Getting Rid of Books – How to Decide When It’s Time to Part Ways
/32 Comments/by SuzanneThis is the time of year when I most often think about parting ways with some of the physical books that fill my bookshelves. Every year I receive wonderful new books as Christmas gifts and then spend days trying to figure out where to put them because my shelves are already overflowing.
I have to admit that as a book hoarder collector, I find it very hard to get rid of books. In the back of my mind, there’s always this little voice that tells me I might want to re-read all of my books someday and that it therefore doesn’t make sense to part ways with them. Spoiler alert: I rarely EVER re-read books so the little voice in my head is totally full of it. And now that I’m doing bookstagram, that first little voice has been joined by another that says “Don’t get rid of that book. You might want to use it in a photo layout one day.” So yeah, fun times, lol.
That’s not to say I never get rid of books though. I do. I have to. I’ve come to accept that my house just isn’t big enough to store an infinite number of books so when I’m maxed out on shelf space, I make the difficult choice to part ways with some books.
How do I decide which ones to get rid of? Well, the easy ones are the books that I didn’t really enjoy when I read them, especially if I actually DNF’ed them. Those are always the first to go. I know I’m never going to read them again so I go ahead and donate those, either to Goodwill or to the local library.
The books that are harder to choose from are those that I liked but didn’t necessarily love. I kind of cheat when it comes to these books. I’ll pull them off my shelves to make room for newer books, but I won’t part ways right away. Instead, I box them up and shove them in the back of my closet. If I haven’t given any of them a second thought after a few months, then I’m good with getting rid of them. Because I did enjoy these though, I’ll usually show them to my mom and sister, who are also avid readers, and give them first pick if any are of interest, then I donate the rest.
I have an even harder time parting ways with classics. There’s just something about them that makes me feel like I should hold on to them, even if I didn’t particularly like them when I read them. I have two copies of Moby Dick sitting on my shelves right now, for example, and I absolutely hated that book when I read it. And as you can see from the photo above, they’re not even pretty copies of the book. Maybe it’s the collector in me or maybe I subconsciously think it makes me look smart to have classics on my shelf. Or maybe I think my son might want to read it someday. I don’t know. Maybe I’m just weird, lol.
So if classics are a struggle even if I didn’t like them, what happens if I actually loved a book? Well, you can pretty much forget me ever parting ways with it. It’s just not happening. Those are the books where those little voices in my head always win out. Thankfully, although my methods are clearly far from perfect, it seems to work out well enough. I’m typically willing to get rid of just enough books each time to make room for the new ones. If that ever ends up not being the case, I guess I’ll have to re-evaluate what I’m doing, but until that time comes, I’m content with my system.
So, what about you? How do you decide which books to part ways with?
Review: WATCHING YOU by Lisa Jewell
/10 Comments/by SuzanneAlso by this author: The Family Upstairs, The Night She Disappeared
Published by Atria Books on December 26, 2018
Genres: Mystery, Thriller
Pages: 320
Source: Netgalley
Amazon
Goodreads
FTC Disclosure: I received a complimentary copy of this book from the publisher via Netgalley. All opinions are my own.
MY REVIEW:
Lisa Jewell’s latest novel Watching You is the thrilling domestic drama you need in your life. It’s a murder mystery that is filled with suspense, complicated characters, and a myriad of plot twists that will keep you guessing and on the edge of your seat until the final piece of the puzzle is in place and the murderer is revealed.
Watching You is set in an upscale neighborhood in Bristol, England, and although several of the neighbors play important roles in the overall story, the novel primarily follows a character named Joey Mullen. Joey apparently has a history of not always making the best choices in life and so when we meet her, she has just moved back to Bristol with her brand-new husband (who she has only known for a few months) and the two of them are living with Joey’s brother and sister-in-law while they try to find jobs and save up to get a place of their own.
One night Joey encounters Tom Fitzwilliam, the beloved headmaster at one of the local schools, and she, like most of the female student body at his school, develops a crush on Tom. Even though he is happily married and therefore unavailable, Joey thinks about him all the time, makes up excuses to walk near his home to see if she can catch a glimpse of him, and goes out of her way to find ways to cross paths with Tom. She thinks her secret crush is safe, but she doesn’t realize that Tom’s son, Freddie, has been watching her just as much as she has been watching Tom.
Ah yes, the watching. That’s what it’s all about with Watching You. Everyone in this novel is watching and spying on someone else. It’s disturbing and yet also quite fascinating because none of them are as innocent as they would like for their neighbors to believe. They all have secrets they’re trying to keep hidden, but at the same time, they’re almost desperate to find some dirt on their neighbors and in the end, everyone involved gets way more than they bargained for…
There’s so much to love about this book because Jewell just sets up the drama so perfectly. She opens the novel by introducing us to Joey, Tom, and a few of their neighbors but then immediately hits us with a murder. She starts building up the suspense immediately too because she doesn’t give the reader any details as to who the victim is or what has happened. I was hooked right away and immediately started looking closely at the characters I had met so far, trying to figure out who might be the victim, who might be the murderer, etc.
Speaking of the characters, Watching You is filled with realistically flawed characters, any of whom seem capable of having murdered someone. Each of the neighbors had messy, complicated lives and their individual dramas just added so many more layers to the story that made it so much more than just a murder mystery. It was interesting to learn more about each of them and to watch them in action. Fallible is probably the best word to describe them because mistakes and human error play a large role in the story. As I’ve mentioned, these neighbors like to observe each other, but not only do they observe, they judge and make assumptions about people, they take things out of context and try to fit them into whatever narrative they’re trying to spin, and unfortunately, more often than not, they’re wrong.
All of these wrongs are what Jewell skillfully weaves into the narrative to drive the story along. She presents the story to us from the viewpoints of several of the neighbors, so we get to see several perspectives as to what is going on in the neighborhood. Those chapters move us forward toward the murder so we are able to see what tensions are mounting throughout the neighborhood – who might have been a likely target, as well as who might have the biggest motive to commit the crime. Interspersed throughout, however, are also police interviews with the various neighbors to specifically give us their thoughts and theories about the murder. The novel’s structure actually reminded me a lot of Liane Moriarty’s Big Little Lies, and it works here just as well as it did there. It really made for a fast-paced read that held my attention throughout, and the more I read, the more I desperately wanted to know who was dead and who had done it.
Overall, I really enjoyed Watching You. I thought the pacing was fantastic and I loved how Jewell kept the suspense and tension building throughout the novel. The only aspect of Watching You that fell a little short for me was that I didn’t really feel much of a connection to any of the characters. Joey was probably the character I connected with the most, but even then, for the most part, I still felt like I was on the outside looking in. Maybe that’s fitting since this is a story full of people watching each other, but that distance kept this from being a 5 star read for me.
Lisa Jewell’s Watching You is a riveting read that is sure to keep you on the edge of your seat. I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys domestic thrillers. If you’re a fan of Liane Moriarty’s books, you would probably enjoy this one too. This was my first time reading Lisa Jewell but I’m looking forward to reading more of her twisty thrillers!
GOODREADS SYNOPSIS:
Melville Heights is one of the nicest neighbourhoods in Bristol, England; home to doctors and lawyers and old-money academics. It’s not the sort of place where people are brutally murdered in their own kitchens. But it is the sort of place where everyone has a secret. And everyone is watching you.
As the headmaster credited with turning around the local school, Tom Fitzwilliam is beloved by one and all—including Joey Mullen, his new neighbor, who quickly develops an intense infatuation with this thoroughly charming yet unavailable man. Joey thinks her crush is a secret, but Tom’s teenaged son Freddie—a prodigy with aspirations of becoming a spy for MI5—excels in observing people and has witnessed Joey behaving strangely around his father.
One of Tom’s students, Jenna Tripp, also lives on the same street, and she’s not convinced her teacher is as squeaky clean as he seems. For one thing, he has taken a particular liking to her best friend and fellow classmate, and Jenna’s mother—whose mental health has admittedly been deteriorating in recent years—is convinced that Mr. Fitzwilliam is stalking her.
Meanwhile, twenty years earlier, a schoolgirl writes in her diary, charting her doomed obsession with a handsome young English teacher named Mr. Fitzwilliam…
About Lisa Jewell
Lisa was born in London in 1968. Her mother was a secretary and her father was a textile agent and she was brought up in the northernmost reaches of London with her two younger sisters. She was educated at a Catholic girls’ Grammar school in Finchley. After leaving school at sixteen she spent two years at Barnet College doing an arts foundation course and then two years at Epsom School of Art & Design studying Fashion Illustration and Communication.
She worked for the fashion chain Warehouse for three years as a PR assistant and then for Thomas Pink, the Jermyn Street shirt company for four years as a receptionist and PA. She started her first novel, Ralph’s Party, for a bet in 1996. She finished it in 1997 and it was published by Penguin books in May 1998. It went on to become the best-selling debut novel of that year.
She has since written a further nine novels, as is currently at work on her eleventh.
She now lives in an innermost part of north London with her husband Jascha, an IT consultant, her daughters, Amelie and Evie and her silver tabbies, Jack and Milly.
Can’t Wait Wednesday – KILLING NOVEMBER by Adriana Mather
/38 Comments/by Suzanne
“Waiting On” Wednesday is a weekly event, hosted at Breaking the Spine, which encourages fellow bloggers to spotlight upcoming releases that we’re excited about. It is a meme that I have loved participating in for over a year now, but as Jill is no longer actively posting, from now on I’ll just be linking to Can’t Wait Wednesday, hosted by Tressa at Wishful Endings, which is a spinoff of the original WoW meme.
* * * * *
My selection for this week is KILLING NOVEMBER by Adriana Mather. This one caught my eye mainly because I’m always drawn to books that are set in boarding schools and this one is set in a boarding school that sounds pretty unique, to put it mildly. It also sounds like it’s going to a creepy, twisty thriller, which is even more of a bonus!
KILLING NOVEMBER by Adriana Mather
Publication Date: March 26, 2019
From Goodreads
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of How to Hang a Witch comes a thriller set at a secretive boarding school where students are trained to carry on family legacies that have built–and toppled–empires.
November is trapped.
At the mysterious Academy Absconditi, a school that’s completely off the grid, there’s no electricity, no internet, and a brutal eye-for-an-eye punishment system. Classes include everything from knife-throwing and poisons to the art of deception. And the other students? All children of the world’s most elite strategists, in training to become assassins, spies, and master manipulators. November Adley doesn’t know why she’s been sent to this place, or the secrets that make up its legacy, but she’ll quickly discover that allies are few in a school where competition is everything. When another student is murdered, all eyes turn to November, who must figure out exactly how she fits in before she is found guilty of the crime…or becomes the killer’s next victim.
From the #1 New York Times bestselling author Adriana Mather comes a captivating thriller that will leave you breathless.
* * * * *
I’d love to hear what upcoming book releases you’re waiting on this Wednesday? Leave me your link in the comments below and I’ll stop by and check out your CWW selection for this week. 🙂