Good news or bad news first?
I think bad news.
Bad news is one of my favorite locally owned bookstores went out of business a few weeks ago, which sucks because I loved that place. But I will get over it, and I didn’t let it leave without paying a farewell visit.
This particular bookstore was called Murder By the Book, and focused solely on mysteries, which was the best. They had shelf sections titled “The Butler Did It” or “English Cozies of the 20th Century” and I absolutely loved that place. Not only did they have a huge selection and really great taste in mystery, they also had ridiculously cheap books and a library system for the droves of impoverished bookish college students that live in my town. My favorite thing wasn’t the books I could sort through, though. (Although I loved those too. They have contributed probably 10% of my books.) It was the mystery bags. The deal was, you spent $4-10 on a bag of x many books, with a classification system so you could decide if you wanted books like Nancy Drew or psychological thrillers. Beyond the loose classification system, you couldn’t see anything about the books, and you didn’t know precisely how many or how long each was. You just had to buy it and find out. And it was the coolest thing ever.
So on their closing week I went in and got two bags, one being medium scary and one being the highest class of terrifying. One had a red star and one had a blue. Problem is, I can’t remember which is which, but that’s not really a problem. I’ve opened one of them so far, the one with the blue star, and there were three books in there. I’m going to keep them a secret, except for the first one, which I’ve already started.
The Explorer’s Code by Kitty Pilgrim
It’s quite a dense book, and kind of long, so the review might take a while, but I’m super excited for this new series I’m going to call . . . Mysterious Mysteries. (By the way, did you know you can find an archive of all our series posts on our Recurring Topic Archives? Handy.) I’m hoping to drag it out by reviewing slowly because these books are literally the last remnants I have of my beloved bookstore (although I do have a couple others I bought and haven’t read yet . . . Also exciting), so the posts will probably be pretty infrequent.
Cheers!
Rosey
ALSO: WordPress just told me this was my 75th post! That’s so cool! By the way, our one year anniversary is August 27th, so be excited. I am.
Bookmarks 