Book Acquisitions

So, I went to Borders yesterday.    Took advantage of one Buy-One-Get-Half-Off-Second.   I probably should have picked up another but my arms were getting heavy and I was working with a time constraint.    PRESSURE!   I kept picking up books and putting them down again, etc.    I got distracted before I acted upon looking for Uncommon Reader.   I looked for the Vreeland bio – not in stock.   I did consider some Joan Didion books but decided, “not now.”     Here’s what I came home with: 

The journals were on sale!  and hot pink!   I just can’t resist a pretty clean new blank book.

The Water For Elephants is LARGE PRINT and I am going to donate it to the library of the “Home of the Aged” and Home for my new Silver Book Club since I just might end up being their possible librarian (whatever that might mean, I’m not sure…)    I hope to have that be our second selection…

 Burning Bright by Tracy Chevalier (she wrote The Girl With the Pearl Earring) is the winner for our first Silver Book Club selection  - I was able to check out 4 copies from 2 different libraries and 2 of these are in large print.    I dropped them off yesterday and presented it to my new friends.   Since there are 4 possible ladies participating, I didn’t keep one for me and thus had to go buy myself my very own copy.  

I chose this entirely on my enjoyment of this author’s work and that I found 2 large print copies!     THEN, after having a chance to peruse various book blog reviews, I’m anxious that it will not be well-received.   It is historical fiction about the poet William Blake, told from the perspective of his teenaged neighbors.     The reviews hint that it might be a good idea to know Wm Blake’s poetry.   Which I do not.    So we will see.    Some poems are in the back of the book I bought but not in the large print versions.

I will be taking this on my upcoming trip.    NOTICE!   I WILL NOT HAVE ACCESS TO COMPUTER for a bit of time!   Will be back to check up on everyone March 10 or so.   But I’m not leaving yet, so I will have a few more posts for you before I leave.

I’m also taking Atonement by Ian McEwan.      I can always pick up a trashy chicklit at the airport if I find this not as enthralling for poolside as I anticipate.

Even though my favorite color is purple, I’ve never read nor seen the movie (nor the play, for that matter) of Alice Walker’s The Color Purple and this is the book that jumped into my hands as I casually meandered by the Buy-1-Get-2nd-50% off table.     At 288 pages, could this be a novella?!    

And, now we are almost to the end of the list (I bought the Cooking With Beer Book for my husband’s birthday present; $4).   I now get to explain why I bought Kim Edwards’ The Memory Keeper’s Daughter aka TMKD.    EVERYONE has told me I will love it.    Problem is, I can’t remember if I’ve read it.    I don’t think I have.     I HAVE read the back blurb about a million times and THAT is why I think I might have read it.       Ever have this problem with a book?!      One that has been considered and recommended so many times that the title is so familiar but can’t remember if you’ll really ever read it!?      There are books I read last year that I can barely tell you what they are about and yet I could give you the quick synopsis of TMKD.

So, this is what happens when I go to the bookstore with only a sketchy plan of what I have to buy and leave it to the book fairies and whims of the aisle presentations to decide what I take home.