The Book Junkie Strikes Again

[ase]

About a week ago, I was discussing how to celebrate the First Paycheck with herewiss13. "Something totally frivolous," he suggested. "Socks," I mused. "It'd be nice if people stopped bugging me about the holes at the heels of my socks."

Somehow, this did not strike herewiss13 as sufficiently frivolous.

Fear not, Eric; "frivolous" spending occurred at no less than five used bookstores this afternoon. One of my non-college people wanted to hit "one or two" stores, but once we got started, the list... expanded a bit. Five hours and more than "one or two" stores later, I headed home, replete with book and fannish discussion.

Fiction
Baker, Kage: In the Garden of Iden
Baker, Kage: Sky Coyote
Baker, Kage: Mendoza in Hollywood
Barnes, John: Orbital Resonance
Blake, Katherine: The Interior Life
Cherryh, C. J.: Downbelow Station (Duplicate; lending copy)
Duane, Diane: The Door Into Fire (Corgi/UK edition) [Like I needed another copy. But this one has the less-than-awful American cover!]
King, Laurie R.: The Beekeeper's Apprentice
Le Guin, Ursula K.: A Wizard of Earthsea (Duplicate; lending copy)
L'Engle, Madeleine: A Swiftly Tilting Planet
Murphy, Pat: Nadya
Myers, John Myers: Silverlock
Nix, Garth: Sabriel
O'Brian, Patrick: Post Captain
Smith, Kristine: Code of Conduct (Duplicate; lending copy)
Tolkien, J. R. R.: The Hobbit (Ted Nasmith cover)
Knight, Damon (Ed.): Orbit 4

Nonfiction
Campbell, Joseph: The Hero with a Thousand Faces [Woo-hoo!]

I think I went a little crazy, but I've been keeping an eye out for some of those books for months. Eventually, I would have done something stupid like buy half of these full price, and whinge about how I couldn't afford the other half. That's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

Edited to add: In retrospect, probably should have put off stocking up on books until after the move. Also, I still need to pick up packing tape and throw things (most of them books) in boxes.

Comments

[cathydalek.livejournal.com]

So which used bookstores did you go to? I haven't done the used bookstore tour in about six months, since went out with Madeleine and ehr brother Vincent for dim sum and ended up going on a tour of Virginia used bookstores including 2 branches of Burke's, McKay's and Hole in the Wall.

[ase.livejournal.com]

Roughly in order... the Book Alcove on Shady Grove Road; the Second Story Books on Parklawn Drive - the store that's literally a warehouse - which happened to have a 1/3 off sale (it's continuting until either the 3rd or the 10th of August, if you want to take advantage of it); Bonifant Books in Wheaton; the Wheaton Library Book Sale; and Silver Spring Books.

The Book Alcove, as usual, cheerfully savaged my budget, which was utterly destroyed by the time I was done at Bonifant. I thought it was my first time at Bonifant - which had oodles of books I'd been looking for - but recognized the kid's section ("hey! I came here with mom, years ago!"). The library sale surprised me; I thought I wouldn't find anything, since the books that arrive usually are library weed-outs and donations that have already been through local library sales, but walked $2.10 poorer and four books richer, including the long out of print Interior Life. The Silver Spring store is a co-op, and splits by co-op member as well as subject/genre, which made things a bit confusing, but they did have three of Lois Bujold's novels, which tend to show up rather infrequently in used book stores.

I can't recall the last time I did the used book store tour in Virginia; once I've recovered from this spree, I may have to make a list of stores to look at in VA.