Top Ten Tuesday is a meme hosted by The Broke and the Bookish, featuring a different top 10 theme each week. This week’s topic is Ten Books I Picked Up On A Whim.
Usually, my reading and buying habits are pretty planned out in advance, but the big exception is when I attend our library’s book sales every fall and spring. These sales are huge! Lasting for five days, with all books selling for $3 or less, the sales are just a mecca for booklovers, and I try never to miss them. According to the sale website, they typically have 500,000 books — amazing! Here’s a pic from the most recent book sale:
Okay, so when I first started going to the Big Book Sale (that’s its official name), I’d always take a list with me — all the books I hoped to find among the thousands and thousands of books available. Over the years, I’ve learned that I’ll always find something great, but not necessarily anything from my list.
So, long-winded introduction aside, the last time I bought books on a whim was at the spring sale, when I came home with 41 books for $58! A bunch of those were for my daughter, but here’s a shot of my amazing book haul:
Some of my random, on-a-whim finds from this outing are:
1) The Pigeon Pie Mystery by Julia Stuart
2) The Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov
3) The Pirates! In An Adventure With Scientists by Gideon Defoe
4) White Crow by Marcus Sedgwick
5) In the Garden of Beasts by Erik Larson
6) Things Half in Shadow by Alan Finn
7) Everything I Never Told You by Celeste Ng
8) The Seduction of Water by Carol Goodman
9) The Last Days of Dogtown by Anita Diamant
10) This cool-looking old grammar book (which I think is a 1940s reissue of a 1917 book) — because I can be a total nerd sometimes:
What books made your list this week? Please share your links!
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Bookshelf Fantasies 
book sale! 😀 😀 😀 Wow! you have nice picks. 🙂
Thanks! Being at the sale is even more fun than actually buying the books. It’s so great to be surrounded by booklovers!
geez! i can imagine. 😀
I didn’t find out about the library sale until *after* I left SF – grah! Yet another reason to move back some day. 😉 Nice haul!
Ha, yes, definitely a reason to come back! 🙂 By now, the sale is a standing date for me and a good friend, and we really shop until they close the doors. Such fun!
Wow, what an awesome library sale! That looks great. Glad you enjoyed it!
Thanks! It’s always so much fun.
Oh book sales! The closest I’ve got is a trip to Hay-on-Wye, the Mecca of British secondhand bookstores. Like you, we went in with a list and came out delighted by other things we found instead. I do love rummaging through old books to see what treasures have slipped through the cracks.
That’s really the fun part isn’t it? I love the unexpected finds. 🙂
Oooh, the grammar book looks awesome! 😀 Great haul of books you picked up on a whim 😉 Your list reminds me that I still have to pick up Isaac Asimov’s Foundation at some point; been meaning to read it for ages!
My TTT
I know, I can’t believe I’ve never read Foundation. Even my daughter is shaming me about it by now. 🙂
omg i love book sales like this! eventhough most of the times the books are not to my liking, but just seeing book like this makes my heart all go jumpy. I like the grammar book cos I can be a nerd sometimes too XD
MY TTT
Yes, the friend I was with at the book sale made total fun of me for buying the grammar book, but I just couldn’t leave it behind! I always think that I’ll only come home with a book or two… but it never works out that way. 🙂
I spy Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell! I think that book sale would completely overwhelm me…where to start? Doesn’t mean I wouldn’t like to try!
Oh, it’s totally overwhelming! They hand you a map when you walk in the door. My friend and I always plan our strategy — fiction, horror, fantasy, mystery… we never do quite make it to everything we want to see. 🙂 I do already have a copy of Jonathan Strange– the hardcover from when I first read it — but couldn’t resist adding a paperback for $1.
Did you ever read The Owl Killers?
x The Captain
I haven’t — have you? I’ve heard good things about it!
Holy geez! 500,000 books?! I would love to visit that sale! I don’t think I’ve heard of any of the books you picked up but I hope you enjoyed them all!
My TTT
Thanks so much! Most of these were books that just caught my eye, or things I’d maybe heard of but never got around to. The fun is in being spontaneous!
I’ve never seen anything like this. That’s an absolutely EPIC book sale and I am so jealous I can’t even speak. I’d be there for HOURS going through EVERYTHING
Oh, it’s totally epic, and I do spend hours! All the sales benefit the library, so the more books you buy, the more virtuous you can feel! 🙂 It’s really so much fun, and it feels great being surrounded by people who love books as much as I do.
Wow, that’s an enormous sale! Definitely a book lovers paradise. 41 books- that would be awesome. 🙂
I was so sure that I’d only buy a book or two this time around… but good intention flew out the window once I actually got there!
Oh, my! You’re library book sale has shopping carts?! 🙂
Check out my TTT.
Ha ha, yes — but never enough! There’s always a long line on opening night and they’re always out of carts by the time I reach the front door. 🙂
You may need to purchase a new bookshelf Lisa!
You’re probably right — although I think this just means that it’s time to purge some books from my shelves and trade them in at the used bookstore. 🙂