Lately I have been getting a little carried away with building my library of older works from second-hand bookstores. I think I have visited six different bookstores since the beginning of December. Three of them twice. And yes, each time a tidy little (little? really?) pile came home with me. And by visit, yes, some were online visits only. But what’s a girl to do when she wants to complete sets? And start new ones to complete while she’s at it.

I’m not going to show you all of the treasure that I have been picking up since that first haul I showed you in December. I’m not at all embarrassed by the volume – I feel no need to be given I could afford it and it helped me through a particularly stressful couple of months and brought me much needed joy – it would just be a massively long post, and I’m a little lazy. So I’m just going to show you some highlights instead. Some of these would remain my highlights, some might go up/down the joy list compared to others depending on the day.

First off, a highlights reel cannot exist without Andre Norton.

And while we’re on the greats… can’t neglect C.J. Cherryh.

And Julian May. I’ve heard of her Exiles series but I can’t remember if I have read it in the dark and distant past. Now I just need to find the first volume. Preferably in the same edition, but when it comes to second-hand books I’m not picky.

And I got lucky and found hardcovers of her Galactic Milieu trilogy (plus book 0.5/prequel). But yes, book 2 is the wrong edition. And yes it does bug me. Especially as it’s an ugly version. I made a mistake and added the wrong one to my cart. I’m now deciding what other books I “need” so that I’m not paying shipping just for the correct book 2 edition.

I managed to score the entire tetralogy of The Tide Lords by Jennifer Fallon. No, I didn’t just buy these because they are pretty (though that didn’t hurt), but the blurb for book one sounded very interesting, and I knew that if I liked it, I’d want the whole set.

And because almost every author that I love, I have discovered by randomly picking up books that caught my eye and sounded interesting, I picked several that way. Ok, so the Barbara Hambly and Katherine Kurtz books didn’t quite fit the bill. I already knew about them and they were on my “keep an eye out” list. But the other two, completely random selections of authors I’ve never heard of before.

It has been pretty much skewed to female authors so far, but I have been giving the guys a chance too. Even if they do come in under 25%. Perhaps under 10%. These all sounded very interesting. Well, ok, three of them sounded interesting. I didn’t actually read the blurb for the Phillip Mann book as it’s part two in a duology and I haven’t read book one. This duology is apparently a kiwi classic and there are more modern editions available, but how could I not want the original cover!

And thus ends the highlights reel of my book buying spree. Although, as I type this I’m thinking of some other gems that I should have included…