In My Mailbox 27

Dear Blog,

In My Mailbox is hosted by Kristi over at The Story Siren.

So, it's the summer holidays, and therefore I have no extracurricular activities and next to no schoolwork.  Which means two things: 1) hooray!  and 2) I have more time than usual to devote to reading. Therefore when I was in the huge library in the centre of town the other day, I took out a lot of books. They'll keep me busy for a little while.

GIFT

The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand (currently reading)

FROM THE LIBRARY

Selected Poems by e. e. cummings

Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher

The Wish House by Celia Rees

The Awakening and Selected Stories by Kate Chopin

Purple Hibiscus by Chimanda Ngozi Adichie

Lies by Michael Grant

BOUGHT

Les Misérables by Victor Hugo (*excited squeal*)

 So, there you go.  Did you get any interesting books this week?

That's all. Over and out.

In My Mailbox 25 or The One with the Armchair Travelling

Dear Blog,
IMM is hosted by Kristi at The Story Siren.
I got a lot of books this week, which is mostly the fault of the huge charity shop in the centre of town, which has shelves and shelves and shelves of secondhand novels. I've probably sung its praises before, and with reason.
A lot of the books I obtained are a sufficient transportation method to other corners of time and space; Japan, Korea, Greece, Russia, China and so on, which is entirely ideal because I've been wanting to read lots of books set abroad lately.

BOUGHT

Tuesdays with Morrie by Mitch Albom

Captain Corelli's Mandolin by Louis de Bernières

This Lullaby by Sarah Dessen

Memoirs of a Geisha by Arthur Golden

The Last Day of a Condemned Man by Victor Hugo (read, review here)

Ten Thousand Sorrows by Elizabeth Kim

We The Living by Ayn Rand

Beijing Doll by Chun Sue

Stolen, er, BORROWED FROM MY MOTHER

Norwegian Wood by Haruki Murakami (she's reading this with her book club at the moment, and though I'm quite the Murakami fan I haven't read this one yet.)

FROM THE LIBRARY

The Teahouse Fire by Ellis Avery (currently reading. Entirely fascinating, but pretty heavy going)

So, there you go.  I'm off now to push on with The Teahouse Fire and write poetry.  Over and out.

In My Mailbox 22

Dear Blog,
IMM is hosted as ever by Kristi of The Story Siren.

This was another week in which my taste in books led me further afield than the local library.  I went to the Great Big Library in the centre of town, which is full of Exciting Shiny Novels I couldn't dream of finding in the library closer to home. 
Also, I've been reading a lot more recently.  Of late I'd kind of been in something of a reading slump; that doesn't seem to be so much of the case any more.  Maybe it's because I'm finding more books that I truly want to read, or my tastes have changed slightly.
Excuse the random bottle of water in the picture.  My desk is a mess at the moment, but left long enough it will clean itself.

BOUGHT

Between Shades of Gray by Ruta Sepetys

LIBRARY

We by Yegevny Zamyatin [currently reading]
Le Bal by Irène Némirovsky [read; next week's Foreign Language Friday post] 

The Plague by Albert Camus

Junk by Melvin Burgess

So that was my bookish week.  What about yours?

In My Mailbox 21 or Some More Classics

Dear blog,
hosted as  ever by Kristi of The Story Siren fame.

This week was another in which I found myself in the classics section of my local library, which has been happening increasingly of late (probably because I've read almost all the YA books I want to read there.  Oh the joys of having a pitifully tiny village library).

BOUGHT

One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn

FROM THE LIBRARY

A Study in Scarlet by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle [currently reading]

Cathedral by Raymond Carver

A Dead Man's Memoir by Mikhail Bulgakov

Midnight's Children by Salman Rushdie

So, there you go. That was my bookish week.  What was yours like? 

In My Mailbox 20

Dear blog,

Hosted as ever by Kristi of The Story Siren.

I haven't participated in IMM for about a month or so, which is mostly because I was trying to stick to my goal of getting through some of  the books that I -gasp- actually own, or at least get my to-read shelf on Goodreads down to 100 books. 

However, then I realised that I didn't actually own the majority of the books that were on aforementioned to-read shelf,  and this was a sufficient excuse to buy some of the books I had been after for ages.

BOUGHT

Impulse by Ellen Hopkins

Eunoia by  Christian Bök (already read.  Quite extraordinary.)

This is All by Aidan Chambers

The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera

Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami

Delirium by Lauren Oliver

So, that was my bookish week. What about yours?

In My Mailbox, or, The Week of Interesting Books

Dear Blog,
hosted as ever by Kristi over at The Story Siren.
This was an interesting week, in which I strayed from my normal comfort zone of teenage fiction in search of other things, including plays, Chinese journalism, and Ukrainian classics. 

BOUGHT:
Knife Edge by Malorie Blackman (I read Noughts  & Crosses about a year ago and haven't gotten round to getting hold of the sequel until now)
Dance Dance Dance by Haruki Murakami
The Good Women of China by Xinran
The Importance of being Earnest by Oscar Wilde (I need it for coursework and such)

LIBRARY
Once was Lost by Sara Zarr
Guantanamo Boy by Anna Perera (review here)
Death and the Penguin by Andrey Kurkov
How I Live Now by Meg Rosoff (Currently reading, it reminds me a lot of Bonjour Tristesse for reasons I cannot yet explain )

Well, that was my bookish week.  How about yours?