Lately, I have been completely and utterly hooked on used book stores on
Instagram. After discovering a bunch in the past couple months, I find myself
unable to stop purchasing from them. In total, I've bought 9 books by this
means—and I still want more! It's been good to go low-waste on my book
purchases, cutting down on my carbon footprints and supporting local
businesses. That being said, the books have definitely piled up and taken up
quite an amount of space in my room. I thought, to remind myself, I'd put the
books here, so they can no longer be ignored—in the hopes that you guys will
hold me accountable to reading them. Of course, if you feel the need for book
inspirations, feel free to note down some of the titles in this post to add to
your own TBR.
I am a huge fan of Philippa Gregory. Ever since I watched
The Other Boleyn Girl—available now on Netflix, by the way—I was hooked on her works. There are a
total of 5 books of hers that I've read previously—The Constant Princess
being my favourite one thus far. Her books taught me a lot about English
monarchy history and the whole scandal with Anne Boleyn, especially—most
people would probably know her better as the English version of Marie
Antoinette. She is definitely the first most hated woman in the nation that I
knew of. It has been a while since the last time that I read one of her books,
but I decided to snatch this from
Fat Chicken Books. Her books had always given me a historic pleasure, transporting me to the
age of the renaissance. Can't wait to dive back in!
Dorian Gray is one of those classic characters that I've been intrigued by for
so long, especially after I found out about the
2009 movie
starring Ben Barnes. For years I've put off buying this book, for some reason.
But when Fat Chicken Books—my usual haunts, so you will see this name pop up often throughout this
list—posted this book for sale, I decided to grab it. The cover isn't
necessarily to my liking—the woes of buying secondhand, you know—but it sums
up the whole plot of the entire book. It was really cheap too—only around 30K,
if I'm not mistaken, which is equivalent to today's US$2.12!
Here is the book that took 2019 by a storm! Or was it 2018? I'm not quite
sure. I do remember how numerous booktubers rave about this book for the
greater part of a year—at least 5 that I follow have given it such high
ratings. I don't remember the story very much, to be honest, but as I recall,
it is written by a BIPOC author and has been nominated for a multitude of
awards—so I'm definitely game. For a while, I've tried to get my hands on
one—used, of course—but it has always been snatched by someone else. This
time, however, I was lucky enough to get it from, again, Fat Chicken Books—and on their clearance sale too!
If we've been looking at books I bought from online used bookstores, this one
is different—I actually bought it over
a year ago
from an offline bookstore. Barbara Kingsolver is also one of my favourite
authors, despite having only read one work of hers—Flight Behavior. Having explored the climate crisis meticulously through the eyes of an
unlikely protagonist—who is neither an activist nor a scientist—she made the
issue feel incredibly humane. Ever since then I've always wanted to read more
works of hers. When I saw this at the used bookstore, I quickly grabbed
it—despite the hideous cover. However, to this day, I haven't even tried
reading it once. Not going to lie: the hideous cover plays a major role in
this lack of interest. Any tips on how to get over it?
When we moved to a new office and I got my own space, my former supervisor
gave me this book to add to my corner of books. This is a translated version
of the famous Indian book-turn-movie in Indonesian. I've watched
the film
myself, and, although I didn't hate it, it didn't speak to me in any
particular way. I have since, however, been reminded by an alarming fact of
the story that I missed completely in the film—or, at least, in my memory—so
I'm piqued to try and read the source material. I suspect, however, that my
former supervisor has an enormous pile of books at his home himself, so he
deliberately dumped this in my care. How convenient.
Here is another book that I've been wanting to read for so long. There are two
covers for this title that I adore—this above being one of them, and
this
being the other one. As usual, I'm not sure what the story is about, but I
haven't been disappointed by a cover that I love so far—let this not be the
first one. I've also never read any work by Anthony Doerr before, but I'm so
excited to try. This one was bought on a whim from
Buku Kaki-kaki, which is another Instagram-based local used bookstore. When the book
arrived, it turns out to be much thicker than I expected, albeit being
incredibly light in weight alone. I might save this one for much, much later,
due to size alone. We shall see.
One of two birthday presents my beloved
Agung got
me—the other one is
Lalita, which I devoured quite early on. Both these books were requested by me,
because I'm very particular about books and I will not like to be
disappointed. This one is by my favourite Indonesian classics writer, the
legendary Nh. Dini. I thought, upon picking up this book, that this was her
last work before her passing the previous year. However, after making a quick
search on Goodreads, it turns out to be a newer edition of her 1993 work.
Never mind, I'd still pick it up as I love her work so much. The new cover
design certainly gives it a fresh, modern look. I can't wait to flip through!
After reading
The Uninhabitable Earth
earlier this year, I was intrigued to try and read some of Harari's famous
works, including
Sapien,
Homo Deus
and this. Personally, I would've picked Sapien to read first, since it is
quoted multiple times on the aforementioned book—and have been hyped up
several people whose tastes I trust completely. But my friend bought me this
book and I couldn't possibly be picky, so I suppose this one first then. As I
understand it, the book will deal a lot with the topics of mankind and their
relationship with the environment, as well as each other. You may notice that
these are topics I hold so close to my heart. Super excited to read this one!
Okay, saving the best for last, this book is truly the star of the whole pile.
I bought this book off the discounts section of a local bookstore—not used,
I'm afraid. The title alone incredibly intrigued me, not to mention to
gorgeous cover and illustrations. Oh, my Lord! The topic in an of itself is
quite unique and one that I've never dove into—and can you tell the irony in
this self-isolation period of human history? I love the concept very much and
cannot wait to get into it. I've never heard of Rob Dunn before, but if I like
this one, I might want to look for his other books. Sadly, this book is large
in size—as you can see—and hardcover to boot, so it's quite impractical to
carry around. We'll see when I'll be able to squeeze it into my bag out and
about.
BONUS: Currently Reading
The title of this book is incredibly apt, not only to uncover the horrifying
method used to control the world's economy around mid '70s until, I suspect,
well into the '90s, but it is also appropriate to describe how I feel reading
each and every page of it. Several jaw drops were had, even only shortly into
the first chapter. If you're a citizen of Chile, Argentina, Brazil, Bolivia
and Indonesia, you might have the same experience, because this book
definitely goes above and beyond in analysing the most traumatic periods of
our respective human histories. For Indonesia, it uncovers the shocking truth
behind the infamously bloody coup d'etat of 30 September 1965—swiftly, in one
paragraph early on, that left me with a heartache and my jaw permanently
dropped. It also revealed, to me, why Thatcher is such a controversial figure
in the UK. But that was only the beginning—there are more shocks to be
had.
Well, that's a peek into my TBR pile thus far. While there are quite a number
of books here, I actually only need to read one more exemplar to reach my
reading goal this year—woohoo! If I look back to the start of the year, when I
lamented for not being able to read as much—due to thesis and work—it seems
silly now. I managed to comfortably and swiftly close in on my reading goal,
almost without much fuss. Not only that, I also get to read as many amazing
books as I possibly can. There were plenty of 5-star books in my read-list
this year too, which, of course, is always a welcome prospect. I wonder if
this has anything to do with my improved psyche. It may not be much,
quantity-wise, but, if you had to choose, you should always choose quality,
right?
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