My first Big Bad Box Sale

If you are either a bibliophile or bookworm (or even both) in Malaysia, you would definitely have heard of the annual Big Bad Wolf Book Sale and may have been to one of these events yourself. Since its inception in 2009, I have always wanted attend this self proclaimed World's Biggest Book Sale but something always came up at the last minute to scupper any well laid plans. This year, I still harbour hopes of making it to the year end sale but until then I made do with another smaller scale Big Bad Wolf event i.e. The Big Bad Box Sale 2015 which is being held at MINES 2 in Selangor.  

Big Bad Box Sale 2015

My loot from this year's event at MINES 2, Seri Kembangan, Selangor

For those of you who might be unaware of the Big Bad Box Sale, the event is premised on getting a box and filling it up with as many books as you can. Rather than bore you with details, the intimate mechanics can be seen in the graphics below which I adapted from their Facebook and web site.

Having gotten there early to avoid the crowd, my family and I proceeded to browse the selection of books available for this year's sale. Initially, we were most unimpressed with the stuff on display but after some careful browsing we started to spot some gems among the mass of books. So in the end, we decided to get a RM99.90 (roughly USD27 at the moment) box which is nearly 300 cubic metres in size. As this was our first time at the Big Bad Box Sale, we perhaps didn't manage to fit as many books in the box as we could. Nonetheless, we did get enough to make the whole trip worthwhile.

My book loot 1.0 ... the soft covers

My book loot 2.0 ... the hard covers

Some books were worse for wear while a quite a few were dated but overall we were reasonably happy with our loot from The Big Bad Box Sale 2015. Personally, I was pleased to get my hands on the Writers' and Artists' Yearbook 2013 (an older version but still a great value find), Terry Pratchett's Nation, historical nonfiction books on Boadicea, Joan of Arc and Catherine the Great as well as a Neil Gaiman's Fortunately, the Milk, among others. Getting a total of 30 books for the price of a new hardcover book is definitely a life saver during times when the family budget seems ever smaller.  

My son's stash ... with a Neil Gaiman book slipped in by me

Books from my favourite genre which is Science Fiction/Fantasy was pitifully few and far between, . Hopefully, the year end Big Bad Wolf Book Sale will have better books all round. Something to look forward to when trying stretch the ever depreciating ringgit as far as we possibly can. So much reading to fit in among the many hobby projects and so little time. I had better get started then.