Bookish Acquisitions

During our trip to Derby and the Peak District last week, I managed to acquire some great new books!

One of the places we visited was Chatsworth House, Mr Darcy's house in the BBC adaptation of Pride and Prejudice.  Of course it has many other features too, but from a bookish perspective it was great to visit Mr Darcy's home.  The gift shop had a great selection of Jane Austen books, sequels by other authors and non-fiction books all about the world of Austen. I managed to find Talking About Jane Austen in Baghdad.  

Synopsis from goodreads:

May's a tough-talking, hard-smoking, lecturer in English. She's also an Iraqi from a Sunni-Shi'ite background living in Baghdad, dodging bullets before breakfast, bargaining for high heels in bombed-out bazaars and battling through blockades to reach her class of Jane Austen-studying girls. Bee, on the other hand, is a London mum of three, busy fighting off PTA meetings and chicken pox, dealing with dead cats and generally juggling work and family while squabbling with her globe-trotting husband over the socks he leaves lying around the house. They should have nothing in common. But when a simple email brings them together, they discover a friendship that overcomes all their differences of culture, religion and age. "Talking About Jane Austen in Baghdad" is the story of two women who share laughter and tears, and swap their confidences, dreams and fears. And, between the grenades, the gossip, the jokes and the secrets, they also hatch an ingenious plan to help May escape the bombings of Baghdad...

I'm hoping it'll be a nice cosy read.

And then we found a nice independent bookshop and my husband bought me two book from the Penguin Classics hardcover series that I've been coveting for the longest time.  They are both beautiful, bound editions with page markers.

Dracula by Bram Stoker.

I already own this book, but it's one of my favourite books and I wanted a nice edition to keep.

Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen.

Believe it or not, I haven't read this one yet.  How gorgeous are the patterning and covers on this book?

What I love about the Penguin editions is that the pages are nice and thick, the font is just the right size and type and there are page markers included.  One day I will have a whole shelf of Penguin Classic Hardcovers....

Have you acquired any great books or bookish treats lately?