Reddit Book Exchange 2018

Did you know that the people who run reddit also run a gift exchange? www.redditgifts.com is like Secret Santa all year long, but they offer a variety of exchanges you might like to participate in. For example, I REALLY want to do the sock exchange, because socks are the bomb diggity, but my wallet is like NOPE! It looks like they have 13 different exchanges going on at the moment, including Fantasy, T-shirts, Dr. Who, and yarn.

Once a year reddit gifts hosts a book exchange. This was my third year to participate, and it’s one of the things I really look forward to each year. I love sharing some of my favorite books with other people, and getting books I maybe would never have picked up otherwise. I was GOING to post a “hey this is coming up you should participate!” post, but then I *hem* kind of ignored my emails and almost missed it myself. Maybe next year…

SO! My exchanges!

This year buying for my match was really hard. They gave me a list of books they loved that I had literally never even heard of, but then they were like “Also, I just finished Where’d You Go Bernadette and it was hilarious!” My immediate response was to send them a message fangirling over Bernadette, but I refrained and went back to analyzing their list. In the end I sent The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo and just had to cross my fingers that they hadn’t read it yet, and Mrs. Queen Takes the Train, a rather obscure book that I’ve brought up here several times and I find to be nearly as funny as Bernadette. 

My match said they were exactly the kind of books they would have picked out for themselves, but I’m still sitting here anxiously biting my nails, because what if they don’t love Mrs. Queen? My match mostly reads books off the Opra booklist, and Mrs. Queen has a scant 5,000 reviews on goodreads. I mean, I love it, but I know not everyone will. OH THE ANXIETY!

My Secret Santa, on the other hand, was extremely outgoing. The day matches were sent out they sent me a lengthy message saying they’d read my goodreads list and had a million ideas, so could I please answer a few questions about my preferences? I chuckled to myself, and then continued to receive messages for the next few weeks. Wow! THEN, I kid you not friends, my Santa sent me TWO FULL BOXES of books. To give you an idea, on the reddit book exchange it’s normal to send either one kind of pricey book (maybe a hardcover, or collectible), or two regularly priced books. My Santa sent SIX.

And you guys, I’m pretty excited about most of them. The Goblin Emperor has been on my to-read list since I joined Goodreads in 2014, but I’ve just never gotten around to it. Honestly, mostly because I’ve never met anyone else who read it. But my Santa gushed about how it was one of her all-time favorites. The Invisible Library is a book I’ve literally never heard of, but is exactly the kind of thing I would pick out for myself. It sort of reminds me of that crappy C-movie, The Librarian, which I’m secretly in love with. If you haven’t watched it, you should. The Looking Glass Wars is a book I’d heard of but never bothered to find out more about, but now that I’ve got it I’m really looking forward to reading. It sounds fun and unique. And I’m honestly not sure what The Hundred Thousand Kingdoms is about, it doesn’t have a blurb on the back (WEIRD!) and I haven’t looked it up on goodreads yet. But the cover is certainly intriguing.

I mentioned in my post on Tuesday that my TBR pile is now massive, and this is a big part of the reason why. 6 books from the gift exchange, 1 left from Christmas, 2 from when my mom was in town (she ALWAYS buys me books <3), and 3 or 4 left from last year. Whew. Considering my goal is 30 books this year, you can see why I’m not planning on reading a lot of new releases, lol.

Summary. I had a lot of fun at the reddit book exchange this year. I got to share a few favorites, and now have a whole stack of books I’m very excited to read. I strongly recommend the reddit gift exchange if you’ve never done it before! Next year I’ll be sure to let everyone know when it’s happening so you can sign up too!