Books Haul
September 14, 2013Bonjour,
Today has been a lovely, rainy September day, and I've spent it sitting at my laptop wearing a big woolly jumper and furry socks - alright, so I've been doing my homework all day, but who's counting?
Anyway, today I'm posting a book haul, as a huge box arrived from Amazon yesterday, and this is my portion of the goodies.
A Great and Terrible Beauty, Rebel Angels and The Sweet Far Thing by Libba Bray
Firstly, I got this trilogy by Libba Bray. I really can't remember where I first heard about these books, but they haven't actually been on my wishlist all that long. Set in 1895, the main character is Gemma Doyle, who is shipped off from her life in India to a boarding school in England, where she discovers her power to attract the supernatural. I think was interested by the odd mix of historical fiction, school story and fantasy these seem to involve - they're also described as Gothic novels "touched by modern conceptions". Despite (or perhaps because of) this bizarre mix of genres, I think I'm going to enjoy this trilogy a lot.
Bright Young Things and Beautiful Days by Anna Godbersen
Surprise, surprise - it's historical fiction. I first read Anna Godbersen's series The Luxe a year or two ago, and I remember being thrilled to find out she had written another similar series set in the 1920s. Especially after reading and watching The Great Gatsby, I think it's safe to say that the roaring twenties are a favourite period of mine, so I really hope these books live up to my expectations. I got the first two books from the series because these were both available for about £2 each, and the next one was over £5, so I'm going to wait for it to go down in price.
Rose Under Fire by Elizabeth Wein
Glow by Amy Kathleen Ryan
Rose Under Fire is Elizabeth Wein's second novel set in World War II, after Code Name Verity which was an incredible read that I reviewed back in July. It's about an American ATA pilot who is captured and sent to the Ravensbruck concentration camp - if it's anything at all like Code Name Verity, I cannot wait to read this!
On a bit of a departure from the historical fiction theme, Glow is about two teenagers called Waverly and Kieran who are part of the first generation born in space. The blurb gives very little away about the rest of the plot, but that was enough to convince me! I saw this in a bookshop in the UK over the summer and decided to buy it online. To say one more thing about it, I just love the cover - it's so beautiful and it has a really tactile, waxy feel to it.
Untold Stories by Alan Bennett
Greek Tragedy
These are actually two books I need for school, but I thought I'd include them here anyway. I don't know much about Alan Bennett, but this book has some raving reviews on the back cover so I assume that means it's good, ahaha. The one on Greek tragedy is because we're going to be looking at tragedy and comedy over the next two years, and as my English teacher said "You really can't talk about tragedy without going back to the Greeks, can you?".
And that's it! Even though I promised myself I wouldn't buy any more books until I'd read everything on my bookcase, I have made some decent progress over the summer and I just needed something to keep my spirits up in the face of a whole year of school. I spent less than £20 in total (not counting the ones for school), so I'm pretty pleased with myself for getting finding them for such good prices. I'm really excited to get stuck into all these - I may review one or two if they really catch my interest, so look out for that.
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