Today is Day 6 of the 15 Day Book Bloggers Challenge hosted by April @ Good Books and Good Wine. Today is about how I shop for books. This ought to be interesting.
So I'm cheap. Honestly, Husband and I are working hard to meet some pretty big financial goals and so that doesn't leave much extra money for book buying. Luckily I have family that contributes to the funds for birthdays and Christmas and this keeps me going money wise. I totally ask for books/gift cards for books for birthday and Christmas. This past Christmas I racked up on books, and shoot for my birthday I racked up in gift cards for books too. Now to the part about how I actually decide what to purchase...
Considering I don't read many reviews of books that I'm planning to read before I've read them, I do look at ratings from bloggers that I follow who have rating systems as well as overall ratings on both Amazon and Goodreads to help me decide. I typically don't spend money on anything that has under a 4 Star overall rating on both of these sites unless I am 100% into the author or the series.
I read the books description when I'm browsing Goodreads or Amazon. If it sounds interesting I'll add it to the TBR list. Being a member of the book blogging community I look to other bloggers to see which books they loved. For me it's not about reading the popular books just because they're popular but trusting that if so many people in the book blogging community loved a particular book then there's a good chance that I will as well.
Books in a series that I've started and loved the earlier books, the sequels and subsequent books automatically get added to my list of ones needing to be bought. Also, some authors are just on the auto-buy list. I've read enough of their work to know that I trust them and want to read everything they write.
But pretty much I've got to have some pretty good reason to think that it's going to be a pretty rocking book before I'll spend the money on it. Gift cards I'm a little more lenient on. And sometimes it just depends on if I can't get the book somewhere else like the library or borrow from a friend. If I want it that bad, I'll just buy it myself.
How do you decide which books to buy?
I think I'm going to try this challenge, so I'll save my long answer for that. But I completely get where you're coming from regarding financial constraints; I'm under them too. It means I buy fewer books and get more from the library (and these days, also as ARCs. Though if I loved a book I received as an ARC, I'll try to buy a copy to support the author. Especially if I want to re-read it, since some digital ARCs expire.)
ReplyDeleteOh you totally should. I'd love to read all of your posts. :) I completely agree about trying to support the authors that you've really enjoyed!
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