Birthday Books: Bad Trisha Busts BLoB Score

Okay, I went a little crazy for my birthday.  It was my excuse on three separate shopping trips to buy books (and I'm continuing the trend when I go to BEA for why I'm allowed to bring home even more books).  Sorry about the lighting on these pictures; I took them in my downstairs dungeon.

Trip #1 Galena
In one lovely antique/old books store, I found the following lovelies.

Emile Zola's Germinal had me smiling like an idiot when I saw it as Amanda over at The Zen Leaf had recently sparked my interest in the book.  Henry James' Washington Square caught my attention because of all the reviews on Crossing Washington Square such as Jen's at Devourer of Books and Jill at Fizzy Thoughts and Stephanie at Laughing Stars and well you get the picture.  Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami found its way into my bag because of Nat at In Spring it is the Dawn and Trish of Love Laughter Insanity. The Phantom of the Opera just seemed like a book I should read.  Seven Gothic Tales caught my fancy because who doesn't like Gothic tales?  Finally A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius has been on my man-you-really-should-read-this list for years.  I'm taking the plunge this summer.

Trip #2 and Trip #3 Barnes and Noble (aka The Bane of My Existence)

Now here's where I went a little crazy and had my husband giving me The Look.  The Complete Sherlock Holmes is entirely the film's fault.  Badass by Ben Thompson just sounds so unbelievably fun. That's right ladies and gentlemen, the first four GNs in the Fables series! We can of course blame Nymeth for this...or buy her a really fancy dinner for turning me on to this series. Unwritten by Mike Carey and Peter Gross is also Nymeth's fault as is Alison Bechdel's Fun Home; although Amanda is the one who pushed me over the edge to buy it. I bought Marked on the recommendation of one of  my students when I told her I was looking for a fun YAL series.

The Physick Book of Deliverance Dane by Katherine Howe was all over the blogosphere for awhile with Jen at Devourer of Books, Fyrefly's Book Blog, and S. Krishna all offering reviews.  David Gilmour's The Film Club appealed to me as an educator and as a film buff.  Eva at A Striped Armchair and Ana from things mean a lot are entirely at fault for The Virago Book of Ghost Stories with their reviews. I was just going to buy book 8 in the Cirque du Freak series, but in my birthday bliss I just figured I'd get the rest of the series....

I started Riordan's Percy Jackson series at my library but they only have books 1 and 2.  I'm something of a book whore so I just bought the next two instead of waiting for my library to get them.  Dead and Gone by Charlaine Harris was really an impulse buy so I could finish the Sookie Stackhouse challenge.  Keri Arthur's Full Moon Rising was unheard of by me, but the student who recommended Marked suggested I buy it for a more adult fun paranormal series.  I take this to mean there's sex.  The dirty kind.

So, 27 books later I'm thinking that my book buying ban has failed miserably.  And yet I must say I'm not upset by that at all, and I'm really looking forward to reading these books (pushing the other 100+ TBR books back yet again).

Oh, I also got these adorable book ends from my grandmother:

And my husband thought it was hilarious for this to be the first thing I saw the morning of my birthday:

It's a pinata!  We plan on filling it with candy and beating the heck out of it the first day the pool is open.