Borders on The Borderline

It was bound to happen sooner or later, I suppose:



BORDERS FILES FOR BANKRUPTCY

Now, before you start picketing outside The Curve and Times Square demanding that the stores stay open, bear in mind that this is probably only in the US. Not sure how it would affect its international stores, but considering the franchise is owned by another company here, I think the shops should still be opened here.

Doesn't make much of a difference to me though, I hardly go to Borders. In fact, have you SEEN the Borders in Times Square lately? They seemed to have misplaced it. No, really, I literally could not find the store the last time I went.

Apparently, after all that hoo-haa about being the BIGGEST BOOKSTORE IN THE WORLD 6 years ago, they've finally ripped it all out and relocated to a tiny little place on the lower ground floor of the complex. I guess they finally that the clientele at that termite warren of a shopping mall just ain't the reading sort, eh?

The one in The Curve seems to be going strong though (not sure about the Gardens one - it always seems so empty whenever I go there).

But yeah, I'm not exactly mourning the demise of Borders. Besides, I still prefer Kinokuniya anyway. The selection is still way better, everything is nicely arranged, and current, and they have a kickass comics/graphic novel section that no other bookstore can match. I've even come to prefer the Kinokuniya in Singapore over the Borders there (which seems to have lost its charm somehow).

The other bookstore I frequent more these days is Bookxcess, of course. New books at cheap prices? AWESOME. Plus they are only about 4-5 months behind the usual bookstores anyway. Considering how few books I've been reading lately (something I REALLY need to rectify this year), I would rather not pay a full RM100 for a hardcover when I can just wait a while longer for it to hit Bookxcess instead. Plus their Big Bad Wolf Warehouse Sales are just AWESOME.

It WOULD be nice to have a lot more bookstores around, of course, and the demise of Borders IS quite sad. It WOULD be sad if they closed down the Malaysian stores as well. But seriously though, I DO wish they would buck up on they selection of titles, and/or layout, because as far as I'm concerned, even after six years and several new stores later, Borders here still has room for A LOT of improvement.

The Day Books Take Over The World!

In two days time, there will be a reckoning.

On the stroke of midnight, on 23 April, books all over the world will rise up as one, and TAKE OVER THE WORLD. And major fantasy book series will take their thrones as Supreme Rulers of the world's superpowers.

In Australia, there was no challenger to Garth Nix's Abhorsen Trilogy. It's a book about NECROMANCERS, fer gawds sake. Who can beat THAT?

Meanwhile, The Journey To The West lays claim to China and Asia, beating out pretenders like The Romance Of the Three Kingdoms and The Red Chamber by virtue of having an awesome MONKEY KING in its story.

In Europe, a dispute broke out between His Dark Materials, The Chronicles of Narnia and Harry Potter for the throne. In the end however, there would be only one book to rule them all - The Lord of The Rings.

And America? Well, Twilight can have America. It's a silly place anyway.

So that's World Book Day for you. If only reality were as cool as that. Sigh...

So, for the rest of us mundane humans, we'll have to be content with celebrating World Book Day by either reading a book, or buying some books.

If you're doing the latter, you could do worse than heading over to Bookxcess, where they're having a promotion from 23-25 April, giving 20% discounts ON TOP of their already cheap prices on 100 selected titles. Click to enlarge the image below to find out more:



Meanwhile, Kinokuniya is also having some sort of World Book Day thingy, where they've partnered with UNICEF to provide a bin where people can donate their books for charity.

On top of that, they're celebrating their NINE YEAR anniversary. For every RM30 purchase, you'll get a stamp on a card, and when you complete nine stamps, you get a RM30 rebate on your next book. It's not THAT GREAT a deal, but hey, better than nothing huh?

Damn Those Little Blue Kinokuniya Stickers

I was in Kinokuniya just now. Big mistake.

I was there looking for the new Terry Pratchett book, Unseen Academicals. I found it, but they only had the crappy US cover, and the UK one was out of stock. SIIGGHH.



I should have left, just then. But NOOOO, being the glutton for punishment and sucker for books that I am, I HAD to walk around some more, over to the comics section.

And lo and behold, what do I see, but this GORGEOUS sight:



Holy shit, THE ABSOLUTE DEATH? If the title alone doesn't hook you, the damn HUGE, GORGEOUS covers by Dave McKean would. And as if that wasn't enough, Kino was kind enough to slap one of those EVIL blue stickers that say 20% discount with any other purchase!

Damn those little blue stickers.

At first I was content with lugging that HUGE HEAVY HARDCOVER book around to the magazine section and just get a cheapo local magazine to get my discount. But NO, I just HAD to go to the fantasy section AGAIN, to make sure there wasn't a UK version of Unseen Academicals hiding behind the crappy US ones (there wasn't. damn).

And that's how I spied THIS:



ARGH. I'd been longing for another Moers book since I finished City of Dreaming Books two years ago. And it's finally here! WOOT!

And yes, it had one of those dastarly blue stickers as well. EVIIILLLL.

Oh, And Another Thing...



No, I didn't buy this. No money lar.