Stacking the Shelves #1

Stacking the Shelves is hosted by Tynga’s reviews and you can find the original post here, for more details and guidelines.

 

Stacking The Shelves is all about sharing the books you are adding to your shelves, may it be physical or virtual. This means you can include books you buy in physical store or online, books you borrow from friends or the library, review books, gifts and of course ebooks!

 

Since it’s the first time I’m taking part, I thought I would share the books I’ve added to my shelves recently. I don’t think this will be a weekly thing for me, but probably more of a monthly instalment (my local library is opening in August, so I might get new books more frequently then!). Anyway, here are the new joiners:

 

 

• Alain Mabanckou, Demain j’aurai vingt ans (Tomorrow I’ll be Twenty, 2010)

I have been looking for some French novels as I need to practice my French more since it’s getting pretty rusty. This book is described as the African The Life Before Us (by Emile Ajar aka Romain Gary) which is one of my favourite novels of all time, so I’m very excited to read it! I love when authors write as a child would speak, with a faked innocence.

 

• Nathaniel Hawthorne, The House of Seven Gables (1851)

I’ve been feeling very witchy lately and I remembered how amazing the atmosphere in Hawthorne’s Young Goodman Brown is, so I decided to get a copy of this novel about Hawthorne’s family house through the years. It sounds wonderfully gothic and I like Hawthorne’s writing so I’m very excited by this one! Also, I love this vintage edition from the 60s I found on eBay.

 

• Akala, Natives (2018)

As I’m not from the UK and I am a white woman, I am not very familiar with race issues in this country. I know more about class differences because this is something I have researched a little and I think that if I want to learn more about it, I need to seriously educate myself on racial discrimination as well. After reading Queenie earlier this year, I realised the lack of knowledge I had and I don’t see how I can help if I don’t know what’s going on.

 

• Colson Whitehead, The Nickel Boys (2019)

I only bought this book because someone at Waterstones just brought the book to me and said it was the best book they had read in a very long time. I feel like if someone is passionate enough about a book to take a stranger apart and hand it to them, it must be good.

 

• Jessica Andrews, Saltwater (2019)

Something about me: I love the north of England, so of course I need to read the book that won the Portico Prize this year! This prize is described as the ‘booker of the north’, and there are a few books on the long list that I’d like to read as well. But Saltwater sounds especially good and the blurb at the back reads ‘Saltwater explores the complexities of mother-daughter relationships, the challenges of shifting class identity and the way the strongest feelings of love can be the hardest to define’ – something I can absolutely relate to.

 

• Malcolm Lowry, Under the Volcano (1947)

I need to explain the context for this one: back in France, I had a lecturer who I absolutely loved and saw as a role model. She was a Victorianist and her favourite novel was Jane Eyre, she taught me so much and I still really look up to her. Her other favourite novel was Under the Volcano, so that’s why I bought it. It sounds quite depressing, but the Brontës rarely are a carnival of joy either!

 

I realise that I have bought a lot of new books recently, which is something I actually rarely do – I mostly buy second hand books or borrow them from the library if they are new releases. But I have to say, it does feel nice to buy a brand new book from time to time. What books did you get recently that you are very excited to read? I’d love to know!

Also, something very strange is happening with my laptop and WordPress, so please excuse the mess that is this article. I need to figure out what’s going on, but it seems that my browser refuses to work on the new WordPress block editor, and I can’t modify line spaces in the classic editor… Fun times!