The Reading Diva

As some of you may know, I will be attending the National Book Club Conference in Atlanta later Friday and Saturday. I will be leaving Thursday and will be going with my friend's book club, the Literary Divas of the Lowcountry . We will also be attend Ella Curry's Black Pearl Chocolate Social , which is Thursday evening. There will be a lot of authors at the event and I so excited to take part in the conference. I will also try to get some signed books and meet the authors. I will try to blog from the event as much as I can. Maybe I will get a chance to meet you there! :-)

As many of you may know, Borders and Waldenbooks are going out of business . There is a Waldenbooks in my city and since I was on that side of town anyway, I decided to go there this morning. I got there close to 10 a.m., before the doors opened. Here are some things I saw during my 30 minutes at the store: I didn't see a markdown on the new releases. Markdowns are based on what section you are in the store. If you want something in business or politics, you got 30% off. Biographies and DVDs were 20% off. Children's books, young adult books and various fiction - 10% off. I know this store was catered for the tourists, but their African-American fiction and true crime section was poor. Remember Steve Harvey's visit to Charleston a few months ago? Well, this was the store he visited and there is evidence of it. There are TWO FULL SHELVES of Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man and Straight Talk, No Chaser. And most of them are signed. But I didn't see any sale sign...

It's official: Borders is no more . I am sad to see any book store go, but for the second-largest book store chain in the country to go out of business is a pretty big blow. But the signs were there: late to Internet shopping (by themselves), late to e-books (with crappy e-readers) and the closings that were happening way before the Great Recession. But then I have a feeling of indifference about Borders closing and here's the reason: they never opened a Borders in South Carolina. Never. If we did want to go to one, we had to go to Charlotte or Augusta (which are both three hours away from Charleston). But I did go to a Borders once outside of DC, which I was in town for Obama's inauguration. But I will mourn the loss of their smaller sibling, Waldenbooks (or Borders Express, in some places). Years ago, almost every mall in South Carolina had a Waldenbooks. At that time, there were no Barnes and Noble or Books-A-Million in SC. My mother used to take me to the mall with ...

I recently read a book about one woman's journey from abuse, then jail, and then to physical and mental freedom. As a child, Stacey Lannert thought she had the perfect childhood. She had a loving father, caring mother and a little sister she tried to protect. Even though she moved a lot, her family was a constant presence. Then cracks in the family facade started to show. Her parents started to argue more. Her father came home drunk many nights. And at age 8, Stacey experienced something no child should ever go through. She was sexually abused and raped by her father. The sexual and physical abuse continued for 10 years. During this time, Stacey was afraid to tell anyone about the abuse (including her mother) because of her father's threats. She also wanted to prevent her sister from also being abused. But on Independence Day 1990, Stacey's worst fears were realized. Drunk and belligerent, her father raped her sister and Stacey was unable to protect her. Several hou...

As some of you may know, I finished graduate school in May. This gives me time purchase and read books that I would enjoy, instead of books about library science. Since all of my books were purchased through Amazon, I was given the opportunity to trade in the books for items that I may want by giving me a virtual gift card. It's like trading your books back in while you were in college, except you mail them and probably get more money back. Once you let them know which books you are going to return, you print out a receipt that goes inside of the box and a postage label. After you mail them off, it will take several days for Amazon to notify you on when your credit becomes available. This was one of the books I couldn't sell back (due to a new edition) but it is an example of what some of my grad school books look like. So after searching for books at my parents' house (I moved while I was in school) and my house, I was able to mail off several books. I got a credit of al...