you could rattle the stars ★

I went into this with a list of books I wanted to find, and I partially succeeded! The list was:

As much murderbot as possible

Carmilla - Sheridan le Fanu

The Shining - Stephen King

Big Swiss - Jen Beagin

Some Frieren, Dungeon Meshi, and/or Witch Hat Atelier

The Ending Writes Itself - Evelyn Clarke (pen name for V.E. Schwab and Cat Clarke)

Make Me Better - Sarah Gailey

The Lamb - Lucy Rose

Klara and the Sun - Kazuo Ishiguro

I found all of them except WHA (they only had book 1), Make Me Better (miffed that no one had it lol), The Lamb, and Klara and the Sun (tbh I forgot to look for these).

The Stores

For this crawl we went to 6 different bookstores: Slow Burn Books (romance bookstore and the only one I didn't buy anything at, sorry Slow Burn), Nocturne Books (horror themed store just down the street from Slow Burn), Words and Pictures (comic store), Forbidden Library (another romance store, though much darker aesthetically), The Next Page (my old haunt, which I sadly rarely get to these days), and Owl's Nest Books (the city's oldest bookstore and first female-owned retail business!)

Stop 1: Nocturne Books

This store is SO cool and unique, much like its' cupcake-coloured counterpart Slow Burn. I've developed an appreciation for small, genre-specific stores lol. I have a friend who loves horror and I was so glad we finally got to go here, since it's in a part of town that can be difficult to get to from our area. Also: George the skeleton:

Books purchased:

Sublimation - Isabel J. Kim (someone I follow on tumblr has been obsessed with this book recently so I decided to give it a shot)

If We Were Villains - M. L. Rio (read this ages ago, loved it, but hadn't bought a copy yet)

The Shining - Stephen King (I watched the movie last winter and really liked it, but I know King hated it so I wanted to read the book and compare. Also, the movie is very weak on the lore and I'm hoping the book has more of that)

The Road Through the Wall - Shirley Jackson (I'm always on the hunt for her books!)

Carmilla - Sheridan le Fanu (I read Hungerstone recently and wanted to read the original Carmilla to compare)

Stop 2: Words and Pictures

This was a fun store, the owners were VERY enthusiastic about a bunch of mostly thirties-ish, mostly romance-reading women taking over their store lol. They had a really great selection, but alas and alack didn't have the Home Sick Pilots or Monstress trade paperbacks that I'm missing, so I bought manga lol.

Books purchased:

Delicious in Dungeon/Dungeon Meshi vols 3-4 (I have 1-2 being shipped to me. I'm doing as the internet says and buying them chronologically lol)

Frieren vol 7 (they only had vols 7, 11 and I think 13, so I bought 7. I've read up to vol 6 so it made sense to me)

The Elegant Courtly Life of the Tea Witch vols 1-2 (this one was new to me but it looked super cute)

Stop 3: Forbidden Library

This place ended up being really cool--mainly because it's in a mall I didn't know existed, and that same mall has the legendary Video Game Trader (had only visited their booth at cons before). We visited VGT, got some lunch, and then doubled back to Forbidden Library. It's a nice counterpart to Slow Burn, being basically the goth twin of it and carrying merch thats a bit spicier (including having a hidden back nook with a shelf of Extra Spicy Erotica lol):

(I will forever be chuckling at the cockmarks)

Books purchased:

White Teeth, Red Blood: Selected Vampire Verses from Pushkin Press

Stop 4: The Next Page

Ah, my old haunt. I used to work just down the block from this place, but my office moved a few years ago. I somehow had no idea that the entire basement is filled with used or discounted books! The top floor is full enough, with delightful if logistically challenging floor-to-ceiling shelves. With a little parlour, I was able to retrieve some books.

Books purchased:

The Ending Writes Itself - Evelyn Clarke (yay, goal accomplished! I almost fell off a stepladder getting it OTL. friend bought it for me as a bday present)

The Mimicking of Known Successes - Malka Older (had never heard of this before, but it's a tor.com novella and sounds interesting!)

System Collapse and Platform Decay by Martha Wells (accomplishing the Murderbot Goal--i checked every store and these were the only two available, alas and alack. I'll hunt down the rest eventually, but for now I will make do with the library)

Cult Following: The Extreme Sects that Capture Our Imagination and Take Over Our Lives - J.W. Ocker (my friend found this for me!! really excited to have more Cult Content and the cover is very neat)

Sleeping Giants - Sylvain Neuvel (I originally had this confused with another sci fi novel, I think, but I've heard good things about it so I wanted to give it a try!)

Dragonsong - Anne McCaffery (finally found the first book in the Dragon Riders of Pern series!!)

Stop 5: Owl's Nest Books

As mentioned above, this place is kind of a local legend. Not a bad place, but considering how much I'd heard about it, I expected it to be larger. It's very much a store that tries to cater to everyone and is more family/child oriented than some of the others. Still found 5 books there though so I can't complain too much LOL

Books Purchased:

Dead but Dreaming of Electric Sheep - Paul Tremblay (saw someone recommend this for people who like Backrooms...i haven't actually seen it yet but I like the concept)

Seasons of Glass and Iron - Amal El-Mohtar (borrowed this from the library a while ago and loved it, so I had to get a copy)

Big Swiss - Jen Beagin (this has been on my list for a while, though I didn't become interested until its popularity had faded and it went from being everywhere to difficult to track down...except for at the library where it still had a massive holds list. finally found a copy!)

Station Eleven - Emily St John Mandel (another one that's been on my list for a while and I couldn't seem to find, plus the library holds list was super long)

Never Whistle at Night - edited by Shanw Hawk and Theodore C. Van Alst Jr. (this one has been on and off my radar, as I'm pretty picky about horror and anthologies aren't always a good investment (some tropes good, others nightmares lol) but I have mutual who liked it so I decided to give it a try)

Annnnd that's it! After the Owl's Nest we went to a bar/arcade downtown called Greta for dinner. I had a wonderful but expensive Sage Mai Tai (the irony of spending ??? on books and then complaining about a $15 drink lol)

It was a REALLY fun time and I'm really glad we chose to do this! Despite the rain it was a great way to spend the day (and frankly, my usual birthday plan of going on a hike would not have worked out due to the rare "rex block" weather phenomenon that's dousing the whole province). When so many other people are in a horrible heat wave I can't really complain (though I am worried we're going to get a flood or tornado).