Warehouse Wonderland
Scooped up some books at the MPH warehouse sale yesterday.The current sale differs from past MPH warehouse sales in that it is the distributor's sale (as opposed to the bookshop sale - MPH is both). The books are not only brand new but in some cases so new I haven't seen them in the bookshops yet.
And this is the first warehouse sale that actually takes place ... in a warehouse! Quite a crowd turned up and many people were buying by the boxload.
There were some generous reductions. I bought both parts of Adibah Amin's As I Was Passing for just RM16 each, a Collins Malay-English dictionary ('cos I lost my last one!) for RM10, Brickfields: A Place, A Time, A Memory by Balan Moses (RM22 down from RM30), and a hardback copy of Malaysian novelist Tinling Choong's Firewife for RM47 (price on Amazon is $21=RM73). All stuff I very much wanted.Parking is a real nightmare. I left my car outside a building supplies store a couple of streets away and ran away from the security guard!
Aren't these copies of Collector's Library classics so pretty all piled up? Almost felt like buying them all as a piece of installation art. They cost RM9.90 each. I bought Nathaniel Hawthorn's The Scarlet Letter and Melville's Moby Dick. Things I should have read but haven't.The sale ends tomorrow, and you can read more about it in the Metro section of the Star.
If you went - what did you buy???
Labels: book retail, mph, warehouse sales
posted by bibliobibuli at 7:10 AM
28 Comments:
Do they accept credit card? I'm planning to go with a definite amount of cash, which I will not purchase beyond.
March 03, 2007 8:26 AM
yes they do accept credit cards, chet
March 03, 2007 9:13 AM
Sharon, I'm running a title contest for Dark City 2. Could you please let your readers know so they can participate with their creative juices?
Thanks!
BTW, sent you a SMS yesterday on Nizam Zakaria.
Xeus
March 03, 2007 11:35 AM
Arghh!!! Look at all those books! And me not going, me not buying! *huffs heavily, breathes, relaxes*
Oh, but is my wallet gonna thank me for this or what...
Still, all them pretty, pretty books... *sighs*
March 03, 2007 11:50 AM
xeus - can't find nizam's number but you can contact him via his blog or maybe call aliza at mph (or he might just see this passing by)
and yes, i'll put up a note about the title - glad to! one of the participants in a previous creative writing class was very very happy after you gave her such positive feedback on her story ...
never mind kenny. there will soon be the next sale along, and i just get guiltier about all the books i've acquired but not read yet!
March 03, 2007 12:50 PM
http://daria.be/archives/163
i posted about it in my book blog too.
March 03, 2007 5:05 PM
whoops, broken link. basically i bought
agatha christie's 'and then there were none' and enid blyton's 'the wishing chair collection'.
broke and in want of a second childhood, lol.
March 03, 2007 5:09 PM
there were lots of agatha christies ... hope you find you second childhood sulz!
March 03, 2007 5:14 PM
I ended up with 3 books: 2 Ben Eltons (Stark and Gridlock) and Matthew Pearl's The Poe Shadow.
March 03, 2007 5:26 PM
Good to hear, Bib :)
March 03, 2007 5:38 PM
Small haul.
Two by Adibah Amin (you know which two)
Two by Amitav Ghosh
Paulo Coelho's The Alchemist
Yiyun Li's A Thousand Years of Good Prayers
I dipped into The Alchemist and fell in love.
Oh, when I was there, I heard an announcement about the different categories of books on sale, and this gem:
"For those of you who don't like to read, there are audio books you can buy."
Hahahaha ...
And I have some tales of frustrated parking - not mine, but others, which I will put up on my weblog in a while.
March 03, 2007 5:51 PM
oh yes chet - do tell the parking stories!! it was funny - as i was walking back to my car (miles and miles away!) two women in a big car stopped - one a new zealander the other and american. they offered me a lift back to my car, and i though "that's kind". i realised though that they (clever people) actually wanted my space. when i'd moved out and they'd parked i could give them a lift back, miles and miles, to the sale!
March 03, 2007 6:11 PM
actually chet - i missed the audio books. keep thinking i should buy some for the car.
"a thousand year of good prayers" was there? must tell my reading group guys as it is their next read. how much was it?
synical - those sound like good choices. i've not read ben elton but love him as a comedian.
March 03, 2007 6:13 PM
Hardback at RM35/-.
I've posted and shared the funniest of the parking stories.
I didn't stay long cuz it was stuffy and I was beginning to get a headache.
Tomorrow, the last day, will be a nightmare!
March 03, 2007 6:40 PM
That's so true, Sharon --- I've got stacks of books still unread. Really can't go out and buy more when these poor things stare at from the shelves, asking, "When will you read me?"
March 03, 2007 7:50 PM
Hei, anyone knows how to get there by public transport, since as almost everyone said that the parking was a nightmare. Do enlighten me as I plan to go there tomorrow.
March 03, 2007 8:02 PM
public transport? i guess you have to just get to jalan kemajuan and start walking. wear comfortable shoes and take a bottle of water.
myabe though someone else reading this blog might be able to give you a lift. whereabouts do you stay??
March 03, 2007 8:18 PM
after my sister and i thought we were going to die in our car, as a kelisa had parked haphazardly by a tree, thereby sticking its ass out and blocking traffic on one lane, thereby forcing the deprived book-loving masses to move into the other lane, thereby going against traffic of the OTHER LANE and causing a standstill, thereby halting a huge-ass trailer right in front of the book sale, thereby forcing us for about 30 mins or so to watch happy, dusty people return from the sale with bags and bags of books... to SEE the sale yet be so far from it... after making about 5 rounds and turning into a little lane and parking our car haphazardly by a tree... i stumbled out into the street, stumbled into the warehouse, and nearly passed out from excitement from the long corridors of books that only lead to more books, after ALL THAT, i bought:
the glass palace by amitav ghosh, and a volume of tintin's comics, and two enid blyton books (The Wishing Chair stories) for my nephew.
4 books! can you beat that.
March 03, 2007 9:43 PM
haha you really caused chaos!!
yes, i question whether in the end it was worth it for the stress induced by parking. suggestion for mph and times. hold sales in the venues that big bookshop and pay less use
March 03, 2007 10:53 PM
sharon - another book for you. as appreciation for help in editing etc, IAM is waiting for you in silverfish...
March 04, 2007 7:54 AM
very many thanks ms d. :-D
March 04, 2007 8:25 AM
Let's see..
A Tony Buzan "Mind Maps" book.
The Monk Who Sold His Ferrarri.
3 Terry Pratchett Discworld books.
Could have got more, but I had to remind myself not to go broke so early in the year...
March 04, 2007 11:35 AM
I got 4 of the books i always wanted. Jodi Picoult's Keeping Faith and Songs of the Humpback Whale. Plus Mark Haddon's new book 'A Spot of Bother' and the Man Book Prize 'the Inheritence of Loss' by Kiran Desai.
I wanted a lot more books because the prices were so reasonable! Thanks for the info on the sale, sharon!
March 04, 2007 2:48 PM
Bet nobody can beat my parking story going to the MPH warehouse sale on Friday. Involved a big hole and 10 men. Curious?
March 04, 2007 8:02 PM
sashi - yes, thanks goodness for self restraint!
debbie - you're most welcome, and glad you found some good stuff
oh yes animah. now you have to tell!
March 04, 2007 9:30 PM
argghh!! so many books waiting for me to get my hands on! sighh.. but as Kenny said, my purse's gonna love me for not going. ;o)
March 04, 2007 9:56 PM
I got 8 of those Collector's Library classics -
Madame Bovary (Flaubert)
Walden (Thoreau)
Grimm's Fairy Tales
The Age of Innocence (Wharton)
Treasure Island (Stevenson)
Gulliver's Travels (Swift)
Crime & Punishment (Dostoevsky)
and my all time favourite
Dracula (Stoker)
I went home kicking myself for not getting more of the series, but can't make myself go through that throng of elbows again. Ah, next year ..
March 05, 2007 11:26 AM
sharkgila - yes, i'd like more of those classics ... it was hard to leave the rest behind as the books were so pretty and cheap
March 06, 2007 6:27 AM
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