I have a small collection of books published by Virago It’s a feminist publisher and I usually buy the books which they have re-printed and saved from obscurity. I don’t think I’ve ever been disappointed by a Virago book, and they never spend long in the TBR pile.

It looks like quite a pathetic haul really but I suppose I’ve read a lot more than these ones, having borrowed a lot from the library.

I usually buy them from second-hand/used bookshops but I don’t feel guilty about not buying them new, mainly because my local bookshop is a Waterstones and they were pretty ruthless when they expanded their business. They targeted towns which already had independent bookshops and set about putting them out of business. The local family run buiness here didn’t last very long after Waterstones turned up, they just couldn’t compete with them and so had to close down after years of trading. But that’s another gripe altogether.

I’ve just discovered after looking at the Virago site that I could be buying them straight from the publisher, I hadn’t realised that!

I prefer the older Virago covers to the newer ones which have the apple logo on them. I think the old ones look classier.

I’ve just realised after looking at the photograph that one of the Rosamond Lehmann books is a Collins. Silly me!