2015 Annual Book Sale Haul

Today was the annual Times Colonist book sale, which I mentioned earlier. It’s a great event that goes to charity, so not only can you buy what you want without guilt, but you can even feel good about it.

I’m always surprised at how large an event this is. The doors open at 9:00am and someone commented on their Facebook page that the first people started showing up around midnight. Another commented that at 5:30am there were already 50 people in line. That’s dedication!

It confuses me a little why people would do this, as there are more books than they can actually display and the stock is constantly being replenished, so much so that if you go six hours after opening it’s like an entirely new sale, but I guess they’re either just excited or they have an inside scoop that I do not. They did post a photo of one of the volunteers holding up a first edition Pudd’nhead Wilson in good condition, so maybe there are some collectibles on display that early.

• Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson
• City of Thieves by David Benioff
• The Human Factor by Graham Greene
• Thud! by Terry Pratchett
• A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving
• The Satanic Verses by Salman Rushdie
• The Lost World by Michael Crichton
• The Star’s Tennis Balls by Stephen Fry
• The Napoleon of Notting Hill by G.K. Chesterton
• The Club Of Queer Trades by G.K. Chesterton
• The Martian Chronicles by Ray Bradbury
• The Man Who Loved Books Too Much by Allison Hoover Bartlett
• I Dreamed of Africa by Kuki Gallmann
• Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen
• The Master and Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov
• Boneshaker by Cherie Priest
• Ship Breaker by Paolo Bacigalupi

There are a few books here I’m not sure about, but I thought this would be a good chance to give them a try. Namely: Water for Elephants, I Dreamed of Africa, City of Thieves, and Boneshaker. The Master and Margarita makes me a little nervous as well. I think I’m most excited to read The Martian Chronicles, The Lost World, The Human Factor and the G.K. Chesterton novels. I’m reading Terry Pratchett’s non-fiction right now, and G.K. Chesterton comes up quite a lot. He seemed to have really influenced Pratchett when he was young, so that will be neat to read.

Three hours of marathon browsing and seventeen books for $38. Not too bad!