Monday, June 22, 2009

Betterworld Books Buyback offer --

Betterworld Books is one of my favorite online shops. I've find Hard-to-find and Out-of-Print titles here at very good prices and I love the flat shipping rate ($3.97 to international destinations.)

I recently checked their website and found an interesting new development -- Betterworld Books now has a Buyback policy -- you can sell your books to them! (They'll even pay for shipping if you're selling more than 3 books.)

Unfortunately, the offer is only available in the US. ~sigh~

I hope they expand this and open it to countries outside of the US.

Clickety click here for more information.

While you're at it, check out their books!

Saturday, June 06, 2009

A wonderful book meme --

Got this from Julie --

Childhood Favorites:

I read a lot of Nancy Drew growing up. (One of our older cousins gave us her entire collection when she visited us.)

Also a lot of encyclopedias. One of my best memories of childhood is my mom leaving the most current catalog of Reader's Digest books and let us pick 2. My siblings would deliberate on which 2 books we would get and we ended up with gems like: How Was It Done?, When, Where, Why and How It Happened, The Story of Jesus, etc.

We also read a lot of comics. I remember my uncle sending us the Mile High Comics catalog (back when they were printing them) and told us to pick one each. We weren't picky back then -- we didn't mind getting grab bags because we just wanted to have a lot of comics to read. ^_^

Believe it or not, I didn't get into Sweet Valley and Sweet Dreams until I was in high school.

Comfort Reading (to which i return again and again)

1. Possession by A.S. Byatt
2. Tuesdays with Morrie <-- which I read every New Year's Eve
3. Reader's Digest issues (old and new) <-- laughter really is the best medicine ^_^
4. Little Women <-- but not so often. I just think about it (especially Beth's dying scene) and I get misty-eyed.
5. The Phantom Tollbooth by Norton Juster
6. Worried All the Time by David Anderegg
7. Suddenly Silver by Lynn Johnston

Best I've Read in the Past Year
Apologies ... this list will contain romance novels and comic books because that's what I've been reading mostly ...
1. Private Arrangements by Sherry Thomas <-- she's an interesting writer though -- she's Asian-American and English wasn't her first language.
2. The Umbrella Academy: Dallas by Gerard Way and Gabriel Ba
3. How to Eat by Nigella Lawson <-- I read this one a few years back and decided to re-read it. I love her. >_<
4. Anna Godbersen's Series: The Luxe, Rumors, Envy ... can't wait for the next one!
5. Mary Balogh's Simply Series <-- didn't like her the first time I read her. But this series was very good. ^_^
6. Tempted by his Kiss by Tracy Anne Warren <-- read this a few days ago. Amazing! Can't wait for the next installment.
7. My youngest brother's dissertation proposal <-- it was choppy and I helped him edit it and his proposal was approved (not because I edited it ha. The topic is very interesting). (Made me feel good knowing that I still had a bit of the teacher in me. =^_^=)

Non-fiction Faves
1. Anthony Bourdain's A Cook's Tour
2. Nigella Lawson!!!
3. The Professor and the Madman by Simon Winchester


Ones which I've only pretended to read in their entirety

1. Ulysses by James Joyce <-- was supposed to read this for my compre -- read the first five chapters and then made a big show of flipping through the rest of the book
2. The Republic by Plato
3. Siddharta by Herman Hesse <-- was supposed to read this for a class. Don't know how I managed to get through that paper and test without having actually read the book

Strangely have never picked up
1. JRR Tolkien <-- but I am not a fan of fantasy (or SF)
2. Gabriel Garcia Marquez <-- I've only read 2 short stories
3. Haruki Murakami <-- one of my husband's favorite authors. I've only read Sputnik Sweetheart and 1 short story
4. Philip Pullman <-- I tried to read him ... but I couldn't understand it. T_T