time. I can buy the books I like for a discount, which could be less (so far its cost me $10 a book for the two books I have bought). They get shipped to you. The best is, I was always having fines at the library and with booksfree, there is no late fee or deadline to return to the book.

I probably sound like I work for the site lol - Im just very happy with it - it may be a solution for some people

Sounds like Netflix for books, yes?

teelgee - exactly :)

First bunch of textbooks:

Orientalism, by Edward W. Said
The Agricola and the Germania, by Tacitus
The Annals of Imperial Rome, by Tacitus
Fences, by August Wilson
1918, by Horton Foote
Valentine's Day, by Horton Foote
The Origins of Totalitarianism, by Hannah Arendt
The Prince and the Discourses, by Niccolo Machiavelli
The Sonnets and Narrative Poems, by William Shakespeare
The Pocket Aristotle
Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego, by Sigmund Freud
Backstage Handbook, by Paul Carter
Theories of Tyranny, by Roger Boesche

Message edited by its author, Aug 21, 2007, 4:14pm.

I stop buying books and what happens? people start giving me books instead!

I swapped a book with a co-worker
She gave me Jonathan Strange and Mr Norrell and in return I gave her The curious incident of the dog in night-time what a hoot! One is so skinny the other is a door stop. I'm so glad I was picked up that night from work not lugging it home on the bus.

I saw my sister in the weekend she bought a load of books from her, my mum and my aunt. Some were my books that have made the rounds and will now head to the second hand shop. These were the new ones:
The way the crow flies: a novel by Anne-Marie Macdonald
An Absolute Scandal by Penny Vincenzi
Sylvia By Bryce Courtenay
City of Dreams: A Novel of Nieuw Amsterdam and Early Manhattan by Beverley Swerling
My boyfriend did not look pleased with yet another box of books to be added to the collection lol.

Message edited by its author, Aug 21, 2007, 3:05am.

Textbooks, batch two:

The Age of Empire, by Eric Hobsbawm
Arcadia, by Tom Stoppard
Anton Chekhov's Selected Plays
Man, the State, and War, by Kenneth N. Waltz
The Marx-Engels Reader

Was away for a few days and when I got back I had these books from mooch.com:

The Girl with the Pearl Earring by Tracy Chevalier

The Remains of the Day by Kazuo Ishiguro

Daughter of Fortune by Isabel Allende

at a flea market on Saturday I picked up:

Summer People by Marge Piercy

The Bleeding Heart by Marilyn French

I actually went to Value Village yesterday and bought nothing - although a couple tempted me.
I went to a branch of the library - again, I resisted!
Cariola, I agree about Kathy in House of Sand and Fog. I found The Hours incredibly depressing, it just seemed to wallow in it. I didn't find it represented life from a female point (I think ellevee said this) from my experience anyway.

Big summer sale at audible.com--I downloaded three new books:

England's Mistress by Kate Williams. It's a bio of Lady Hamilton.

American Bloomsbury by Sussan Cheever.

The Mercury Visions of Louis Daguerre by Dominic Smith.

I resisted buying a new edition of Moll Flanders but saved it to my wish list.

August 21 - bookmooch

Silent Invasion : The Shocking Discoveries of a UFO Researcher
Garfield Hangs Out (Book, No. 19)
The Rights of gay people (An American Civil Liberties Union handbook)
Medicine for Mountaineering
Wilderness Basics

Argh!! I can't stop myself!! I picked the following up from the sale stacks of a couple of bookstores:

Renaissance Faire, edited by Andre Norton and Jean Rabe
In the Night Room, by Peter Straub

Expensive People, by Joyce Carol Oates
I'll Take You there, by Joyce Carol Oates
The Barrens, by Joyce Carol Oates writing as Rosamond Smith

Just been to my local bookshop and bought the third book in John Simpsons auto biog Tales from no man's land.Have finished the Constant Gardener really liked the book.

Just picked up at Barnes & Noble: Away by Amy Bloom, On Agate Hill by Lee Smith, Poet of Tolstoy Park by Sonny Brewer and lastly Echo Maker by RIchard Powers. Echo Maker got very mixed reviews--I hope I didn't make a mistake by buying it. It sounded good and won the National Book Award so I figured what the heck.

Well, got my Amazon-Parcel just in this moment with my books for September:

George Eliot: Daniel Deronda
Edith Wharton: The House of Mirth
Wilkie Collins: Miss or Mrs?/The Haunted
Hotel/The Guilty River
Mary Elizabeth
Braddon: Lady Audley's Secret

I'm quite happy, because the next two weeks I'm on vacation and will have plenty of time for reading! :-)

Message edited by its author, Aug 23, 2007, 6:39am.

A Ride to Khiva just arrived this morning :-) It's a somewhat comical account of a Victorian Englishman's journey to Central Asia to check out what the Russians are up to, and I'm looking forward to reading it - I seem to like his writing style a lot (though this is only from page 1, so we shall see how it goes...!)

God is Not Great by Christopher Hitchens
The Autobiography of God by Julius Lester
The Robber Bride by Margaret Atwood
I plan to read all three concurrently.
All of them are from the public library. This weekend the Chapel Hill public library is having one of its big book sales. I usually come away with a couple of dozen good titles. Can't wait!

Just arrived by mail this evening... Willard and His Bowling Trophies, a 1975 paperback by Richard Brautigan. Oh, joy! Another Brautigan book for my collection!

God is Not Great by Christopher Hitchens

Another Value Village (really, I was in the neighbourhood!) run yesterday:

Jemima Shore's First Case by Antonia Fraser
I Don't Know how She does it by Allison Pearson
Casino and other Stories by Bonnie Burnard
Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt
Moo by Jane Smiley
Knots and Crosses by Ian Rankin

And from the secondhand library store earlier in the week:
A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson
Five Red Herrings by Dorothy L. Sayers
Have his Carcase by Dorothy L. Sayers
Nora, Nora by Anne Rivers Siddons
Midnight is a Lonely Place by Barbara Erskine

August 24- (from bookmooch)

Fire and Ice: A History of Comets in Art
The Real Science Behind the X Files: Microbes, Meteorites, and Mutants

I received an ARC in the mail, and brought home three books from the library. The ARC is Free for All: Oddballs, Geeks, and Gangstas in the Public Library by Don Borchert. I brought home Book Crush by Nancy Pearl, The Secret Lives of the Kudzu Debutantes by Cathy Holton, and Power Play by Joseph Finder.

Went on a job interview at a non-profit organization today and, as I was leaving, the Executive Director gave me a copy of What Erika Wants by Bruce Clements, a locally well-known author who previously has been a finalist for a National Book Award. This book is about a child and the work this organization does.

I could get enthusiastic about this job search if all interviews ended with a gift of a book.

I went to the second hand shop with 3 books to trade and left with 6! *sigh*

A breath of snow and ashes by Diana Gabaldon
Camelot's Shadow and Camelot's Honour by Sarah Zettel
The Rose Grower by Michelle de Kretser
The birth of Venus by Sarah Dunant
The God of Small Things by Arundhati Roy

I got home to find not one, not two, not three, but FOUR books waiting in my mailbox for me!:

Kite Runner by Khaled Hosseini
Lord of the Flies by William Golding
Confessions of a Shopaholic by Sophie Kinsella, and
Night Flight by Antoine de Saint-Exupery

I love BookMooch.

Bought on 8/25/07...

Eat This by Ian Jackman
The Complete Herb Book by Maggie Stuckey
The Organic Way to Plant Protection by Rodale Press Staff
How to Do Everything with Your Digital Camera by Dave Johnson
Organic Gardening for the 21st Century by John Fedor
Photography for Scrapbookers by Tracy White
10-20-30 Minute Scrapbook pages by Nancy Hill
10-20-30 Minute Card Making by Nancy Hill
Better Homes and Gardens Friendship Paper Crafts by Leisure Arts
More Quick & Easy Scrapbook Pages by Memory Makers
Scrapbooking Life's Little Moments by Rebecca Sower

Summer Knight by Jim Butcher, from the Borders on Sunset and Vine, topping off a delightful (though hot & humid) Sunday morning at the Hollywood farmers' market.

*sigh* Life doesn't get much better!

August 27

Introductory Astronomy (Addison-Wesley series in physics)
Adventures With a Texas Naturalist
National Audubon Society Pocket Guide to Constellations of the Northern Skies

From the library, I'm taking home Down the Rabbit Hole by Peter Abrahams and Earthly Delights by Kerry Greenwood. In the mail, I received Jack Absolute by C.C. Humphreys.

A hand-me-down from my sister (even after all these years, I get her cast-offs!): In the Name of Salome by Julia Alvarez. Looking forward to that read!

Via BookMooch

A History of the English Language - I've been waiting a long time for this one to become available.

The Golem's Eye - part 2 of a trilogy my son is reading

More textbooks:

From Max Weber
Oedipus Tyrannus, by Sophocles
Letters to a Young Poet, by Rainer Maria Rilke
The Shia Revival, by Vali Nasr
Democracy in America, Volume 2, by Alexis de Tocqueville

August 29 2007

A Field Guide to Medicinal Plants: Eastern and Central North America (Peterson Field Guide Series)
The Worst-Case Scenario Survival Handbook
The Russian verb: form & function
English Grammar for Students of Russian
Out of the shadows: Understanding sexual addiction

And one final textbook:
The Republic, by Plato

From the library:

Divisadero by Michael Ondaatje
After Dark by Haruki Murakami
House of Meetings by Martin Amis

and for my husband's commute, on audio - Freakanomics: A Rogue Economist Explores the Hidden Side of Everything.

Things Fall Apart by Chinua Achebe. I love bookmooch very much :-)

Waiting for me in the mailbox was Doomsday Book by Connie Willis.

Stopped to donate some books to our local second-hand bookstore. Returned with 2 more, at least they're trade paperbacks -TBR shelves getting higher.
Northern lights Tim O'Brien
Wide Sargasso Sea Jean Rhys.

I received a gently used hardcover in the mail today:

Consequences of Sin: An Edwardian Mystery

I had some good coupons, so I made a Border's stop today. I came back with:

Loving Frank by Nancy Horan
The History of Love by Nicole Krauss
Atonement by Ian McEwan
Royal Harlot by Susan Holloway Scott
and a book on living with arthritis.

I listened to Atonement on cassette about two years ago, and didn't much care for it. As a McEwan lover, however, that made me feel quite guilty, so I'm going to give it another try.

Through the mail from Amazon yesterday: Nightmares and Dreamscapes by Stephen King

Yesterday I borrowed Collapse by Jared Diamond from the library - I've been really wanting to read this book and thought I'd never find it secondhand (it's highly desired on BookMooch).
Well, the fates were smiling, I found it this morning at a yard sale for $1! Yea!! Now I have my own copy.
I also got The Day the War Ended by Martin Gilbert.

Me again. I went to my local Value Village yesterday to drop off donations - the whole store was 1/2 off everything. The book shelves had been really picked over, but I got Howards End by E.M. Forster and Stolen Continents by Ronald Wright.

hi i am new here and was wondering how can or do you buy or swap books , i am looking for cold moon over babylon ,by michael mcdowell , read it once and loved it , thalnks for any help , triciamt

Just got a swap copy of Susan Straight's A Million Nightingales.