I was actually a person who usually sleep after flipping two or three pages of a book I'm holding. It never caught my interest not until it became part of my options to busy myself last year.
When the whole world had shut down a year ago due to COVID-19, binge reading has become my stress reliever. It all started with a free application software (just curious about it) but I eventually got hooked up with the stories there until I found myself buying books online to read more and more books of my interest.
In this blog, I want to share to all of you the new books I bought last Thursday at the Booksale and how I evaluate the books before buying it.
Disclaimer: I am not of any way affiliated to Booksale and to the products mentioned here. All information added is for educational purposes and not for promotional purposes.
Booksale
Booksale's main goal is to make reading affordable to anyone. Thus, all their books are cheap in prices. These books are unused, pre-loved and bargain publications from the U.S., Canada, Australia and the UK. It's usually more on self-published books too but they sometimes sell famous and limited edition books.
Aside from selling various kinds of books, they also sell locally-printed magazines. They currently have 90 stores in the Philippines based on the information from their website.
With that being said, I buy books in Booksale because:
- their books are affordable;
- they have plenty of books with different genre to choose from; and
- their stores are accessible.
Three Picks for This Week
Last rainy afternoon of Thursday, I got a chance to visit the store and that's also the reason why I'm writing this now. I guess I can't contain my happiness now holding these picks. I was caught up with a lot of problems in the past few months which hinders me in feeding this pleasure. So, looking at these new babies seems surreal.
These are the titles I got:
(1) A Reliable Wife by Robert Goolrick;
(2) Blood Father by Peter Craig; and
(3) When God Doesn't Make Sense by Dr. James Dobson.
Why I Chose These Books?
The first thing that I look at when choosing books (especially when it's bargain, there's a lot of books there I tell you) is the cover. Though it's contradictory with the idea that we must not judge a book by its cover but I guess book cover matters at times also.
The covers of these books really caught my attention. When I first saw it, I already had an idea in mind about its genre and at a glance I knew these would tickle my interest. By the way, I'm always fascinated with thriller, mystery, and fantasy genres. I also love to include self-help books in my collection. So that somehow explains why I picked these.
The second criterion I consider is the book's blurb. Blurb is the description of the book and it's basically what we see at the back cover of a book.
He placed a notice in a Chicago paper, an advertisement fot a "reliable wife". She responded, saying that she was "a simple, honest woman." She was, of course, anything but honest, and the only simple thing about her was single-minded determination to marry this man and then kill him, slowly and carefully, leaving herself a wealthy widow. What Catherine Land did not realize was that the enigmatic and lonely Ralph Truitt had a plan of his own.
Sounds intriguing, right? I got curious of what will happen to Catherine at the end of the story and would also love to know if who among the two would succeed.
I guess this does not focus merely on suspense, I am expecting for romance on this book actually. I'm still crossing my fingers hoping that this does not focus on romance because I'm still not attracted to that kind of genre.
Perhaps, that's also the best thing when you buy books — you'll also be thrilled to know its plot and if it would meet your expectation.
Lydia Carson is an accident waiting to happen. Strung out, she's always running from disaster, and more often she's running right into it. Now at seventeen, Lydia has stumbled onto real trouble. Not only has she witnessed a brutal murder perpetrated by her boyfriend, but his minions are out to make sure that she doesn't have a story to tell to the police. Jon Link is a former Hell's Angel, an ex-con, trying to stay clean and sober while running a tattoo parlor from the kitchen of his trailer home. He's also Lydia's long-estranged father, and when both the police and her boyfriend's thugs are hot on Lydia's trail, Link becomes Lydia's only hope.
To tell you honestly, this book got my interest because of its upper front cover that says "Now a Major Motion Picture". That may sound funny but that's the truth. After I saw that label, I was intrigued by what this story can tell me.
In addition to that, I immediately added this to cart after knowing that this story belongs to the genres I love. Like the first pick above, I'm again curious as to what would happen at the last chapters of this book.
An immensely practical book for those who are struggling with trials and heartaches they can't understand. Why does disease, natural disaster, divorce, rejection, death, or some other sorrow seep into our lives when we are trying to serve the Lord? It's just doesn't seem fair! This book deals unflinchingly with life's most troubling question — the awesome "Why?" Drawing on his long experience as a Christian psychologist and family counselor, Dr. Dobson brings hope to those who have almost given up. When God Doesn't Make Sense also helps believers avoid the "betrayal barrier" — the sense that God is abandoning them amid the storms in life.
In the Booksale branch where I bought these books, they offered too many self-help and religious books there. And with all those piled books on their shelves, this book pierced greatly my heart.
Perhaps, it really talked to me when I first held it that's why it's in my care now. I don't know what to feel, but I am curious what is it really when God doesn't make sense.
The third criterion I consider in buying books is its price specially now that we are financially challenged. I see to it that while I feed my pleasure I can still have something left to feed my family's stomach too.
For these three picks, I only spent two hundred forty-eight pesos (P 248.00) all in all: A Reliable Wife book costs fifty pesos (P 50.00), Blood Father costs fifty-five pesos (P 55.00) and When God Doesn't Make Sense costs a hundred and forty-three pesos only (P 143.00).
When I went home on that same day, I checked the reviews of the books I have picked at goodreads.com. These are what I've found out.
A Reliable Wife has an over-all rating of 3.27 that's composed of 76,655 ratings and 10,065 reviews.
Blood Father has an over-all rating of 3.84 stars that's composed of 189 raitings and 21 reviews.
God Doesn't Make Sense got 4.17 star ratings that's composed of 1,532 ratings and 99 reviews.
Given that I got these books from bargain with the consideration of its price too and with the reviews I've read, mayhap, it's good to say that I have picked fairly good books.
My heart is full while I'm writing this last part. I don't know what's ahead of my journey with the chapters of these books but I am excited to explore its parts.
If you happen to read any of these books, please feel free to share your thoughts about these. I wish not to hear any spoiler because it will literally ruin my excitement 🤣. Even as I checked the ratings of these books on goodreads, I had to be careful to not click any reviews that contain spoilers.
I thank you for reaching this far. I hope that you got something new out of this narrative. By the way, how do you choose your books to binge read? See you in the comment section!
References:
Booksale goals https://www.booksale.com.ph
Blurb definition from Oxford Languages Dictionary
Books' blurb included in this blog comes from the book's blurb at the back cover of each book.
Goodreads.com book ratings: