Sunday post#10

Sunday is when I sit back with a lovely cup of tea and write about all the wonderful new books I've received and purchased in the past week. This post participates in fab memes Showcase Sunday and Stacking the Shelves.


• Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking-Glass by Lewis Carroll (gift)
• A Possible Life by Sebastian Faulks (gift)
• A Thousand Splendid Suns by Khaled Hosseini (bought)
• Filth by Irvine Welsh (gift)
• Perfect Ruin by Lauren DeStefano (competition win/review copy)
• Stoner by John Edward Williams (gift)
• Sweet Tooth by Ian McEwan (gift)
• The Confusion of Karen Carpenter by Jonathan Harvey (bought)
• The Misinterpretation of Tara Jupp by Eva Rice (bought)
• The Night Circus by Erin Morgenstern (gift)
• The Proposal by Tasmina Perry (gift)
• Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal? by Jeanette Winterson (gift)
• Wonder by R.J. Palacio (bought)


  I had a really exciting literary week! Firstly on Monday I attended a Red magazine event titled "How to write a bestselling beach read", which had a panel of fantastic authors (Flic Everett, Lisa Jewell and Tasmina Perry) talking about their experiences. You can find my write-up of the event on Womans-World.co.uk. It was a really insightful evening, providing very useful information for the aspiring authors in attendance. Everyone received a goodie bag as well, which included a proof copy of Tasmina's new novel, The Proposal (out November 7), and I can't wait to read it.

On Tuesday I ventured over to the Random House offices in Pimlico for a focus group on the Vintage Books imprint. It was an absolutely brilliant night and answering the questions from the Vintage Books team didn't feel like work at all - it was just so much fun getting the chance to discuss all things books with likeminded people! I even ended up exchanging contact details with a few fellow attendees, which was a lovely bonus to the night. And at the end, as a thank you, everyone there got a whole bag of super awesome vintage novels in a branded tote, how cool is that?

Then on Thursday I won a proof copy of Lauren DeStefano's Perfect Ruin from the HarperCollins fiction team on Twitter! I loved Wither so am very interested in this new series, but even more exciting is the way it looks. I've received bound manuscripts in the past but they were always A4 size, this one however is the size of a regular paperback and just looks so cool :D

Finally, on Saturday it was of course the launch for the fantastic new campaign Books Are My Bag, which aims to reverse the rapid decline in high street bookshops by raising awareness about their importance. For the occasion I decided to go to an independent book store I'd never been before, Newham Bookshop in (you can guess it!) Newham, which is about an hour from where I live. It's a brilliantly stocked store with stacks and stacks of books not only on the shelves, but also on the floors and basically everywhere you look. You can easily spend an hour browsing and then when you turn around suddenly spot some more exciting titles you missed before. I ended up buying four new books and got the Books Are My Bags tote to carry them home in - it was a very successful trip!