this is a tad embarrassing...

So...I really, really, really think I need to get back on that book buying ban. I tell you, the amount of books that I've acquired during the last couple weeks...yeah, so not pretty. I'm tempted to play the old "but they were mostly gifts" card, which while true, doesn't excuse the fact that they came from my wish list. Ahh, but this is where shirking responsibility comes in...and I get to pass off some of this blame to those who made these books sound too good to resist. Yep, I've decided to keep up with the "blame game"...after all I'm still reading your blogs, and you're still *making* me buy books. ;)

(Btw, I'm sure it comes as no big surprise that Ana won the round which just ended in April. :D)

And thus we are off to a fresh start:

*Transformations by Anne Sexton. Ana earned a point for this one a while back, because her review inspired me to check this out from the library. Unfortunately, as so often happens with me and library books, we had to part ways before I actually got to read it. But then Chris went and reviewed it, and dammit, but there was no stopping me...I *had* to just go buy it! POINT FOR CHRIS.

*Empress of the World by Sara Ryan. Well, I first heard of this book from a guest post by Lauren Bjorkman on the GLBT Reading Challenge blog. So, hmmmm...do I give her a point? Seems only fair, huh? POINT FOR LAUREN BJORKMAN.

*Between Mom and Jo by Julie Anne Peters. Okay, I sort of feel like I should blame Amanda for this one. Not because of her review, as it was already on my wish list at the time she read it, but because she started the GLBT Reading Challenge to start with. It was back when she started the first year of the challenge. I was searching around for books to put on my list and stumbled upon Julie Anne Peters. Every single one of her books sounded so fabulous that they all ended up on my wish list. Of course, par for the course for me, I'm only now reading my first book by her (Keeping You a Secret)...and it is so good! Anyway, I guess that would sort of be stretching it with the blame, wouldn't it?

*The Wild Wood by Charles de Lint. Another one of those books that I really want to blame someone, but guess I shouldn't. See, in a very real sense, Carl is to blame for this book. Simply because of the Once Upon a Time Challenge. A few short years ago, before stumbling on his challenge (a stumble which literally changed my life!), I'd never even heard of Charles de Lint. But again, I guess assigning him blame for this book would be pushing the limits a bit, huh?

*One Foot Wrong by Sofie Laguna. Totally have to suck up the blame for this one myself. One of those pure impulse buys. It just sounds so good, so creepy, so different. I read the first few pages in the store and was totally sucked in by the uniqueness of the voice.

*Piggy Monk Square by Grace Jolliffe. Now this one is easy...the blame goes straight to Valentina. I likely never would have heard of this book if not for her. The title of this book is intriguing enough, if you ask me. But Valentina's review sent me straight off to PaperbackSwap to request it. POINT FOR VALENTINA.

*DMZ: On the Ground, DMZ: Body of a Journalist, and DMZ: Public Works by Brian Wood and Riccardo Burchielli. I think I actually mentioned receiving these before, and they don't really come with any blame attached...unless I can blame Brian Wood for making me fall in love with Local and thus want to read everything else he's ever written. :)  Besides, it's dystopian...like I could resist.

And now, look at this pile of lovely (mostly used :D) loot Rich gave me for Mother's Day:

*The Ogre Downstairs by Diana Wynne Jones. This one's been on my wish list for a while...but I still remember just how wonderful it sounded in Ana's review. So, should this be my first Diana Wynne Jones read? Or should I borrow Howl's Moving Castle from Annie first? POINT TO ANA.

*The Bloody Chamber by Angela Carter. I remember the very first time I ever saw this book. Rich and I were on a getaway weekend, and were wandering around a bookstore (surprise, surprise). I saw this book and was immediately intrigued. I carried it around with me for a long time before deciding I should put it back. Well, wouldn't you know, just days later Carl reviewed it! Talk about kicking oneself! Directly to the wish list it went after that. Of course, I've heard of Angela Carter plenty since then (Annie even had to do an essay about one of the stories from this collection for her children's lit class last fall), but that was my first meeting with her. POINT TO CARL.

*The Prairie Girl's Guide to Life: How to Sew a Sampler Quilt & 49 Other Pioneer Projects for the Modern Girl by Jennifer Worick. Actually saw this one in a book sale catalog (I think, Edward R. Hamilton Booksellers). And well, face it, doesn't everyone want to know how to cook dandelion greens and make rock candy and spin yarn and whittle and pan for gold and...

*From the Land of Green Ghosts: A Burmese Odyssey by Pascal Khoo Thwe. This is the 2002 winner of the Kiriyama Pacific Rim Prize...a prize I never heard of until I read the cover of this book. I am so not hip when it comes to literature. Or anything else for that matter. :P  Anyway, I've wanted this book ever since reading Eva's review. So, of course, POINT FOR EVA.

*From the Borderlands edited by Elisabeth E. and Thomas F. Monteleone. Short stories. Which I love! (And never make time to read.) And horror. Which I love! (And never make time to read.) So this book, I will hopefully love. (If I ever make time to read it.)

*Sounds like Crazy by Shana Mahaffey. This is one of those odd books that I am both leery of and yet very intrigued by. Usually I end up avoiding books that I feel that way about, but I'd really like to give this one a try. POINT FOR STACI.

*The Lost Executioner: A Journey to the Heart of the Killing Fields by Nic Dunlop. This is another book that I've previously checked out of the library but never got around to reading. :(  You know, as much as I adore the library, and though I will likely never get over my addiction to checking out books, there is something so nice about having a book here in my home knowing there's no deadline.

*The Long March: The True History of Communist China's Founding Myth by Sun Shuyun. Ditto the book immediately above. :)

*Nobel Prize Women in Science: Their Lives, Struggles and Momentous Discoveries by Sharon Bertsch McGrayne. Do I really need to explain? ;)

*The History of Death: Burial Customs and Funeral Rites, From the Ancient World to Modern Times by Michael Kerrigan. Just sounded interesting.

*When I Knew edited by Robert Trachtenberg. This is a collection of short little essays, written by gays and lesbians, some famous, some not. As the title suggests, the essays are mostly about the moments when the authors knew or accepted that they were gay. (Yes,  I realize this is a tremendously simplified way of explaining this book.)

*Pixerina Witcherina (curated by Bill Conger). I'm not sure quite how to describe this book...so I'm just going to cheat and use this description from www.artbook.com. Oh okay, I'm also using this description to show you how utterly irresistible this book sounds, and thus you will understand why it *had* to go on my wish list to start with. ;)

In the typology of fairy tales, women are routinely reduced to caricatures of innocence or evil, either impossibly saintly and self-sacrificing or malevolent in ways that only the male sex would project. That said, fairy tales also provide a wealth of inspiration for art, and the work in Pixerina Witcherina transforms these polarities into whimsically abstracted visual yarns (the title is taken from the invented language used by Virginia Woolf to share secrets with her niece, and refers to this polarization of women's roles as either pixies or witches). These women embrace the power of myth while deconstructing it, re-imagining its pungency for our times. Pixerina Witcherina features work by Meghan Boody, Amy Culter, Margi Geerlinks, Claudia Hart, Julie Hefferman, Julia Latane, Tracey Moffatt, Maria Porges, Amy Sillman, Elena Sisto, Karen Arm and Katharina Fritsch.

Now, it may seem unfair to the lovely Ana, as she didn't actually talk about this book (as far as I know anyway)...but I'm still blaming it on her. See, it was reading a review she'd written about a book by Maria Tatar (The Hard Facts of the Grimm's Fairy Tales, I think) that made me run off to look up everything by Maria Tatar. And yes, most of it went to my wish list. So how does this book figure into that? Well, this lovely art book also features three essays on the subject, one of which is by Maria Tatar. See, it all makes sense now...POINT FOR ANA.

*Amphigorey by Edward Gorey. Again, no need for explanations.

*Instructions by Neil Gaiman and Charles Vess. Now here's the epitome of "no need for explanations". :D  (And of course, this one wasn't used...but if ever paying "full price" was warranted...) OMG...it is soooooo beautiful!!!

 *The Tombs of Atuan by Ursula K. Le Guin. So this one wasn't a present. But, of course, I had to get it after finishing A Wizard of Earthsea, didn't I? Luckily PaperbackSwap had it available with no wait. (You know, like that matters 'cause I don't have anything else to read. :P)