hi everyone my name is Cynthia let's
talk books and let's just call myself
out I have a huge haul today and I'm
gonna see if I can fit it all on a video
so that means I'll probably go through
these a little bit quickly but I want to
I want to haul them share them with you
all I think that's I have
a lot of fun watching
haul videos even though you don't get
reviews and and they can sometimes be
problematic I love watching them I love
filming them and I have a shit ton of books
here to share with you. All over the place - we've got all
the genres used new but from all over
the place so without further ado let me
just get started first is the first
big one in here is Asterix and
Cleopatra. Asterix is a french comic
book strip. They've done several cartoon
versions of it as well. I recently used
this Asterix in my class to
talk about kind of the Romans in modern
culture because it was made in like the
50s 60s and it can actually be quite
racist and sexist and the way it hadles
Cleopatra is one of the is one example
of how it does both of those things so
let me put that there okay next up. This
I bought a while ago but most of these
books are over the course of a few
months so this is Martha Wells All
Systems Red I am dying to read this book
it's super short and I've heard really
good things and it's about murderbot
a bot out in space and it sounds really
good. To go along with that I was just in
San Francisco last week no this week
this week and I bought the rest of the
books in the sea in the murder bot
series because I just have a feeling
that I'm really gonna love it so let's
see we've got Rogue Protocol, Artificial
Condition and Exit Strategy so there we
go
I bought these in hard cover
this one was only in the
paperback and I'm not one to like I
don't care about uniformity and I
actually prefer paperback but I haven't
seen these other ones at my local
bookstores so I grabbed them and I felt
like these are smaller books I could
justify buying them in San Francisco
because I was gonna have to carry them and
I was like smaller books great
I can carry those. Alright next book
I bought in San Francisco is Marguerite
Duras' The Lover so Maguerite Duras
was a French writer and she is amazing I
just assigned one of her other books in
my class called The War: A memoir which is
her writing about her experience at the
very end of world war two and she is an
incredibly gifted emotional writer. Like
she has a way of drawing you in to her
inner world in like taking you with her. It's
such an impactful experience to read her
so I picked up The Lover this one's
about sort of semi-autobiographical set
in Saigon and talks about the
relationship between a French woman and
a Chinese lover. Yeah so this is during
the French colonial period and I thought
this may be another one that may be
useful in a class. Okay. Next up
I picked up With the Fire On High by
Elizabeth Acevedo. I really
liked The Poet X and this is such a
gorgeous cover everybody buys it
automatically points that out. Look at
this it's just it's it's gorgeous and I
wanted to support her and I wanted to
have this book so now I do.
This one is YA and I think it's about
a teen mother and about cooking yeah and
so I'm really looking forward to it.
Alright you need through these a
little quicker don't I.
I thought Susan Dennard's TruthWitch
it's, I believe that it is the first in Whichlands
series and I've heard a lot of really
good things and I don't
all that much about it other than a lot
of people whose opinions I really
value have said good things about it and
so here it is now in my collection. I
also bought The Everlasting Rose by
Danielle Clayton. So I this is the sequel
to The Belles. I thought I was gonna read
The Belles in May and that's why I picked
up the second a book in the series I
didn't get to The Belles but it is on my
TBR and it's pretty high so I want to
have the sequel in case I'd like me to
jump right into that one.
They this is this was a weird purchase
okay I was at Barnes & Noble and I had a
coupon and had several coupons and so I
picked up the V.E Schwab's A Darker Shade
of Magic this is the exclusive collector's
edition and it has a nice little book mark Then I also picked up V.E
Schwab's A Gathering of Shadows in this
exclusive Barnes & Noble edition because I
thought was gorgeous really gorgeous
cover and that was really a bit of an
impulse buy with cupons. There it is.
Next up, I bought the sequel to The Naturals.
So I have the Naturals also really high
on my TBR and when I saw this in my used
bookstore I just immediately grabbed it
because I have feeling I'm really gonna
like it.
It's YA murder-mystery I believe and
a thriller. Is it a thriller? Either way, I
feel I am I'm really gonna like it and
so this is a really nice like well-kept
use copy of it so I am happy to have
that. So that's by Jennifer Lynn Barnes
they had another Jennifer Lynn Barnes book
and the shelves on the shelves at my used bookstore
this one's  every other day and I'm not
really sure what this one's about but it
was at the used book store and I've
never seen her books at the used bookstore
before as an aside I just
grabbed it
Oh yeah, my used bookstore is also
really good about usually having these
editions of Agatha Christie in stock.
They just got a bunch the other week.
This one is Easy to Kill and so I have a
couple of others in this edition and
this was just such a good copy like it
doesn't even look read like when you open
it it kind of feels really new so
picked up some Agatha Christie. Ugh they also had this copy of
Murder on the Orient Express
and I've actually never read Murder on
the Orient Express but this is another
one that like feels new like it opens up
like new copies do but this is an
impress printing of it and I just thought it
was really pretty and just a good book
to have. I also bought a Spectacle by
Jodi Lynn Zdrok  maybe so this
one takes place in Paris in the 19th
century and involves a murder. I was my
sign me up.
Paris 19th century, murder. It's checking
all my boxes. So next up is Courtney
Milan The Duchess War so this is one of
her historicals. She is an incredible
person. I follow her online and I
haven't read any of her books so I
picked up this one so this is a historical. I
also picked up one of her contemporaries
where did it end up it somewhere my piles,
I will get to it. I also picked up The Five
The untold lives of the women killed by
Jack the Ripper by Hayley Reubenhold
actually went to her talk at the Ripped
Bodice which is an all romance
bookstore in LA and I did get my
copy signed but so the big addition that
Hallie Rubenhold brings to the studies of Jack the
Ripper is that she went in to back into
the archives to write about the women
that Jack the Ripper killed and what she
found is that they weren't prostitutes
only one was actively involved in sex
work.
I think the couple of the other ones had
been involved sex work in the past but
not at the time that they were killed so
that really a lot of us got, get that
history wrong and that it's really
important to kind of correct that
because it says a lot about us and our
understanding of women and women's lives.
Next up I put in an order on Book
Depository and I got Grey Sister by
Mark Lawrence
and Holy Sister. So I already have the
first one Red sister and these UK
paperback editions are gorgeous. So I I just
wanted them and I wanted the paper
back I don't like the hard copies so
yeah hardbacks. Okay another non-fiction book I
picked up Burn Out: the secrets to
unlocking the stress cycle by Emily
Nagoski and Amelia Nagosky so it's a
pair of sisters and I really I think I'm
experiencing burnout and it's really
easy to burn out teaching. So you know I I
don't want to do that I don't want to
fully burn out, I don't have to quit I
you know and I'm hoping that there will
be some really good advice and some good
strategies in here so yeah. I this is
actually really high of my to read list
this summer. Next up I bought Women
Talking a novel by Miriam Toews. So I've
heard quite a bit of this on books on
bookstagram and it's the story of these women
that belonged to a Mennonite community
and it looks like there's going to be a
sexual assault and that the women have
to deal with this separately than the
men because the men take a very
different approach
and it impacts the whole community and
it basically divides it along gender
lines and it sounds really really good and I am
hoping that it's as good as it sounds. At the Riped Bodice
I also picked up
Beverly Jenkins Tempest this I think is
one of her most recent historicals and I
haven't read aton of Jenkins
and I really really want to and I don't
think I'm gonna start with this one but
I'm glad to have this one in my collection
now. This one I picked up at the LA
Festival of Books Pride and Prometheus
by John Kassel
it is Pride and Prejudice with a SiFi
fantasy twist so it's like merging the
stories of Pride and Prejudice and
prometheus. It sounds a little weird but
I am here for all of the Pride and
Prejudice retellings, all of them.
So, I'm gonna give that on a shot.
Next up is Christina Lauren's My
Favorite Half Night Stand so I do I did
get this one signed and you show us
signature I was at a talk that included
Christina and Lauren they're a writing
duo and the last two books I've read by
them I liked with some caveats like
there were elements in there that I really
really liked and then one thing in each
of those books that are really really
did not so I'm hoping um the summer will
be better this one's about history
professors or at least one history
professor I think at UC Santa Barbara
professors so hopefully it's not a
professor-student relationship because
that would be yucky. Next up I
bought Alicia Rai's Rai's A Gentleman
in the Streets I really really love her
she was such a delight she was the
at the Ripped bodice for that talk
signed my book and told me I was pretty so
what a delight but I really really love her and
her book that is coming up this summer
The Right Swipe looks amazing
like everybody that talks about it says
it's amazing so gotta read more of her
then I also picked up The City of Brass
by S.A Chakraborty. So another
one of those fantasy books that people
really really love and my feeling I'm
gonna go on a fantasy and scifi
binge so along those lines I have Brandon
Sanderson's Warbreaker so I believe
this one he actually offers on his
website for free to download but I
wanted the physical copy of it so I
ordered it from Book Depository because
I liked their cover better and it's a
standalone
fantasy and several people kind of say
that this is a great place to start with
Brandon Sanderson so I thought I would
give it a shot. Then I picked up Ursula Le Guin's Lavinia
this is a retelling of the Aneid, it is one
of those classic ancient books it's it's
the story tells the story of the
founding of Rome before Romulus and
Remus and this is a retelling of that
through the eyes of the Italian princess
of that Aeneas marries and I'm here for
all the ancient retelling so I'm looking
forward to that one.
Along those same lines this is
For the Most Beautiful by Emily Hauser
so this is a retelling of the Trojan War
yeah this one is the Trojan War and I've
really been into these are lately I
teach a class on it's called classical
civilizations and the modern world so I
think that is a great fit for retellings
and I'm always on the lookout for new
ones that I can recommend to students
and assign in classes.
Oh next up, I had to, I had to buy this
book that and I ordered from book depository
because in the u.s. it looked really
expensive it's a pri... copy of Pride
and Prejudice. I know I don't need a...
a new copy of Pride and Prejudice like I
already have several of them but this
was just too gorgeous to pass up. So this
is the sisterhood collection they have
a bunch of these classics of like
women's writing and they just did like
oh here it is, they have Little Women
Heidi and Ann of Green Gables, a Little
Princess I had to have Pride and Prejudice because it
is one of my favorites. Oh more from the
Ripped Bodice, a couple more romance books
these are by Sally Thorn so she was the
reason the event was taking place the
Ripped Bodice I've already read The Hating
Game I had I read on an e-book and so
she was there signing books I thought it
would be a great time to pick up The
Hating Game and then I picked up for
her latest book 99 Percent Mine and I'm
really looking forward to it alright I
kind of get the drug few more of these. At my used
bookstore I picked up The Age of
Empire by Eric Hobsbawm this is part of
collection of his like historical
collection of books that aim to tell
kind of full history and so it's a
classic in history and I don't have a
copy of it so when I saw it, I picked it
up. I also picked up one more book by
Simone de Beauvoir this one's The Woman
Destroyed these this is three stories
yes these three long stories draws until
the lives of three women. Simone de Beauvoir was a wonderful
philosopher
intellectual and I haven't read any of
fiction so I am planning on doing that
this summer. I also picked up Kathy
Reichs
Déjà Dead from the used bookstore so it
is the story of Temprence Brennan so Bones
the series Bones is based on
these bookd but it turns out the books
are more interesting like she speaks
French in the books
yeah they are set in Quebec so I'm gonna
give it a shot see how that works for me. A couple more, just a few more I picked
up Journey to the Center of the Earth by
Jules Verne and I had a student read this book
in my Modern France class and he did a
whole project around it and it actually
got me really interested in Jules Verne in guiding this student
through that research and they I had one
so I had several students who read
Jules Verne and I one student in particular
like just was able to ties in his his
story to like the different historical
trends in the 19th century. So now I
really need to read it. I also picked up
a copy uh The Time Machine I assigned
this in one of my classes the semester
and I like having extra copies of books
that I use in class just o like gift to
students or loan out and this is
actually a really pretty addition of it.
Alright last book I have Wicked Saints by
Emily A Duncan so this was the Owlcrate
I have one more OwlCrate that's
currently sitting in my mailbox but the
key to open and you know sometimes
they'll put him in  a separate box.
The key to open that box doesn't work so
I'm stalking my mail woman who is
normally really great I have a feeling they they
sent somebody else in she must be on
vacation. But so Wicked Saints, OwlCrate
uh apparently this is like a mystery
story with a lot of a mystery fantasy
that's all I know but I have now seen
one person who's read it and really
really loved it and another person who
thinks they will like it and I do't know I
like it I love
I love mysteries and I love fantasy so
this will be a good mix it's also by
YA so it should be easy to get
through oh and I think I'm through I
think I got through all of my purchases.
Again this has been over months but let
me know if you've read any of these
books I really do love hearing what you
guys have to say about some of these
books and I do move books up in my TBR
when you all talk about them in the
comments especially when you give her a
recommendation for it. So if you have
read any of these please please please
let me know and yeah in the meantime
thank you so much for watching and I'll
see you in the next one.
