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What books did you get from the library, bookstore, online? - 2020
My library book sale haul! 
I got both Lost and Found sisters and A New Hope because they had dogs on the cover 😂🤷🏼♀️.
I looked for
but they didn’t have it. I’m not into politics at all but was interested in George W.’s book mostly because he seems like a kind soul; at least he has kind eyes ☺️. I was told they didn’t have all categories at this sale but will at their June sale! I managed to get all books I have not read before 🥰
Stephanie wrote: "My library book sale haul! [bookcover..."
Wow ! Really nice haul. Enjoy.
I look forward to hearing your reviews.
What great reading you have in store, Stephanie. And, frankly, how neat there is another big book sale in June! Some years our library does that but not often.
What's even better is when you find a book on the free shelf at the library that you want to read!
Julie wrote: "What's even better is when you find a book on the free shelf at the library that you want to read!"I wish my library had that. Though my YMCA gym has such a shelf. Members come in and put books and magazines on the shelf.
I usually drop off New York magazine.
I've picked up 2 books over the past few months.
The Complete Book of Running-Jim Fixx
The Presidents Club: Inside the World's Most Exclusive Fraternity--Nancy Gibbs
I recall a friend reading the Fixx book back in the 70s...at least i think it’s the same guy. He died running, right? That friend is a habitual jogger to this day, btw. Enjoy!The Gibbs book might be really good. When you finish it, please let us know what you thought.
Both books sound interesting, Alias! Looking forward to your reviews.
When the Gibbs book came out I started a hardcover copy from the library. It very soon became clear to me that this was a book I wanted to own an annotate. I've been waiting to find a sale copy.
Alias, that’s a great way to figure out which books to actually purchase. I agree, way to do it!
I finished a couple of books over the weekend, one i’d been reading awhile. Claire DeWitt and the City of the Dead is a cleverly written mystery series (thank you, Michele and John, who reviewed it on our boards). In addition to the unique main character, a PI, author Sara Gran created a dead French detective, from whose book she quotes. This initial offering is set in post-Katrina New Orleans but has insights to other post tragedy events. I look forward to the next in the series.It took me longer than expected to read The Burning: Massacre, Destruction, and the Tulsa Race Riot of 1921 about the May 31, 1921 events in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Tim Madigan’s book was a tad too dramatic for me and woefully short on endnotes but the story compels. What horrors were perpetrated against the successful African-America community there. It’s still mind boggling that the truth of it was so well hidden for over 50 years.
Now I’ve begun Louise Penny’s The Beautiful Mystery. One focus of the mystery are Gregorian Chants, which i’ve long treasured. The series is set in Canada’s northern parts, in a remote monastery.
madrano wrote: "I finished a couple of books over the weekend, one i’d been reading awhile. Claire DeWitt and the City of the Dead is a cleverly written mystery series (thank you, Michele and John, ..."If you liked the first book, Madrano, you'll like the Bay Area sequel just as much.
John, i stared Bohemian last night & was sucked right in. As it happened the book I finished yesterday was also set in San Francisco, Homicide in Hardcover. I wasn’t thrilled with it and imagine many would like it because it names places. For my money, Kate Carlisle didn’t really get very deep involved in the culture of the city. This was the first of the series so maybe she improves. I doubt I’ll ever know firsthand.
I picked up another free book from the shelves at my gym. It was in excellent condition. It looks brand new and unread. It's one I had on my TBR list. Unfortunately, it's large print, but beggars can't be choosy. I am sure once I begin reading it, the over-sized print won't be an issue. Over sized print is better than tiny font any day. Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk---Kathleen Rooney
NOW A NATIONAL INDIE BESTSELLER
“Transporting…witty, poignant and sparkling.”
—People (People Picks Book of the Week)
“Prescient and quick....A perfect fusing of subject and writer, idea and ideal.”
—Chicago Tribune
“Extraordinary…hilarious…Elegantly written, Rooney creates a glorious paean to a distant literary life and time—and an unabashed celebration of human connections that bridge past and future.
—Publishers Weekly (starred and boxed)
"Rooney's delectably theatrical fictionalization is laced with strands of tart poetry and emulates the dark sparkle of Dorothy Parker, Edna St. Vincent Millay, and Truman Capote. Effervescent with verve, wit, and heart, Rooney’s nimble novel celebrates insouciance, creativity, chance, and valor."
—Booklist (starred review)
“In my reckless and undiscouraged youth,” Lillian Boxfish writes, “I worked in a walnut-paneled office thirteen floors above West Thirty-Fifth Street…”
She took 1930s New York by storm, working her way up writing copy for R.H. Macy’s to become the highest paid advertising woman in the country. It was a job that, she says, “in some ways saved my life, and in other ways ruined it.”
Now it’s the last night of 1984 and Lillian, 85 years old but just as sharp and savvy as ever, is on her way to a party. It’s chilly enough out for her mink coat and Manhattan is grittier now—her son keeps warning her about a subway vigilante on the prowl—but the quick-tongued poetess has never been one to scare easily. On a walk that takes her over 10 miles around the city, she meets bartenders, bodega clerks, security guards, criminals, children, parents, and parents-to-be, while reviewing a life of excitement and adversity, passion and heartbreak, illuminating all the ways New York has changed—and has not.
A love letter to city life in all its guts and grandeur, Lillian Boxfish Takes a Walk by Kathleen Rooney paints a portrait of a remarkable woman across the canvas of a changing America: from the Jazz Age to the onset of the AIDS epidemic; the Great Depression to the birth of hip-hop.
Lillian figures she might as well take her time. For now, after all, the night is still young.
Thanks - there's a title that's been on my radar for a while, but couldn't think of what it is, and now you've reminded me!
Sounds good. The title isn’t familiar to me. I hope you can handle the font & report your thought on it later.
I liked the Israeli novel Five Seasons, so yesterday at the library I checked out another by the same author that looks promising The Extra. However, in looking at through it after I got home I noticed that there are a few places consisting of extended dialogue which will read more like a play script. Not really my thing, but not a deal-breaker either as most of the book looks fairly solid.
I picked up another freebie at the gym today.
---Alice MunroWINNER OF THE NOBEL PRIZE® IN LITERATURE 2013
In this series of interweaving stories, Munro recreates the evolving bond between two women in the course of almost forty years. One is Flo, practical, suspicious of other people's airs, at times dismayingly vulgar. the other is Rose, Flo's stepdaughter, a clumsy, shy girl who somehow leaves the small town she grew up in to achieve her own equivocal success in the larger world.
John, please let us know your final opinion, whether you continue or not. Dialogue is a mixed bag for me. I’m not a fan of it page after page (although books are quicker read that way) because I like descriptions of place and movements of the characters. Alias, Munro was a brilliant story teller. Some of my favorites have been from her pen. I wasn’t aware she created a book of interconnecting stories but like that idea. I hope you enjoy it/them.
After reading John’s comments, i remembered that i wanted to mention a book i began but abandoned. The Jane Austen Miscellany sounded as though it would flush out society in Jane Austen’s times. While Lauren Nixon Did that, somewhat, she also quoted far too much for my preference. Yes, in each chapter she shared about one aspect (fashions for both sexes, gatherings, etc.), however each chapter ends with page after page of quotes from Austen’s books and letters. Ultimately i felt disappointed and gave up reading it after two chapters.
Years ago i read What Jane Austen Ate and Charles Dickens Knew: From Fox Hunting to Whist—the Facts of Daily Life in 19th-Century England by Daniel Pool and felt overly informed, hence my search for a lighter touch. Apparently that wasn’t the book for my desire.
I was able to compare the print and ebook versions of the story. The print edition is rather tall, rectangular the book so that the dialogue on opposing pages seems longer than it is; I think those passages will be much easier to deal with on my Kindle. Started it yesterday, and it about 10% of the way through I'm fairly well engaged in the story.I like books about Jane Austen, including the mystery series with her as the sleuth, but I'm not as fond of reading before her novels themselves.
Good news on the Kindle front, John.Austen herself is the route to go. I imagine there are so many attempts to play off her fame because we want more!
Recently purchased a few titles on Amazon:Live Bait
Three Days in April
The First One You Expect
The Elephant Tree
Anita wrote: "Recently purchased a few titles on Amazon:Live Bait
Three Days in April
[book:The First One Y..."
Nice book haul, Anita ! It's such a treat to get that box of books from Amazon. :)
Gosh, Anita, Edward Ashton’s speculative mystery, Three Days in April sounds fun. Please let us know your opinion once you’ve finished it. I ask this with the knowledge that buying isn’t the same as reading soon!
Really liking my current library book English Journey: Or the Road to Milton Keynes. Bainbridge is a hoot with her observations!
Reading one GR review had me smiling—we bring our own biases to our reading. I’m not familiar with Bainbridge but like the premise of the book.Thanks to Petra for mentioning Margaret Atwood’s In Other Worlds: SF and the Human Imagination. I like reading about her life but also about the genre of science fiction, as well as others. Her exploration of science and fields addressed by these novels/stories is enlightening.
I picked up two from the library today.
On Hitler's Mountain: Overcoming the Legacy of a Nazi Childhood----Irmgard A. HuntI have the paperback and audio. I picked up the paperback because one of the reviews noted the the photos in the book.
Have You Seen Luis Velez?--Catherine Ryan Hyde
I've been getting so many books from the library lately and not reading them. I feel a bit sad when I take them back unread. Yesterday I picked up:
The Survivors: A Story of War, Inheritance, and Healing
Citizen Illegal
Spit Delaney's Island (I read this author way back in my 20s. He's local and I remember enjoying his writing)
Last week I picked up, still have and haven't read:
The Ambulance Drivers: Hemingway, Dos Passos, and a Friendship Made and Lost in War.
Deb, thank you for the mention. I'm so happy that you're enjoying Margaret Atwood's Sci-Fi book. I thought it was very interesting and entertaining.
Thanks, John. I looked her up with my online library and found Injury Time, which sounds intriguing. No Milton, though. ☹️
Alias, it can get frustrating to have to get a paper copy just for photos. I wish authors or publishers would put photos on a web pages for folks like us. It doesn’t seem like much to ask.Good luck completing both books.
Petra, i understand your frustration. I hope your next batch click with you.One thing i treasure about books such at Atwood’s is that they lead me to other authors. For instance, I’m trying to find something from my e-library by Bryher, who sounds fascinating. And I’ve never heard of her!
Petra wrote: "I've been getting so many books from the library lately and not reading them. I feel a bit sad when I take them back unread. ."On the other hand, you are doing a good deed as the library will see interest in the book and keep it in circulation and not cull it. :)
madrano wrote: "Alias, it can get frustrating to have to get a paper copy just for photos. I wish authors or publishers would put photos on a web pages for folks like us. It doesn’t seem like much to ask.Good lu..."
I don't mind, deb. When I am able to get the audio and the book at the same time, I often read and play the audio at the same time. It takes longer to finish a book that way. However, I find it pleasurable.
Anita wrote: "Just picked up three titles from Amazon:Foe
The Culling
Blood Rites [bookcover:Blood Rit..."
I don't know why but it made me smile. Before I read your post, I used the word cull in my reply to Petra.
Anita, I’ll be interested in reading your thoughts about the Iain Reid book. It sounds freaky to me. Regardless, enjoy the newbies!Alias, funny about “cull”. When that happens you gotta wonder what’s up with the planet. I mean, how often do you use that word?
You are patient if getting two versions of the same book doesn’t bother you. For some reason it makes me feel clumsy.
I just went back on Amazon and grabbed a few more, these are horror genre reads:Usher's Passing
The Hungry Moon
The Totem
Maynard's House
Anita wrote: "I just went back on Amazon and grabbed a few more, these are horror genre reads:Usher's Passing
The Hungry Moon [bookcover:The Hungry..."
Nice. Amazon does make it easy !
LOL, Anita! Enjoy your purchases— you have plenty til spring arises.
For $4 I sprung for the Kindle cookbook Potty!: Clarissa's One Pot Cookbook. Clarissa Dickson Wright, which seems promising! Not sure how well-known the TV series Two Fat Ladies, in which she co-starred, might be?
I loved Two Fat Ladies when it played. Those two ladies are not afraid of fats and oils. LOL. They made some delicious looking dishes.
John wrote: "For $4 I sprung for the Kindle cookbook Potty!: Clarissa's One Pot Cookbook. Clarissa Dickson Wright, which seems promising! Not sure how well-known the TV series Two Fat Ladies, in ..."I used to enjoy their show. I was sad to hear one of them had passed away.
I kind of went on a fantasy kick and bought these three books from Amazon last week.
Marie wrote: "I kind of went on a fantasy kick and bought these three books from Amazon last week.[bookcover:The Lone Dragon Knight..."
Amazon sure does make it easy. I love getting that box of books from them !
Alias Reader wrote: "John wrote: "For $4 I sprung for the Kindle cookbook Potty!: Clarissa's One Pot Cookbook. Clarissa Dickson Wright, which seems promising! Not sure how well-known the TV series Two Fa..."They're both gone. I read Clarissa's memoir Spilling the Beans a while ago, as well as getting her audiobook on her personal association with each English county Clarissa's England. I own a TBR copy of Rifling Through My Drawers, and my library has the ebook of A History of English Food. Fanboi much?
Alias Reader wrote: "Marie wrote: "I kind of went on a fantasy kick and bought these three books from Amazon last week.[bookcover:The Lone..."
Well Alias - I normally do not buy the physical books - so unfortunately no box (lol) - I am strictly kindle so I buy them and they just download into my kindle. Way quicker than the box! LOL :)
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