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Stacked is our sister-site's weekly mailbox-sharing feature.
Crikey, it's been a while! I've only acquired a handful of books since last time, which is good for the hoard, but I do also have a ton of news.
First off, I finally started hitting the bookstores near my parents' place in Manila. Did you know that in a recent study by the World Culture Score Index, the Philippines is the top 4 country in the world in terms of time spent reading per person? The US is #22 on that list, though only a couple hours less per week on average.
In the mall near my mom's house alone there are at least 4 bookstores, that I know of anyway. One is inside the supermarket. In some of the malls the bookstores take up 3 or more floors! There's even one mall where I was getting so confused because the same company would have a store on the ground level and one on the third floor. Not just one company, but two different ones with multiple locations in the same mall. It's pretty crazy.
Anyway, here's one shelf from a store called Book Sale. It's basically a used bookstore (they sell some new books from local presses as well as magazines and assorted stationery like gift wrap and notebooks) and they are freaking everywhere. I was too embarrassed to take a photo of the store to show you what one looks like (I was already kind of lurking and surreptitiously taking pics). They basically cram everything into a tiny space, pile books on the floor, triple-stack them on shelves and tables with no real order. You just have to pick through and find something you might want to read. I think it's pretty fun! I ended up with Joan Didion's The Year of Magical Thinking and Ann Patchett's Bel Canto for about $2 each.
I also went to Fully Booked at the GreenHills Promenade. I like them because the interior is kind of cool, they face out a lot of their books (especially in arts and design, where it matters so much!) though this isn't one of their coolest locations. Their kids/YA section was in disappointing disarray, but at least they have some nice huge display tables for new and bestselling YA. I even found some sale books for half off!
The thing they really have going for them is their selection. I just have to stop myself from going in and re-organizing their shelves. I will be doing a Shop Hop post soon (yep, bringing that back) where I will go into more detail.
Next up, I finally freaking finished the Pasadena Teen Book Festival website! PHEW. I hope you'll take a look when you're done here.
Also, next weekend is the 3rd Annual Yarn Crawl LA--our friends at Unwind in Burbank will be hosting Salina Yoon on Sat, Apr 5 from 11am-1 pm. There will be storytime, crafting, and snacks. My cousin and epic-level cake popper Adri P. is bringing Penguin and Bootsy pops! Our very own Thuy is running the show. Salina will show kids how to do finger-knitting, even though she admits she doesn't know how to knit for reals, haha! Once Upon a Time Bookstore will be selling Salina's books, including the Penguin titles and her latest book, Found! Awesome yarnista and knitwear designer Heather Walpole of Ewe Ewe Yarns created a scarf and hat pattern inspired by Penguin in Love. You can peek at the samples here and pick up the kit at Unwind during the Yarn Crawl! Last but not least, our favorite photographer Katie Ferguson will be on hand to document the event. I can't be there, sadly, but maybe I can eat some cake pops while I look at the photos afterwards!
This weekend, I headed out to Glorietta Mall to meet up with some of the Filipino book bloggers (find them #PHYAbookbloggers on Twitter). Thanks Louisse (@louisse_ang), Kate (@BookishBlurber), and Jesselle (@_jessellev) for hanging out with me! They actually had to run off to Becca Fitzpatrick's blogger forum and OMG you have to go look at their photos because Black. Ice. ARCs. Who do I have to beg, bribe, or bake for at Simon & Schuster to get a hold of one of those?
My selfie skills were strained to the max, haha! You can see the rest of our photos on my Instagram feed @frootjoos. I totally missed Kai (aka @amaterasureads) but I still hope to meet up with her and get a #PHYAbookbloggers t-shirt because how cool is that?!
Anyway, about the signing. I didn't get to go because I was going to have to work at 11 pm (I know, time zone madness) and the signing was at 4 pm. So what, you say? That's plenty of time!
People, this was the line at National Bookstore at 8 am for this 4 pm signing:
This was the bottom floor of the bookstore (which has 4 floors I think, I didn't get to them all) at 1 pm:
Scheiße! American YA fans, you don't even know. I think we sometimes take these events for granted, since so many YA authors actually live there. On the other hand, publishers, this is where you should send YA authors. Pinoys read! They read widely. We love fantasy as much as we love contemporary. We love Andrew Smith as much as we love Cassandra Clare--yes, they've read and loved The Marbury Lens. We are equal-opportunity readers. We buy books (libraries aren't really a big thing here) and we wait patiently in massively mind-numbingly long lines. We fangirl like it's going out of style (you would know how over the top we go if you had been here the year Michael Jackson died--I swear I didn't enter a single mall, jeepney, or restaurant that didn't have MJ songs playing or being performed by avid karaoke singers).
In case you're wondering, here's who I heard they want to see the most: Rainbow Rowell, Jennifer E. Smith, and Leigh Bardugo.
@frootjoos OMG, tons! @JenESmith @Marie_Lu, @mstiefvater, @marissa_meyer, @AndrewFukuda, @Susan_Ee, @jenlynnbarnes!
— Kai A (@amaterasureads) March 30, 2014@frootjoos Lots! Jennifer E. Smith, Marie Lu, Rainbow Rowell, A.G. Howard, Kendare Blake, David Levithan, Sarah Dessen! :)
— Jesselle Villegas (@_jessellev) March 30, 2014I actually really wanted to see Kate Evangelista (Til Death, Entangled Teen 2014) but I had to work that day, too. Bummer! Her launch party looked like it was a lot of fun. I did buy her book at National yesterday.
National actually books auditoriums for some visits, where they expect way more people than will fit in their store. Example:
Anyway, I'm sad I didn't get to see Becca, but I have already met her 3 times, and hopefully she'll tour in SoCal when Black Ice when it hits the shelves on October 7, 2014.
Crap, I just thought of three more book-related things to tell you. But this post is way over tl;dr already so I'll just leave you with this:
Folks, I legit fell off a futon when I read the email telling me to expect one in the mail. Like I wasn't excited enough to get Ruin & Rising when it releases on June 17! Anyway, my husband took a photo of the package contents with my lil' Darkling-wannabe John Carter, but he refused to read me the chapter sampler over FaceTime. *frowny-face*
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