I recently resolved to cut back on buying books (and dvds and t-shirts) because I am currently unemployed. To help myself remember this resolution, I wrote a list:
Don't buy anything more from amazon.co.uk, even though they have the best tv on dvd, at great prices, or from amazon.com, even tho it's great for US tv on dvd, and US books that aren't available in Aus;
Don't buy anything more from fishpond.com.au, boomerangbooks.com.au or booktopia.com.au, even though they're good, and Australian/New Zealand owned;
Don't buy anything more from threadless.com, even though they have fab designs, not even if they have a $10 all t-shirts sale.
and I knew without needing to list it that I should stay away from actual bookshops as well as online ones - frustrating given that I've just moved to a suburb that puts me conveniently close to Shearer's on Norton (where I bought some nice books in their sale the other day), and Gleebooks (always a delight to visit any of their stores - new, secondhand, children's, etc), and not that far from Better Read Than Dead.
so today I was in the city, having gone to a meeting at the Centre for Volunteering, and saw that Dymocks was having a sale. I don't often get to the big Dymocks in the city, and even tho the company supported the lifting of Parallel Importation Restrictions (which I was against) and used their Booklover email list to try and persuade customers that ending PIR would be a good thing (which I disapproved of, and emailed them about), they do have a great range of fiction & non-fiction, and are at least an Australian-owned chain bookstore, even if no longer the independent bookshop that Dymocks once was.
(I was pleased to see that they had several copies of F2M by Hazel Edwards and Ryan Kennedy - it's by local Aus/NZ authors, it's YA, and it's about gender identity and transitioning - a first for local YA - and it's a good read. hopefully they'll sell the copies!)
I decided to check the sale out - not committing to buying anything (I have on occasion actually made it out of a book sale without buying anything - not often, but it has happened), just having a look. the stickered sale prices were good - lots of recent fiction at $5, some at $10, and $20 for big hardcovers - so I picked up a few titles - a script book of Little Britain reduced from $39.99 to $5!, John Barrowman's autobiography in hc for $7.50 - and passed over others that were more than $10 and/or not something I'd be sure to re-read.
then a staff member made a charming announcement over the PA "shoppers, if you are in the store right now, consider yourself lucky, we are making you an offer you can't refused. all books and other items on sale tables are now reduced by 50% from the sticker price, so pick up a basket and go crazy, treat yourself, buy gifts for loved ones without costing a fortune. we want to sell all the stock so we don't have to pack it up!"
I did indeed pick up a basket and go crazy, as did many other shoppers. the nice announcer repeated his spiel a few times, changing "so we don't have to pack it up" to "we're doing this as a thank you to everyone who's shopped with us during the year" and adding "consider yourself lucky, it's like a Lotto win!".
so, I decided to be flexible and accommodate this amazing lucky opportunity to help the staff avoid packing up all the stock again, and suspend my "no buy" resolution for an hour or so. and just look at what I got!:
(I'm using pb to mean paperback, not picture book; hc is hard cover; tpb is trade paperback; gn is graphic novel)
Laurell K Hamilton - Blood Noir (hc) $3.75
John Barrowman - Anything Goes (hc) $3.75
Archimede Fusillo - Last of the Braves (pb) $5
Matt Lucas & David Walliams - Little Britain: Scripts and Stuff from Season 3 (hc) $2.50
Justina Robson - Going Under (trade pb) $3.75 (book 3 of Quantum Gravity; I have book 1, now looking for book 2)
Pamela Freeman - Full Circle (tpb) $2 (it's book 3 of the Castings Trilogy, so I'll want to buy or borrow the first two before I read it)
Elizabeth Honey & Heike Brandt - To the Boy in Berlin (pb) $3.75
ed.s James Gunn, Marleen S Barr, Matthew Candelaria - Reading Science Fiction (pb) $10
Kathy Reichs - Devil Bones (pb) $2.50
Brian Caswell - Cruisin' (pb) $2.50
Amanda Lohrey - Vertigo (pb) $1
Gabrielle Bell - Cecil and Jordan in New York stories (hc graphic novel) $7.50
Cristy C Road - Bad Habits (pb gn) $2
Dark Horse ed - My Space: Dark Horse Presents (pb gn) $2
Rehannon Pompey - Smashing Aunty Kathy's Car (pb) $1
Nicki Bloom - Tender (pb playtext) $1
Debra Adelaide - The Household Guide to Dying (pb) $2.50
Hunters & Collectors - Great Australian Albums 2: Human Frailty (dvd) $5
Powderfinger - Great Australian Albums 2: Odyssey Number Five (dvd) $5
Zach Braff - Garden State (dvd) $7.50
Alyssa Brugman - Girl Next Door (pb) $5
ed. Sherman Alexie - Tell the World (pb) $3.75
ed. Amy Goldwasser - Red (pb) $3.75
John Marsden - So Much To Tell You (pb playtext) $2.50
Simmone Howell - Everything Beautiful (pb) $3.75
David Walliams, read with Matt Lucas - The Boy in the Dress (audio cd) $7.50
James Manos, Jr/Jeff Lindsay - Dexter Season 2 (dvd) $10
Melissa Rosenberg/Stephenie Meyer - Twilight (dvd) $5 (now I can make my own Buffy/Edward mash-up!)
Sean Williams - The Dust Devils (pb) $3.75
Jane Godwin - Falling From Grace (pb) $3.75
Cathy Park Hong - Dance Dance Revolution (pb) $2.50
A. Koford - The Laugh-Out-Loud Cats Sell Out (hb gn) $2.50
Quentin Blake - You're Only Young Twice! (hb) $2.50
so I got 34 titles - books of poetry, prose fiction, criticism and plays, dvds of movies, tv series and docos, graphic novels and picture books, and an audio CD - all for $134.25!
and I'm obviously having a lucky book day, cos I just received an email from Text Publishing to say that I'm one of several new subscribers to their e-newsletter who has won a copy of a book published by them! yay!
I wish all who read this may have a lucky book day - lots of lucky book days - whether you're a writer, editor, publisher, bookseller or reader, may you find, buy, win, read, sell to a publisher or to a customer, contract, edit, or write - lots of wonderful books!!!
