On my birthday last month I ventured into my local BN store for the first time. This was the first time I’d been into any BN store in nearly 4 years. Suffice it to say I was not impressed. Watch and tell me your thoughts!
Tag: HPB
A New Possibility
Maybe you know, maybe you don’t, but for about a year from 2015-2016 I worked at Half Price Books. I’m sorry if you’re not in the US or live in a state without one. They’re really great places.
It was during this period I realized how silly I’d been for so long. Prior to that I’d almost exclusively bought my books through Amazon. Several years ago my favorite was actually Borders because they had the best coupons, but then they closed. At another point I had a Barnes and Noble membership. But the savings were never worth it.
As you can see, over the years I’ve constantly tried to get the most bang for my buck when buying books. Then I found HPB and my world forever changed. Now that vaccinations are starting my hope is that HPB is able to bring back their biggest sales in 2021. 4 times a year they have 20% off everything for a four day weekend. 4 other times a year they have a coupon for every day of the week, culminating with 50% off the final day.
I’ve written over and over about HPB on here. I honestly love the place. But lately it’s been difficult to find some of the books I’ve been looking for. And I’ve been looking for months. I partially attribute this to the pandemic. There’s definitely lots more shelf space than normal. I recently found another used bookstore just down the street from where I live. This is something of a gem, as it’s only one location. But it’s been around for decades. I haven’t gone yet, but I intend to. Who knows? Maybe this will be my new go-to store?
Video: My Experience at the Flagship Half Price Books
I know I told y’all about this when I went. But I enjoyed it so much I wanted to make a video about it too. So here it is!
Whoops.
Yesterday I wrote about Amazon largely ignoring readers during its annual Prime Day. I may have been mistaken.
There’s a new book I’m interested in coming out next week. I happened to see a tweet from its author stating that the book was 70% off on Amazon. I checked. It was. A brand new release was $8.40. I decided to buy it. Then noticed that Amazon was (and still is) running a promo on books. $5 off $15. Not exactly the mountain of savings you could have from other items, but it is something. The promo code is primebooks17.
Also, this week is coupon week at my local HPB.
Go Now!
This week in the Houston area is one of Half Price Books’ coupon weeks. What is coupon week? Shoppers receive a coupon for each day of the week to use in-store. The week started with 20% off one item and has now risen up to 40% off an item. Tomorrow will be 50% off an item.
I write about this just about every time it happens because there is no better deal to be had. Why spend outrageous amounts of money to buy books if you don’t have to? Now go get something before the coupons are all gone!
Also, I can’t guarantee that it’s coupon week in other parts of the country.
2017 Reading Update #2
At the end of January I wrote a post providing an update on my reading progress for the year. Last month will be no different. Let’s take a look.
Books read
2017: 11
2012: 3
When compared to my best year ever, one would think I’m doing well to start this year. Meh, somewhat. I didn’t read a single page after February 3, completing just one book in the month after my record-breaking January. Of course that wasn’t all that surprising since I started my new job on February 9.
Time
62 hours, 36 minutes
Pages
3290
7 books
Genres
Young adult: 2 books
Literary fiction: 4 books
Mystery: 2 books
Fantasy: 1 book
Nonfiction: 2 books
Ratings
1 star: 1 book
2 stars: 1 book
3 stars: 3 books
4 stars: 5 books
5 stars: 1 book
Average: 3.54
Best Book
The Lightning Thief
Those are the numbers through February! I’m actually going to HPB today to see if I can find some new books to start reading soon. They’ll be both for my 2017 Reading Challenge and also books I’m simply interested in reading.
Some Holiday Advice
The holiday season is officially in full swing. Which means people all over the country are now doing their best to buy things for people who don’t need them. This definitely includes books. I’m sure some would argue that gifting books is better than an iPad or new TV, but I would disagree.
So, my holiday advice to anyone who is thinking of gifting books to a loved one or relative would be this: DON’T. Why? Because I can tell you what will happen. They will say thank you and smile and then put it on their shelf never to read it. Unless you are absolutely certain they want that particular title, don’t do it. I’d say give a gift card to Half Price Books instead. Because your money will go toward more books than if you give a gift card to one of the other book retailers. No doubt about that.
Are you planning on gifting any books this holiday season? I’m not.
Why Does Wal Mart Sell Books?
Serious question. I can name one person off the top of my head who I know buys books fairly regularly from Wal Mart. I’ve definitely done my share of browsing the books at Wal Mart, but my memory tells me I’ve never actually bought a book from there. I usually just look to see if I know which books they’ll have in stock without even thinking about it.
If I set up my tripod near the books and threw Harry’s invisibility cloak over the top of it I’d see just how few people actually stop to take a look at them. I own something like 250 books. But when I think of Wal Mart I think of groceries, essentials, and TVs.
I’ve bought books from Barnes and Noble, Borders, Amazon, Half Price Books, Murder by the Book in Houston, and the Wal Mart website. We have so many options at this point that I just don’t see any benefit for a grocery store to sell such a limited number of books. They sell mega bestselling new releases and ultra popular older ones. The problem is that just about anyone who’d be interested in buying these particular books has bought them elsewhere.
Also, Target does a MUCH better job with their books than Wal Mart does. Better titles and better selection in every store I’ve been in. But still, I haven’t bought from there either.
My question still stands. Why does Wal Mart sell books?
YES!
Most of you all know I haven’t been working full-time since quitting my job at HPB. I can finally say that’s no longer the case. Yesterday I received two offers and accepted the one I felt was a better fit. It’s something different that I previously had never seen myself doing. But now I’m looking to take advantage of the opportunity given to me. It’ll be a challenge and there will be a bit of a learning curve, but I’m confident in my future success.
It took three months and more applications than I can count, but now I can say I’m starting a new chapter in this game we call life.
My BIGGEST Book Haul Ever!
When I quit my job at Half Price Books recently I had a tough choice to make. I could either buy all of the books I wanted before my employee discount was no longer valid or I could just forget about them. I of course chose to buy.
This is the result. There were so many I couldn’t get them all in the picture for the thumbnail. Ha!
Now watch! It’s super quick!
Johnny Reads 