I wish I could blame it on inflation but here in Portugal, the avg book price is around $20 for a paperback (although paperbacks here are usually a bit nicer in paper quality) AND they have the awful habit of splitting one book into two - so we end up paying $40 for what we can get for $20 (or less) in English.

It has been like that since I've been a little girl so it's not even a new thing.

Learning English growing up was a necessity really. If I hadn't, I wouldn't have read as much as I have over these years.