Book Buying & Bookshelf Organizing~ Musing Mondays (1)

This is a weekly meme hosted by MizB at Should Be Reading where I can gripe about anything I want, because it's a freaking Monday.

Musing Mondays asks you to muse about one of the following each week…
• Describe one of your reading habits. • Tell us what book(s) you recently bought for yourself or someone else, and why you chose that/those book(s). • What book are you currently desperate to get your hands on? Tell us about it!  • Tell us what you’re reading right now — what you think of it, so far; why you chose it; what you are (or, aren’t) enjoying it. • Do you have a bookish rant? Something about books or reading (or the industry) that gets your ire up? Share it with us! • Instead of the above questions, maybe you just want to ramble on about something else pertaining to books — let’s hear it, then!

My 1st Musing:
So, it all started one day in December on a day that happened to be my birthday. One of the gifts I was most grateful for was a $50 Giftcard to Powell's Books a widely-known Indie book store based in Portland Oregon. My mom had said, "But Sofia, you can buy used books too." The problem was that I didn't have books that I wanted to own that were old enough to be sold used, if that makes any sense. 

So, one ordinary Wednesday last week, I received the bi-monthly Scholastic Book Orders. I usually scoff at them, laughing, and say, "I belong to a much superior world and have either read all of you over-hyped up books, or heard of you." But this particular batch of book orders have some beauties. If you are unfamiliar with Scholastic Books, this is the wonderfully-amazing-awesome catch. 

The books are sold at discounted rates.

I'm not talking a measly 20% off, but 50% and sometimes even more. A brand new, hardback copy of Cress by Marissa Meyer for $12. The Runaway King, and The False Prince sold in a paperback bundle for $9. There are so many deals like that in the book orders that overwhelm my book-hungry eyes. 

Now comes the hard part. I have to convince my mother to take my $50 Powells Giftcard, and then give me $50 for the Scholastic Book Orders. I calculated the books I wanted the most. I could get 7 or more books for $50 using Scholastic, and 4...maybe 5 at Powells.

These are the books from the book orders I want to buy:

$12~Cress: Marissa Meyer
*$10~Inhuman: Kat Falls
$9~The Ascendance Trilogy (#1 & #2)
$8~The Statistical Probability of Love at First Sight: Jennifer E. Smith
*$5~Stung: Bethany Wiggins
$6~Between Shades of Gray: Ruta Sepetys

*Or...I could buy these instead of those
$9~Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children: Ransom Riggs
$5~Blindsided: Priscilla Cummings

What do you think? Am I giving my mom the short end of the bargain? Am I being a smart and savvy book buyer? That's up for you to decide, in the comments below.

My 2nd Musing: 

I organized my bookshelf this weekend! I have a whole new organization system now that I am very happy with. Before I start showing pictures and going on and on about how brilliantly I organized it. I want to get something out there. On twitter, I have seen some pics of other people's bookshelves, and my entire bookshelf matches their ARC collection only. I know others might say I have so many more books than they do. I don't want to cause a dispute, I'm just showing my bookshelf, and I'm not doing this to brag, or anything like that, I'm just showing you this because I am really excited about it. 

Here's a fun fact about me; I hate cleaning, or even picking up my room (my mom has had years of first-hand accounts with this fact). But this was one organizing project I was happy to do. Now when I say bookshelf, I am referring to the small three shelf one in my room. I have another one in the family room with all my favorite childhood picture books, and other books like that. Then downstairs, my mom has a humongous book shelf taking up one wall of the Living Room with so many books, and I don't even know what kind they are (I'm convinced there is a secret passageway behind it).

The Bottom Shelf is of all my series I own that may not be my very favorites, but still look very pretty on my bookshelf.
The Inkheart Trilogy: Cornelia Funke
Reckless & Fearless (The Mirrorworld Series): Cornelia Funke
Wonderstruck & The Invention of Hugo Cabret: Brian Selznik
Les Miserables: Victor Hugo
Anne of Green Gables: Lucy Maud Montgomery
Tomorrow Girls Quartet: Gray
Among the Hidden Series: Margaret Peterson Haddix
His Dark Materials Trilogy: Phillip Pullman

The Middle Shelf holds all of my most prized possessions.
A random fact about me is that I find a new bookish obsession every year around late Winter/early Spring.
2008: Harry Potter: J.K. Rowling
I remember my best friend telling me about this series, and me scoffing at it because she wasn't that good of a reader at the time an I even had to help her with the hard words. It started with my mom showing me the first 20 minutes, of The Sorcerer's Stone, then saying it was bedtime. That got me hooked. I read the entire series in this order: 2, 1, 7, 3, 4, 6, 5. Did I fully follow? No. Did I care? No.
2009: Percy Jackson: Rick Riordan
I remember thinking that nothing could live up to Harry Potter until I found Percy Jackson. Everything was hilarious, Percy was relatable, and I just fell in love. The weird thing is the entire time I was reading the series, I imagined Percy like Harry, Grover like Ron, and Annabeth like Hermione.
2010: The Mysterious Benedict Society: Trenton Lee Stewart
My mom used to read to me every night and this was one of our gems. I remember begging her to read me another chapter more times than I can count with this series. It was so quirky, fun, and perfect for me at the time.
2011: The Hunger Games: Suzanne Collins
Now we travel into the Young Adult section.  I actually refused to let my mom know what this series was about for about two weeks after I finished it because I knew she would think it was a horrifying concept. Nevertheless, this was the launching pad for the reader I am today.
2012: Underland Chronicles: Suzanne Collins
I wanted more from Suzanne Collins, and where better to go than her Middle Grade series? There's a long story going with this one, but what I learned is to give books a chance no matter what your first impression. I loved Luxa and Gregor, they were my OTP even more than Katiss and Peeta because they were closer to my age.
2013: Legend: Marie Lu
I think we all know about this one. Legend is one of the best Young Adult novels I have ever read and will be even when I'm old and have read hundreds of others. I really don't need to say any more because you know how crazy I am.
2014: ?????? I have no idea what this years obsession is going to be other than -according to past experience- it's supposed to come soon.

The Top Shelf consists of my physical TBR list, and all the Standalones that I own that I love and/or books in series that I only own one book of (no grammatical sense whatsoever).
I don't want to bore you to death, but I'm going to share some stories about a few of these.

The Lost Children is one of my favorite Middle Grade books of all time. If you have any kid you need to get a gift for ages 8-12, you HAVE to get them this book. It was so gripping, suspenseful, mysterious, captivating, and everything else a little kid could want for.

 Moon Over Manifest was also one of the many books my mom had read to me, and it was one of our favorites. I don't remember much, but what I do recall is that the book went between two time periods, and it was a mystery I would give 4 ink jars to. If you want a book for a slightly quirky kid, then this will definitely be it.

The Limit was one of my first-ever futuristic, evil government books way before The Hunger Games. It was very suspenseful, and action-packed (in my memory), and let me tell you, the ending is a HUGE surprise. This was also one of my first-ever books that I read in one sitting, if you can call it that since I was reading in the bathtub (I was a weird kid).

This isn't part of bookshelf, but it is a huge part of me keeping track of my books. This is my trusty little Library Basket, which is pretty explanatory. From a young age, my mom made me put all my library books in it after every haul because I was notorious for losing library books.

While doing this, you can imagine I got a little misty. It was like re-discovering lost treasure as I looked at books that had been my bestest friends when I was little. I saw some of my childhood beauties and it was nostalgia galore of all the feels I had way back when.

Have you organized your bookshelf recently? If so, how do you organize it? By genre? Title? Author? TBR order? Leave it in the comments below and have a great Monday (although who am I kidding,it's MONDAY).