Scarthin Book Shop, Derbyshire

I have a little recommendation today for anyone who might find themselves in Derbyshire and wondering what to do.

There's been a couple of posts in the past regarding my love of books. As an English Literature graduate, I'm a bit of a sucker for any kind of book shop. I love the new smell of Waterstones, and even when I see a sad cardboard box on the pavement filled with brown, battered books, I can't help but stop and take a look.

I've been to some amazing places around the world that would make some book lovers drool, like the El Ateneo book shop in Buenos Aires that is inside an old and glamorous theatre, and the Bosu-Dong book alley in Busan, South Korea where you could get lost for days if one of the precarious stacks of books toppled over.

I'm happy that Scarthin's equals these two places in quirky places to find your next read. Based in Cromford, just outside of Matlock, it is well worth a browse.

It is fit to bursting with old and new books, set out in tiny rooms that create a labyrinth of literary abandon. We went on a lovely sunny, Sunday afternoon, where they had the windows open and the breeze blew through the shop and fluttered the pages of all the books, as if they were trying to tempt you to pick them up. There were lots of comfy seats dotted around, encouraging you to have a rest and a read before you made any purchases.

I loved the fact that when I asked for a particular book, the guy working behind the till checked the new book database, but then told me he had absolutely no idea which second hand books had wormed their way onto the shelves!

The best thing about getting lost in the book shop is finding the vegan cafe that is hidden behind a book shelf and sells amazing blondies and Red Velvet cake.

I found a couple of things I plan to buy next time I go and it's payday, I loved the Chapters artwork, a chapter from a book formed into an image from the story, and this Wizard of Oz Craft Book.









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My Bookshelf

I fell in love after seeing this mini quiz on Nova's blog and had to do it myself. I've been wanting to talk about all of the books I love for a long time, so this seemed like a good place to start. So thanks Nova for having an awesome taste in books and inspiring me to do my own!

Author you’ve read the most books from:
It probably has to be Kelley Armstrong with her Otherworld series. I remember many a long commute to York and back to Sheffield being lost in the books about everything supernatural and spooky. They are a somewhat bizarre mix between fantasy and cheese that I can't help but read.

Best Sequel Ever:
His Dark Materials by Philip Pullman. I started Northern Lights and within a week I was closing The Amber Spyglass. It is the perfect tale of adventure and I really want a deamon of my own. I love Lyra, she is very brave for a young girl! What deamon would you pick if you could? I would kind of like a penguin to waddle around behind me!

Currently Reading:
I'm currently reading What is the What by Dave Eggers. It is a semi-fictional book about Valentino Achek, a Sudanese man who survived the civil war in the 80s and has made a life for himself in Atlanta. I usually like books that are a little fantastical to use as an escape, and despite the subject being harrowing, I'm really enjoying it. Nick recommended it and as I didn't manage to make it to the book swap last month I decided to give it a go. I'm learning a lot!

Drink of Choice While Reading:
Hot Chocolate or Chai Tea Latte. Yum.

E-reader or Physical Book?
I do love books. Kindles just aren't the same. Plus I've had two kindles in the space of 2 years and both of them have broken. I love the smell of a good old book and having something physical to read.


Fictional Character You Probably Would Have Actually Dated In High School:
Although I'd like to say Cedric Diggory, I can imagine myself more with Ron Weasley!

Glad You Gave This Book A Chance:
Lots of people mentioned The Valley of the Dolls by Jacqueline Susann. I didn't read it for a long time because I thought it would be a bit too chic and cheesy for me, but I absolutely loved it. I loved the characters' flawed desperation to stay swathed in the bright lights of Hollywood.

Hidden Gem Book:
The Mechanique by Genevieve Valentine was a recommendation from a friend. I'd never heard of it before, but as I really like the novel Nights At The Circus by Angela Carter, he said I should give it a go, and I loved it! It's about a circus troupe with their ringmaster who 'builds' her artists to make them perfect for the job. It's kind of Frankenstein meets Moulin Rouge.

Important Moment in your Reading Life:
The day I graduated from university with a degree in English Literature and I could start reading for leisure again!

Just Finished:
Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell. It is a series of short stories stretching from the past far into the future, and are all somehow intertwined. I liked that one of the pivotal stories is set in current day Korea. It took some getting into, but I found that half way through I was really getting into each story and felt disappointed whenever they stopped! Not to worry, he does tie each story up by the end of the book.


Kinds of Books You Won’t Read:
I don't usually like biographies, nor do I like awful chick lit!

Longest Book You’ve Read:
Ulysses by James Joyce. This was a really difficult book to read. It's written in the style of someone's thoughts, so randomly jumps from idea to idea, without punctuation. We were given two weeks to read it at uni, that was a looong two weeks.

Number of Bookcases You Own:
At the moment in Korea I only have one book case in my room, and that doesn't hold any books. I only keep one or two books at a time and then swap them for new ones. At home in England I have a beautiful white book case that's stuffed with my books.

One Book You Have Read Multiple Times:
One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. I fell so deeply in love with this book that I based my dissertation around it, and have recently bought it again so I can read it for the fourth time.

Preferred Place To Read:
In bed! Or on a long journey where I can be smug that I have nothing better to do than sit and read my book. I did find this little spot and was adamant that this would be my new reading spot, but autumn arrived and the days got too short. It wouldn't be the same sat up there in the dark!

Major book hangover because of:
Sadly it has to be Franny and Zooey by J D Salinger. My friend bought me this as a leaving gift to come to Korea as we had a shared love for The Great Gatsby, so the sentimental value means that I will always keep the book, yet the story itself was pretty terrible. I kept hoping that something would happen and the mundane story line would come to life, but sadly for me that never happened, and left me feeling as flat and uninspired as Franny.

Quote that inspires you/gives you all the feels from a book you’ve read:
“Oh, please don't go—we'll eat you up—we love you so!” Where the Wild Things Are. It's not so inspirational but whenever I feel a huge surge of love for anything I want to squeeze it really hard, and pretty much feel like this quote sums up the feeling of loving something so much you want to just gobble it up!

Reading Regret:
Reading the Historian by Eizabeth Kostova. It was just a big book of facts veiled with an awful vampire story that leads to an anti-climaz and concludes too quickly for the amount of time spent on a build up. It was a book everyone was raving about at the time, so I stuck with it even though I wasn't enjoying, and really wished that I hadn't.

Series You Started And Need To Finish (all books are out in series):
The rest of The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. I first read this book in primary school and remember adoring it then, so recently I picked it back up and now I really want to read the others.

Three of your All-Time Favorite Books:
Harry Potter, all of them. I was a snob at first and didn't understand what everyone was going on about, so I picked up a copy of the first book from a coffee table and after the first page was hooked. The Great Gatsby, just because it has lots of tiny little messages woven throughout the book that really speak to me. And The Shadow of The Wind by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. I love the idea of a cemetery of old, forgotten books in the centre of Barcelone just after the civil war.


Unapologetic Fangirl For:
I have to say it, I may have been able to keep it quiet, but I do love the Twilight series. Every year Natasha and I would go and watch the new film when it came out and cringe/swoon the whole way through. Team Jacob for the win!

Very Excited For This Release More Than All The Others:
Well it's not really a new release, but I'm really looking forward to reading J K Rowling's 'grown up' book to see if I like it or not!

Worst Bookish Habit:
No matter how much I'm not enjoying a book, I force myself to read it. There's not enough time to waste on awful books.

X Marks The Spot: Start at the top left of your shelf and pick the 27th book: Unfortunately I don't have my bookshelf here with me, so I'm going to substitute a question in here...

Best Bookish Childhood Memory:
The Hobbit. I remember my mum reading this to me before i went to bed at night. I would get so excited about going to bed so I could hear the next part of the journey. This is one case where I am 100% in agreement that the book was better!

Your latest book purchase:
I don't really buy books at the moment, instead I swap books, but the last book I actually paid for was a book about Korean cooking! I haven't got around to reading it yet though!

ZZZ-snatcher book (last book that kept you up WAY late):
Shutter Island by Dennis Lehane. I've never seen the movie so absolutely loved the twist in the book. I kept trying to solve the mystery myself as I read and found it really creepy and eerie. I hate that sense you get when you know a character's trapped before they realise they are.


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What have you been reading lately?

If you do this quiz link it to me in the comments so I can see what you have to say about books and stuff. And you should definitely check out Nova's original post.



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Intercontinental Bookclub

I'm excited at the moment as a friend from home and I have decided to start our own bookclub. When I was back in the UK we always used to share books we'd read and love, so it's great that we can carry it on here.

Even better than that is the fact that he loved one of my all time favourite books, Shadow of the Wind by Carlos Luis Zafon, so we have decided to start with the follow up book to that, Angel's Game. I'm having to play catch up at the moment though as he loved the first one so much he raced straight into the second one.

The only problem now is that I'm restricted to the books that I have on my kindle, or the ones that I can find in the English bookstore here, or the book swap cafe in KSU, Fully Booked.

Which one should we move onto next?

Currently...

                    I got this blog inspiration from one of my favourite blogs, Sometimes Sweet.

I'm currently...

Thinking alot about my Grandad. I've just been told he's in the hospital at the moment. I really hope that he is feeling a little brighter soon and might be able to make it home. It's times like this that it's tough being so far away from home.

Watching this weekend we went to watch the The Amazing Spiderman. It wasn't as good as I had hoped, although I loved Andrew Garfield in it, and I'm a massive fan of Emma Stone too, although i think she should bring back the red or dark barnet.

Obsessing over watching the next season of The Wire. I know I'm slow on the uptake of it, the first season is 10 years old now, but I loved every minute of it and I can't wait until I get the time to watch Series 2. Also if you see my previous post I'm still obsessing over Stumbleupon and Pinterest!

Eating Werther's Original with a creme filling. They're immense. All thanks to the lovely Leigh. You should read her blog Doll Parts. I also had the most amazing pizza at a restaurant in Seomyeon, just near American Apparel and can't wait to eat there again.

Looking Forward to starting Korean classes next Monday. It'll be nice to actually be able to do some basic things in Korean, although every day I find that i'm understanding more and more. I'm also looking forward to trying a few more jimjilbangs in the next couple of weeks after a luxurious trip to Spa Land again on Sunday night. Also the weekend, summer break and the Boryeong Mudfest in a few weeks.

Laughing about the fact that we're still such a novelty at Korean clubs. This weekend we went to the Club Fix Lounge in Dongnae where very few other foreigners venture. As soon as we walked in the girls gathered around us and if anything the difficult conversations we have in broken English are endearing. One girl that took a particular shining to us kept thrusting this strange flashing red baton into our hand and trying to shove us onto the tiny stage. She also got the help of her male friend to try and pick me up and put me on the stage when i refused, which only ended very messily as i flailed so much he dropped me and I managed to kick my shoe off across to the other side of the room...By the end of the night it was funny to see the girls peering off over our shoulder and looking very doey eyes toward the guys, I think they may have been after a few English classes!

Reading One Day by David Nicholls. I'm a bit mixed on this, I saw the movie before I saw the book, so I think knowing what's going to happen in the book means I'm not 100% motivated to finish it, yet at the same time want to get it done so that I can move onto the long reading list I have building up.

Perplexed by the fact my purse turned up yesterday. It had been in the boys toilets at school for the last two weeks, and when I looked inside, absolutely everything was still there. Very strange if you ask me...

Care Package V3

This week has been a strange one so far. Somehow I managed to lose my purse last Monday. It was in my bag one day and then when I went to use it on Wednesday it just wasn't there. Not only did it have my Korean bank account card in there, but it also had two English credit cards that I carry around incase of emergencies, and my Alien Registration Card.

Luckily I checked all of my accounts and nothing had been taken out, but I still had to cancel everything just incase, which meant all of my phone credit was eaten up by calling the English banks. I spent 6 annoying minutes trying to explain to someone at Natwest why I couldn't just go into a branch to sort out the credit card. It's amazing to compare the Korean and English banks. Not only do the Korean banks avoid interior designers who're stuck in the 80s  but they instantly issue you a new card while you wait, no having to wait 10 days for a new one.

So in the last few days I've been to the police station, on Monday I went into Nampo to get some more phone credit and yesterday I went to the Immigration office again to try and replace my card. When I got there at about 4pm the ticket machine told me that there were 59 people waiting ahead of me. Bad news. I managed to read a chapter of One Day by David Nicholls, break the photo booth and make myself look like a crazy foreigner after I started screaming and jumping around, just as I caught a big spider trying to crawl into my bag. Quite a productive hour and a half of waiting. Now I have to wait another month to go and pick it up, which kind of ruins our plans for the Summer break as I won't have it back until the end of the holiday.

So hopefully everything is sorted now and I can have my nights back. It cheered me up lots to go out for some pajeon with friends last night and that when I got home a parcel had arrived from my Aunty Ann. Thank you!

Inside it there was lots of M&S chocolate, Socks, jewellery, glowsticks, and a cute union jack purse which can replace the one I lost. Hurray for care packages, they never fail to put a smile on my face (hint!).

Sick of not being able to get any new music I've also signed upto Spotify Premium tonight so I've been making playlists all night, especially reminiscing about when I was 19 and 20 with lots of bands I've not listened to in aaages!

The Great Gatsby

What with the mingling of my favourite director, one of my favourite actresses and my favourite book that I've read this year has got me super excited. The only problem I have with this film is that I'll still be in Korea for its release date in December, so will probably have to wait even longer to see it. Sad times.

Being a literature student and everything it's with a shamedface that I admit I'd not read The Great Gatsby until recently. Thanks to a good friend who pointed out this really wasn't on, I bought it and decided to read it before I came over here.

I love this story because it heeds to the message that the one thing you never truly get over is the one thing that you never really had. Poor old Jay Gatsby. It seems that he is so tied up in chasing the nostalgic memories of his past love that he never really lives the colourful life that's right infront of him.

I don't want to spoil it for anyone that doesn't know the story too well but if Moulin Rouge and Romeo and Juliet are anything to go by then I CANNOT WAIT for this to be released!

Book Report Season

Recently in the English Department  at school we've been running a book contest for the children. A day before it started all the foreign teachers were given 5 minutes to throw together a promotional video for the school's website.



I really don't understand why I haven't picked up a major Hollywood film debut with my wonderful acting...

Since that day, I think I've read the book Mary Elizabeth's House by Pamela Allen about 100 times as we demonstrate to the kids how to write a book report to enter the competition with. The main points being in bold below, the students just had to finish the sentences. Imagine how hard it was to keep a straight face when I noticed that the majority of the kids' answers went something like this...

This story is about...Mary Elizabeth and her monster killing the boys.
I liked it when...the monster killed the boys.
I wonder why...the monster didn't kill Mary Elizabeth too?
If I were the monster then I would eat all of the boys.
Tomorrow... Mary Elizabeth will kill the rest of the boys.

They're literally obsessed with death and dying. Natasha and I are endlessly coming back from classes with stories of how they have somehow managed to bring up some sort of morbid subject.

In my 6th grade class we spoke about special event days, such as Valentines day, Halloween etc. and then told the children they had to think up their own that the school could celebrate. One of my boys decided to introduce Mafia day where everyone walks around shooting each other...ok you creepy child. Another example is when Natasha used a photo of a forest to elicit some vocab, e.g. what would you find in the woods? Her third grade boy answered 'dead bodies'.

They're also infatuated with the old finger-across-throat gesture to show someone's dead. I was teaching my 5th graders a story about a llama(don't ask) and when I told them the llama had died, did this gesture. This was greeted with a standing ovation, and then a re-enactment of the whole llama death scene.

In a culture where the adults are so so timid, it's absolutely bizarre to see their crazy children and the things that they become fixated with. Lots of times the kids are so literate in English that I forget how young they are, until they're allowed free reign in a writing exercise, which always acts as a wake up call!

No Rainbows without Rain

I know it probably gets boring hearing about all the amazing things about Korea so thought I'd point out some of the things that aren't so great about being here so far...

1. The Weather. This post was inspired by the weather last Friday. We woke up and it was literally relentless, torrential rain ALL day. The people of Sheffield would be quivering in their boots and getting the sand bags ready if we had even an hours worth of the rain that we saw the other day. Even better than this is the fact we were told that this is normal weather for the Summer, AND someone stole my umbrella at school, it appears to be a free for all in the umbrella department!

2. The People who've been deemed fit to drive. I remember this one time I lived in a country where the drivers indicated, they stopped for people in the street (even if it was in an irritated fashion), knew that they belonged on the road and not the pavement and didn't incessantly honk their horns. If someone gave me a pound for every time I had heard someone toot their horn for no apparent reason I'd be a millionaire.

3. The Smells in the street. Eugh.

4. Being shadowed around a shop. As soon as you enter a shop they shuffle to your side and won't disappear until you exit through the door. I know they're only trying to be helpful but it's rather uncomfortable when I'm picking something up, trying to work out what it is and I have them breathing down my neck like they're about to start seducing me. Last weekend in Nampo we were just leaving the shop when our shadow pointed out that we hadn't been to the second floor of the shop. Not wanting to be rude we went upstairs, she obviously followed, and had a whole monologue with herself, the only word I picked out was piercing as she pointed at my lip.

5. The lack of spatial awareness. The bumping and pushing, shoving and shunting. It's enough to make anyone think that there's some ongoing, off-skates roller derby drill. I've seen people man handled by others if they happen to be in the way. We witnessed this poor waif of a girl, who was happily catching the metro, get shoved into the door so others could get on and off more easily. Tasha got inappropriately touched by an old lady the other day as she politely got up to offer her seat, the woman grabbed her chest and shoved her back down. Which brings us onto the next point...

6. The old folk. Ok, not all of them are bad. Some are quite cute, but they aren't quite the quaint old dears we're used to in England. They cough and splutter all over the show. They tut quite often, just today 2 old ladies got up and moved as soon as we sat next to them. They spit on the floors of shops, and cag constantly, and the other day we saw one who was wasted, sprawled out on the seats opposite, who then proceeded to projectile vomit onto the floor of the metro. Classy.

7. Reading. I really don't think you truly understand how much information you gleen just from subconsciously reading instructions and signs. When that information is taken away from you, even the most simplest of tasks are pretty hard. Cue me getting into a bit of a tangle just trying to make instant noodles the other day. Finding recommended bars and restaurants is nearly impossible as well as you may catch the name, but then it's finding the street, and then being able to read the sign. 

8. Recycling. I think this is my worst thing about Korea and has almost brought me to be a quivering nervous wreck several times. Not only do they have about 10 different categories of things to recycle, but all the recycling bins are labelled in Korean, and then they seem to be emptied almost every day, so no matter what time i go to the bin and peer in, hoping to get a clue of what i should put in what bin, they're EMPTY! What makes it worse is all the CCTV warning signs around the bin area, making me worried that while I'm dithering around there is someone somewhere watching me and building up a case against my crimes against the planet- eeeek!

9. The Fashion. Socks with sandals, neon trainers, questionable denim effects, boys in too tight trousers and weird cutsey hoodies with ears are things that you see anywhere you turn. I'd been told before I came that young couples dressed the same as each other, and I'm a bit gutted that I haven't seen this yet either!

10. The rush for food at lunchtimes. I think I took the 'no left-overs' day pretty well, considering every day is a lottery with the food but as soon as the bell goes to signal lunch time, if you actually want to eat, you have to desert your class and do the aforementioned dad shuffle run to the teachers' lunch room. If you don't, you're left with only kimchi and the dregs of rice on your tin tray. Yummmm.

Anyway, as we were busy listing things off the top of our head that we disliked about Korea, we discovered a whole lot more things that we have a mutual appreciation for. I guess it's the bad things that help to magnify everything that's good too.