my books. my life.

Instead of saving this for a Mailbox Monday/In My Mailbox post (and because I may be giving memes up for a little while depending on the results of my poll which I’ll share tomorrow), I thought my new books would get their own post today. I had a good chunk of gift card money so on Tuesday, Ben and I had a date night (date night for us = dinner + book shopping).

Here is what I got:

• Willow by Julia Hoban
• The Knife of Never Letting Go by Patrick Ness
• We Have Always Lived in the Castle by Shirley Jackson
• The Opposite of Me by Sarah Pekkanen
• The Forest of Hands of Teeth by Carrie Ryan
• Postcards from a Dead Girl by Kirk Farber

Here are the books Ben picked up with his share of the gift card money:

• What the World Will Look Like When All the Water Leaves Us by Laura van den Berg
• A Raisin in the Sun by Lorraine Hansberry

And here are the other books that found their way into our home this week:

• The Queen of Palmyra by Minrose Gwin (arc from Harper Perennial)
• The Weight of Heaven by Thrity Umrigar (swaptree)
• The Life O’Reilly (review copy from author)

I had a lot of books join my home this past week so I thought it was as good a time as ever to do my first Mailbox Monday (hosted by Marcia of  The Printed Page)/In My Mailbox Post (hosted by Kristi of The Story Siren).

Won

• Brava, Valentine by Adriana Trigiani (won from On the Bookcase)

Swaptree

• The Dud Avacado by Elaine Dundy

Birthday Gift

• The Well-Educated Mind by Susan Wise Bauer
• No One Belongs Here More than You by Miranda July
• Alice I Have Been by Melanie Benjamin
• Marriage and Acts of Other Charity by Kate Braestrup

Purchased with Birthday Gift Card

• A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick
• Little Bee by Chris Cleave

Purchased

• Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives by David Eagleman
• Brooklyn by Colm Toibin

Books Read:

(sorry the picture is a little fuzzy – I need a new camera)

• Peony in Love by Lisa See (review)
• Betsy and Tacy Go Over the Big Hill (not pictured) (review)
• Betsy and Tacy Go Downtown by Maud Hart Lovelace (review)
• Heaven to Betsy by Maud Hart Lovelace (review)
• The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (review)
• The Mysterious Benedict Society and the Prisoner’s Dilemma by Trenton Lee Stewart (review)

Books Acquired:

(again sorry the picture is a little fuzzy – I need a new camera)

• Jeff in Venice, Death in Varnasi by Geoff Dyer
• The Mysterious Benedict Society by Trenton Lee Stewart
• The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins
• Catching Fire by Suzanne Collins
• Heaven to Betsy/Betsy in Spite of Herself by Maud Hart Lovelace
• Gourmet Rhapsody by Muriel Barbery
• The Last Dickens by Matthew Pearl (not picture)

Six books in one month for me is pretty amazing, so thanks to the quick reads and the read-a-thon for that.  I really liked everything I read this month.  I may have bought a few more books than usual in October, but I got a bonus and part of it made its way to Barnes and Noble, so really it’s all justified (although a twitter conversation forced me to do the math and realize that I could read for about 10 years without buying any more books or using the library).

Big events in my reading life this month were (1) moving my blog from vox to wordpress and (2) the read-a-thon.  The move went very smoothly and I’m still transitioning old posts over.  I’m very happy with wordpress and I an enjoying the comments from non-vox users (my main complaint of vox).  I’m also glad that my vox friends are schlepping over here to continue reading.  As for the read-a-thon, I already expressed how much I enjoyed that event here.

I also completed my first reading challenge, the Maud Hart Lovelace challenge which you can read about here.

October seemed to be a pretty good reading month for everyone and I am hoping to keep it going in November.  Although the end of the month is looking a little busy for me and I’m going to Boston to see my dad for Thanksgiving so that’s some time I probably won’t read much.