2015 Bookhaul

Booooooooooks!!!

It's that special time of the year again!

This time I went on the third day, right after coming back from an award-giving ceremony, with a three-hour class earlier that morning! What a day it was! I was tired but excited at the same time.

I've been saving my money for one year just for this. But on the real day I kinda thought that I should set a proper budget so that I could control myself hahaha. So I carried just an OK amount of money..with the hope that I won't have to bid farewell to some good books.

As soon as my dad and I reached the place, I made an angel choir sound, something like TAADAAA and HAAAA and a guy gave me a weird look but I didn't care because I was too happy!!

I rushed to the pile of fictions..but quickly remembered that earlier on I planned that this year I was going to shop with a strategy. Some of my strategies that day:

1. Look for some good non-fiction books, particularly on self-help/leadership/business. Hah! These were the genres that I laughed about many years ago. After watching many TEDx talks and reading online articles, I realised that most successful people read these kind of books.
2. Buy more classics. Classics can range from RM8.90 to RM43.90 in Kuching, depending on whether there are popular movie adaptations of the books. Collins Classics and Trans Atlantic Classics are very affordable, but local bookstores tend to sell Penguin Classics at outrageous prices. And not all popular classics are easy to find. 
3. Only buy fictions which are hard to find in Kuching. 
4. Find some good textbooks on literature or any interesting subjects. 

Oh, there were emotional let-it-goes. I simply couldn't buy everything I wanted, because let's be sensible here, you can't just have everything that you want.

Books I took but placed back:

• For One More Day by Mitch Albom: My favourite Mitch Albom book out of all the books he has written. Excellent condition. I decided to let it go because Mitch Albom titles aren't difficult to find in local bookstores.
• Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides: Exact same edition that I've already I owned. I wanted to keep an extra copy, maybe to give to someone who enjoys good books (This is a beautiful book, trust me!) but if I took this I would've needed to sacrifice one of the books in this pile. I bought mine for RM49.90 (!!!) but thankfully I used my RM50 book voucher for it last year. The second hand one was just...RM7.90 (!!!) Just look at how ridiculous the price difference is...
• Two Harlan Coben books which I cannot remember (Yes, it's very hard to know which is which when we talk about Harlan Coben books). I decided that I can still buy these books next year. They seem to have a lot of it, judging from last year's sale. Also, I've just discovered that my local library has a lot of his books.
• A biography about Eric Clapton. I'm still not sure whether it was a wise decision to let this one go. I might regret this in the future..
• Playing for Pizza by John Grisham. It was in good condition, at a very reasonable price, but I had to sacrifice it for some rare titles I wanted to own. Playing for Pizza, I will get you next year I promise.
• Some books that I can no longer recall, which is PHEWWW A HUGE RELIEF because that means I didn't really need to buy it in the first place HAHA.

It took me nearly two hours to realllly choose the ones that I've chosen. I'm proud of some of my selections. I mean..I'm SO HAPPY I found some of these titles that I've chosen to buy. We'll get to that soon. 

1. A PRAYER FOR OWEN MEANY

I knowwww! You'd be like "Ermahgerdd why is she buying a book that she already has?"

I adore this book! I want to reread it over and over again in the near future. Keeping an extra copy would be a good idea. But most importantly I purchased this again because I want that classic cover design. Not sure if that's the first edition cover (I'll Google about that later) but if you look for Owen Meany hashtags on Instagram, Americans normally have this edition (right). Left one is a fairly recent edition.

2. INTRODUCTION TO CRIMINOLOGY

Cool subject. I don't care if it was written in the 70s or 80s or 90s. I don't care if it's a super old edition. Can you imagine a day when you need to switch of your wifi router cos the weather is super bad and it's raining heavily outside with thunderstorm and lightning? Hah. This is the perfect book to read bit by bit during those kind of days. This is a huge and heavy book so I cannot imagine bringing it to college to be read while waiting for my classes to start. Unless..yknow..unless I want people to think that I'm a snob. 

3. PSYCHOLOGY: UNDERSTANDING BEHAVIOR

Just look at how retro that book cover is. So hard to resist. I'm not going to lie and tell you I know a lot about Psychology, but hey I don't think the facts and stuffs change over the years? Or do they? Only one way to find out... (Obviously I haven't had the time or commitment to sit properly and read this page by page..)

One of my tutors this semester told us that there is only one way to understand students if you want to be a good educator. And that is through learning and applying psychology. I've been thinking about this and hmmmh I'm not even sure if I really want to teach (dealing with people is not something I enjoy doing) but you know..you never know. Still have a lot to learn..

4. LITERATUREEEEE

I cannot wait to read every page of this book. It's like the ultimate guide for you to claim that you know a thing or two about literature. I've pretty much summed up what I think of this book. Very happy to have bought this. The previous owner's name is on first page of the book hahaha. I managed to search her Facebook because of the rare surname. 

5. THE ULTIMATE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF BASKETBALL

Old book. No Pau, no LeBron, definitely no Steph Curry. Jordan, Abdul-Jabbar, Pippen, Magic Johnson--all yep. You get the idea. This book was published in 1996. All the legends during and before that are in this book. All you need to know about NBA from the beginning of time until 1996 are here. Very happy to welcome this into my collection. If I could get a modern version with all those recent great players it would be very cool.

6. BLA BLA BLA EXCELLENCE

Years ago I'd be ashamed to carry or purchase these kind of books. But eh, time for a change I guess. I kinda regret buying both of these. One would be enough, Didn't realise both are mainly written by the same person. Let's just hope the contents aren't the same.

7. THE PSYCHOLOGY OF WINNING

My mouse is pink not because I bought it. It was a free item.

I like this book. So far so good. Halfway through the whole thing. Very insightful. I'm not sure whether I would like it if I read it in 2012-2014 (If you get what I mean..). I won't recommend it to someone who has depression. It's hard to speak in a general manner but if I read this while I was depressed I might feel that the author is belittling my depression. It does make you think and reflect though, especially about how much control you actually have over your life. Reading this reminds me of my parents and how the previous generation seem to be able to man up more in tough times. Again, this is me just generalising stuffs. Funny how psychology really plays a vital part in our lives.

And no, don't judge this book by its cover (and the title). You'll be like "OH SO KIASU, TALKING ABOUT WINNING." Well. That is why I love this book. It's not about the winning thing you think it is. It's more about how you can win against your negative self. 

8. LONG TITLE(S) TOO LAZY TO TYPE

Wish me luck. My plan for next year's Goodreads Reading Challenge is to read just classics. Or..you know..MAINLY classics. These are on the waiting list. Might read them sooner than I think.

9. HEH

I haven't checked if this is on Goodreads yet.

10. A TIME TO KILL

Everyone seems to say this is Grisham's best work. Only one way to find out... 

ANDDDD 

11. EAST OF EDEN

I am extremely delighted to find this gem among the piles of other classics. I've always wanted to buy this but my local bookstore sells it for RM46! Crazy price! This was RM5.90 if I'm not mistaken. Hope I'll enjoy reading this.

12. TWO OTHER BOOKS I FORGOT TO SNAP PICTURES OF (and I'm not gonna do it cos my SD card is still in my laptop right now.)

-The Soul's Code --> I read some pretty convincing Goodreads reviews before purchasing this.

-Word Origins --> Cool book especially if you have geeky friends who you want to impress with random knowledge of word origins. Imagine staring a conversation with "Hey, did you know the word ___ came from ___ because ____." 

___________________________________________________________

So yeah that's pretty much everything about the booksale. I'm still sad that I can't find:

• The Count of Monte Cristo (Penguin Classics edition, they say this one has the best translation)
• Infinite Jest
• And I forgot to go to the kids section to find Roald Dahl titles. I feel so sad that I forgot. :(

I reallllly want to read these two books. And I haven't seen them anywhere in front of my own eyes yet. Pretty sad eh. Funny how in some parts of the world people can get books so easily and they have cheap books all year round. While some don't even have the chance to learn how to read because books are so limited. And there's us here..where smart book-buying skills are needed so that yknow..you can actually buy books and not be broke. I've stopped buying books sold at regular prices in bookstores. Glad that these kind of booksale exists. 

A girl standing near me while I was taking a wefie with my dad said loudly to her bunch of friends that "WAHLAO SO JEALOUS AH! TWO PLASTIC BAGS AH!"referring to me ehermmm. I was like..in my heart.. Eh gurllll you're merely seeing the fun part of it. Took me a year to save for this. And it looks a lot but seriously..I didn't spend that much. Last year I saw the customer before me paying RM500. Now that's A LOT. But hey, go ahead and spend as much as you can and as much as you want. Books are cool stuffs.

I remember going there for the second time last year on the final day and they reduced the prices of a lot of classics to RM2. Not sure whether I'll be having the chance to go again but I think I'm happy enough I got all these. 

I am currently reading KL Noir, a book I borrowed from the library. Kinda good. 

And I had coffee during lunch and I didn't have any naps today and I'm so impressed what coffee can do to me. I started writing the song I wanted to write (two verses done so far), I practised a fingerstyle arrangement, and you know.. JUST WANT TO END THIS POST BY SAYING THAT COFFEE MAKES ME HAPPYYYY. And books make me happy too of course.