bookgazing | Behold, Books. Again.

The first full week back at work seemed long. But there was one big thing that made it much better than the last full week of last year:

Yes that’s right my workplace, in the building of the saddest ever bookshelves, was suddenly filled with books. Someone bought in three full bin bags of used books that they were on their way to throwing away (as in putting in the bin!) and offered them round, giving me first pick. Don’t worry the 33 books no one took away were taken away by another colleague to a Sense charity shop – who throws away books? See my bounty below:

'His and Hers' - Mike Gayle: After I picked up 'My Legendary Girlfriend' the giver started trying to press all his Mike Gayle books on me, which were many, but I stuck with just taking this one from the pile as it's terrible to stock up on an author and find you don't like them, then feel doomed to read all their books.

'The Given Day' - Dennis Lehane: I really enjoyed 'Mystic River' and wanted to give this new historical a try, but who knew it was so big!

'Yes Man' - Danny Wallace: Danny Wallace is always guarenteed to make me laugh. This is the story of what happened when he decided to say yes to everything (uhhuh that terrible Jim Carey film is based on this book, bet you this is much better). Will it be funnier than when he and Dave Gorman set out to find people named Dave Gorman?

'Carter Beats the Devil' - Glen David Gold: Proper magicians do tricks- end of. Books about magicians who use 'I can really do anything I want to, fairy dust magic' will always be second rate compared with tales of sleight of hand mastery (unless they are comic fantasy, because ridiculous wizards beat capable wizards down to the ground) . Sign me up for all great books featuring proper magicians.

'Cath 22' - Joseph Heller: This is the one book apart from 'Sense and Sensibility' that I always feel bad about not having read. The lack of it makes me feel intellectually shallow, despite the fact that this is silly. This year I will read it.

'The Rotters Club' - Jonathan Coe; Everyone raves about this and it was free so I let greed get the better of me.

'Nocturnes' - John Connolly: I've wanted to read this for ages, but have mostly forgotten why. Looks spooky though.

'Last Tango in Aberystwyth' - Malcolm Pyrce: A satire on hardboiled crime fiction set in Wales. Hehe.

'My Legendary Girlfriend' - Mike Gayle: Man-lit can be quite funny sometimes and this sounds like a light hearted read.

'Perfume' - Patrick Suskind: Again everyone is enthusiastic about this one, so I thought it was a good bet.

'Don't Lets Go to the Dogs Tonight' - Alexandra Fuller: A biography of growing up in Africa which sounds both scary and oddly more innocent than growing up in Britain.

The Lehane was a Bookmooch find, but it arrived on the same glorious day so I decided to include it in the pile as well.

I promise to get back to proper book talk next week. I have been reading and thinking about things, but only list posts seem to ahve made it to the page. I finished the thriller I started over Christmas, 'Too Close to Home' which didn't impress me as much as Barclay's 'No Time for Goodbye', even though it had a much more sensible conclusion to the mystery. Today I finished Cindy Pon's 'Silver Phoenix' which was a bit of a mixed experience for me and I'm sad about that because I wanted it to be excellent, it had such potential. I also read 'Buccaneers' by Edith Wharton, fell in love with it and will post about it later this month for 'The Classics Circuit'. Right now I'm a couple of chapters into 'Leviathan' by Philip Hoare and I think my mind has finally reacclimatised to non-fiction reading as I've stopped being distracted by every little thing. So yes, posting will come on those next week.

Excuse the lack of links but I must dash into the shower and out to a pizza night with friends. It is quite possible that I will slide down my steep, snowy drive tonight as I don't think I can wear wellington boots to the restaurant. Have nice weekends everyone :)