I have been guilty of the same thing I love pixel of ink. Plus I also have a ton of ebooks in epub format too. I have no idea how I will read them all. So many great free books I don't know why I would need to buy any.

I visited Hancock's today only because I was dropping off something with a friend who wanted to meet there. It's further than Joanns, so don't visit often. However, Hancocks is having a great Memorial Day sale. 50% off all Absolute Cotton prints. If I had $$ to burn, I would have taken the opportunity. It's nice to see different fabrics than Joanns. I found some good quality fuschia quilter's cotton for $1.99 at the remnant table. Spent less than $5.00 on fabric today. :)

For children the entire Judy Moody series are $1.99 each. Here is a link that might be useful: judy moody

Hello LauraMarie, George Gissing writes much like Dickens. He writes about the poor of London and was very much noted for his realism. He was one of the "starving writers in the garrett" so he lived amongst those who peopled his books. He wrote in the late Victorian Era. He died in 1903 in France. He is also the author of a much-praised biography of Charles Dickens.. but many who have read both Dickens and Gissing have said that he "out-Dickens Charles". He is wonderful at creating three-dimensional characters that jump from the book into life. I find that his realistic conversations make me feel like I am a fly on the wall. Since this post originally came up three years ago, I have read more of Gissing's works. But I still have to say that New Grub Street is my favorite. For a first Gissing, I would suggest New Grub Street or The Odd Women. New Grub Street is about two friends who want to be writers. Both are poor. Both want to succeed. One of them will do anything to earn money and become suggessful. The other refuses to force his creativity or to sacrifice his principles. Grub Street was (is?) a street in London where magazine and book publishers were located in the Victorian Era. The Odd Women is about a few friends who decide to remain single women in 1890's London. I must say that considering the author is a man, this book captures many of the worries and hurdles of being female in a male-dominated society. I copied this next portion: Early life Gissing was born in Wakefield, Yorkshire, to lower-middle class parents. A brilliant student, he won a scholarship to Owens College, the present day University of Manchester. He excelled at university, winning many coveted prizes, including the Shakespeare prize in 1875, but his academic career ended in disgrace when he fell in love with a young prostitute, Marianne Helen Harrison. In an attempt to keep her from the streets he gave her money, and when his own funds ran short he began to steal from his fellow students. Eventually he was caught, expelled from the university, and prosecuted for theft; he was sentenced to one month's hard labour in prison. In October 1876, thanks largely to a few local sympathisers, he was shipped off to the United States, where, when close to starvation, he managed to earn a precarious living by writing short stories for the Chicago Tribune. [edit] Literary career On returning to England in the autumn of 1877, Gissing married Marianne, and settled down in London to write novels. His first book, Workers in the Dawn, was published at his own expense in 1880; it was a complete failure, and Gissing took up private tutoring to support himself and his wife, who by now had become an alcoholic. In 1883 the couple separated, but he gave her a weekly income on what little money he had until her alcohol related death in 1888. In 1884 his second novel, The Unclassed, which saw a marked improvement in style and characterisation,...