You might know that I’ve been avoiding buying books recently, mainly because I’ve got so many unread books in my house. But last week I bought a few in Edinburgh and that sort of opened the floodgates.
As it was a lovely day today we took ourselves off to St Andrews and ended up (well actually we began) in the bookshops. This lot is the result.
Winter Solstice by Rosamunde Pilcher
Love by Elizabeth von Arnim
The Courts of the Morning by John Buchan
Look to the Lady by Margery Allingham
Hamlet, Revenge! by Michael Innes
Brat Farrar by Josephine Tey
The Singing Sands by Josephine Tey
Miss Pym Disposes by Josephine Tey
Thornyhold by Mary Stewart
The book gods must have been hovering above me today. Only one Virago mind you but what a one, I love Elizabeth von Arnim. There weren’t any books by the authors that I was actually looking for, except for The Braddons by Angela Thirkell but I requested that one from the library so there wasn’t any point in buying it.
It’s just as well that I’ve got more time for reading now that we don’t have a house full of boys any more.
On to Dundee to try out Duncan’s local fish and chip shop which was very good. Then we had coffee towers from Fisher and Donaldson – so bang went the healthy diet. And bang went another Saturday too.
Well, if you’re going to fall off the wagon you might as well do it in style.
What is a coffee tower — it sounds delicious! And the scones on their website are stunning. . . . why can’t we have double cream in the US? We have lots of places with wonderful dairy products, i.e., Wisconsin. Why has this never caught on? Sigh. Someday I have to go to the UK and have proper tea.
I was born on the wrong side of the Atlantic, I really was. Your day sounds wonderful — bookshopping, fish and chips, and dessert. Perfect!
Karen,
Next time I’ll take some photos. A coffee tower is a large choux pastry bun which has a whipped cream filling which has been flavoured with coffee. It’s covered with coffee icing, topped with a big swirl of coffee cream and a large chocolate button – yummy!
When Mark Twain tasted cream in Britain he said that the people back home were being duped because American cream didn’t taste anything like it. Very strange that you don’t have double cream, my favourite is clotted cream, but that’s a west country (of England) speciality.
That’s a lovely stack of books! I’ve only read about four of them. My husband just commented that the one stack of TBRs on a table in the living room has grown to four stacks. And that’s just the living room TBRs. I also have a bag of books I’ve read ready to take to The Book Trader, my local used book store. I turn them in, they give me store credit, I get more books. Time to get reading!
Joan,
It certainly is time to get reading. I’ve still got about 20 pages of The Claverings to go. I’m hoping to blog a bit about it later tonight. I’ve been busy in Edinburgh today.
If my husband complains about my book piles I’m going to say that Joan is even worse!!
Josephine Tey – I have one to start reading on my shelf at the moment.
Got interested in it because of reading Nicola Upson’s books.
Love the sound of fish and chips and coffee towers. Not good when you are on a diet like me!
Jo,
I’ll have to give Nicola Upson’s books a go.
It’s definitely not good for the waist-line. What with Christmas and not being able to get out much to exercise because the place was like an ice rink over the holidays I’ve put on about half a stone! I’m determined to walk it off though.
Must have a coffee tower next time in Edinburgh…which should be soon.
I have solved the intimidation fator of the TBR towers…kindle! An unread queue is far less daunting. And since I refuse to add a book unless and until the publisher backs off the price to under $10 (damn you MacMillan!!), they don’t accumulate quite so much.
Walking into a book store is much the same as turning my pockets out onto the sidewalk, and I simply haven’t the storage space anymore.
Pearl,
I hope you can wait for the better weather before going to Edinburgh, it’s still really cold although nothing like as bad as it was.
I’ve never used a kindle – don’t know if I like the idea although it would solve storage problems. Don’t know what we’ll do when we move to a smaller place.
Luckily I got all of my books from a second-hand bookshop and they cost about £2 each. The hardback Pilcher was only £3. It is terrible of me and I know I sound really mean but I hate paying full price for books!