Top Ten Tuesdays: Topics That Make Me Instinctively Pick Up A Book

This week I am once again linking up with The Broke and the Bookish's Top Ten Tuesday list.   Today's topic is "Top Ten Words/Topics That Instantly Make Me Buy/Pick Up A Book".  I only managed to think of eight topics, and most of them reveal my not-so-secret identity as a history nerd.

1. Russia.  I have a life-long love affair with Russian history, literature, and culture that has taken me on many traveling adventures around Eastern Europe and to the rodina itself. I am unable to resist picking up Russia-related books.  The last one I almost bought as an impulse purchase was The Winter Palace by Eva Stachniak. I've since picked it up at the library.

Me at the Smolny Institute, 2004

At the Kremlin.  What's up with my hair??

2. The Cold War.  Obviously this is related to the above.

3. Alternative History / Time Travel.  Ever since I saw Back to the Future, I have dreamed of traveling through time.  Until I invent a time machine (unlikely) or people from the future come to get me, I'll have to settle with reading time travel books.  :-)

4. Dracula.  Not all vampires, just Dracula.  Maybe it's because he's East European?

5. Dystopia.  I find this theme really fascinating.  My favourites are Margaret Atwood's Oryx and Crake and its counterpart, The Year of the Flood.  Reading through a lot of the Broke and Bookish links last week, however, made me realize there is a lot of dystopian YA literature that I've never heard of, so I'm in no means well-read in the subject. 

6. CIA/KGB/MI5.  I can't resist buying books about the history of intelligence agencies.  I do, however, seem to be able to resist actually reading them once they're in my collection....

7. Cats.  We all know how much I love cats.  I don't actually buy cat books, but I usually pick them up and laugh at goofy pictures.

8. Margaret.  When I was a kid, there weren't many kids called Margaret.  Most people with my name were grandmas or Margaret Thatcher.  As a result, I delighted in finding books where the main character had my name.  Two of my favourites are below; though the covers have since been updated, I've used the ones I remember from childhood.  To this day, if a book title has my name in it, I want to buy it.