This past weekend, two friends and I went to Castlemaine, Victoria, an old gold rush town, for a weekend away in an old converted courthouse, where the only goal was to sit around in our sweats and uggs (or really fuzzy socks) and read.  Oh, and eat nothing but bread, cheese, olives and some fruit.

I think we did fairly well at accomplishing our goals, though we did venture out on Saturday to walk along the 'downtown' area of Castlemaine, which firmly falls into the 'small but quaint' category.  We hit a couple of bookstores, because we were committed to our goals, and a book haul was built:

Also acquired, but not in the picture because I'm currently reading it, is a copy of Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell by Susanna Clarke.  It's a doorstop, but the glowing reviews finally sucked me in.  There are two upgrade titles in the stack: The Horologicon, and Why Shoot a Butler? and a new anthology put together by Martin Edwards called Cozy Crime Short Stories, whose front cover also says Gothic Fantasy, and includes a round selection of, let's call them 'vintage' authors - some expected (Conan Doyle), some not so much (Anton Chekov).  

For the curious, a selection of photos from the trip:

The gold fields, or more accurately, what's left of them. 

A Superb Fairywren.

Galah.

And while I was away, MT took this picture in the pitch black darkness of our garden. I pulled as much out as I could, but let's all just pretend I've applied an old school vintage filter instead of calling it the crap photo it is; I include it because it's a momma bush tail possum with her baby on her back, walking along our fence line.  Probably on her way to eat one of our trees bald.

Yesterday MT uttered 6 of my favorite words to me:  I'm out of books to read.  This means it's time for our bi-annual pilgrimage to our local bookstore, where he creates an obscene pile in 0.4 seconds while I'm still struggling to find the new releases table.

I've also received quite a few new books this month, including an unexpected score from Otto Penzler's recent auction of his collection, a vintage copy of The Red House Mystery, and a collection of short stories from Milne, A Table Near the Band.  They were auctioned as a lot, and I put in a low ball bid expecting to be outbid in minutes, when instead I won.  Woot.

A few Halloween possibilities because they're mysteries (and one magical realism), but nothing really in-season.

We did lunch, we did B&N, and then my husband decides to go with me to Half Price Books...and he fell in love. The kids got a book at each place, Adam got a bunch of movies, a board game, and books, and here is my haul:

Death in the Air: The True Story of a Serial Killer, the Great London Smog, and the Strangling of a City by Kate Winkler Dawson

             - True Historical Crime + Natural Disaster = my catnip

They Called Us Enemy by George Takei, Justin Eisinger, Steven Scott, and Harmony Becker

                    - Graphic novel of Takei's time in the internment camps

Daughters of the Night Sky by Aimie K. Runyan

                       - Fiction based on the real Soviet Union "Night Witches"

1666: Plague, War, and Hellfire by Rebecca Rideal

                         - The worst year England ever experienced prior to 2016 (nonfiction)

Prague Winter: A Personal Story of Remembrance and War, 1937-1948 by Madeleine Albright

                        - Memoirs of a former Secretary of State; wanted to read this since TA put it on the Freedom lists

The Final Days: The Classic, Behind-the-Scenes Account of Richard Nixon's Dramatic Last Days in the White House by Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein

                        - I was so happy to find this book, as All the President's Men seemed to abruptly end. Another one for the Nixon Reading List, which I will read for August and sets up for me taking September through the rest of the year to read Shadow.

Tales of Mystery & the Macabre by Elizabeth Gaskell

                          - No I didn't know Elizabeth "I wrote Mary Burton and North and South" Gaskell also wrote supernatural stories. Picked it up in anticipation of Halloween Bingo.

Feed by Mira Grant

                         - Another possible Halloween Bingo book.

FedEx got their act together a day later than scheduled and delivered my box of goodies from the States.

*Cue the stripper music*

Ta-da!:

That's the entire haul, including MT's books there on the left.  My books, close enough to see most of the titles:

Some of those appeared in an earlier book haul post, before I got stuck into holiday mode and fell off the internet.  Some are upgrades from paperbacks.  Some are new to me authors.  Some of them I've already read during my holiday and the reviews are forthcoming.

On my last day, for those that saw my earlier post and thought: Oh hell no, I'm not looking at all those pics, we spent the day in San Francisco enjoying a 12 hour layover.  We stumbled upon City Lights Books and of course I bought a couple of books:

The one on top was waiting for me when I got home - I'd ordered it from the author and forgotten all about it.  Surprise!  :)

I just now noticed I bought two books from a famously progressive bookstore that have "War" in the title.  Freudian much?  :D

The post you all knew was coming ... my first book haul post.  But first, a vitamin D break:

Ok, moving on; as I mentioned earlier, I made my traditional first-day-home pilgrimage to the FOTL across the street from my mom's house, and bought a few books.  Today I returned, because who knows what I missed because of the jet lag?  Then my mom mentioned the library in the next town up, which had to re-built from the ground up, had re-opened.  I've always had excellent book karma at that FOTL (First edition Eyre Affair signed by Fforde for .25 cents) so we pilgrimaged up there.  My karma remains intact.  On the way home, we hit another library FOTL shop.  The result:

Note that the Icarus Agenda is for MT, because his paperback has disintegrated.  A couple of these are upgrades from paperback - and the two Nancy Drews are first editions; none of this 'updating' crap.

There's at least one title there from the 1001 Badass list.  BrokenTune, I caved.  ;-)

This is all a prelude, of course, to our FOTL book trail that my mom, my sister and I inaugurated the last time I was here.  With 6 FOTL shops in the county, we just can't do them all in one day; now we can concentrate on the bigger shops in the county seat later this week.