Eighteen years ago I visited Seattle for the first time.  It was our first weekend trip away from a job I hated and a city I swore I would never live in (now I realize I’ll live in Los Angeles for the rest of my life, but I did get rid of that job).  The angst I felt over all the changes in my life lifted the moment I walked into The Elliott Bay Book Company.  I found a book during that first visit about living in suburbia; the recommendation card described the tedium of living in tract housing as the constant evenly paced whoosh of a Rainbird sprinkler.  The description struck me, so I bought the book.  It detailed the brain-numbing monotony of suburban life.  Whenever I drive through tract housing I feel that oppression.

Interestingly enough, during my recent trip to Elliot Bay, I bought two more books about home life (really, they have over 150,000 titles, the breadth and depth of the store is amazing, I just seem to have a theme whenever I go there).  When I walked into the store I was a bit overwhelmed by all of the choices.  In front of me as soon as I entered where four 9 foot or taller bookshelves full of staff recommendations.  I wanted all of them.  More recommendations were spread among the various subjects.  An entire bookshelf is dedicated to recommendations for books groups (plus book groups can meet with a staff member to discuss recommendations for their group and tips on how to keep the conversation on topic).  I gave up trying to make a decision and asked the woman at the information desk if there was a unique book she liked.  She had two that she talked about as we walked over to the books (I learned later that employees are trained to walk the customer over to the book they’re asking about chatting with them the entire way, I loved it).  The first was Cost by Roxana Robinson, a story of what all of us give up for family.  I haven’t read it yet, but I’m looking forward to it.  Hmm, is this the appropriate book to be reading around the Christmas tree surrounded by family?  Maybe not. 

Book Review

The second book was The Story of Marriage by Andrew Sean Greer, she said the book did a wonderful job showing that spouses never really know each other.  But the author is young, in his thirties, what, has he been married 15 minutes?  Well, I read this book and the young author has some interesting insights on assumptions in marriage and the problems resulting from a lack of communication.   The basic storyline is how Pearlie’s view of her husband from their childhood and their marriage changes when a person from his war years returns and alters their lives.  What drove me nuts is that Pearlie and Holland, the husband, never discuss the issue, they communicate about this vital topic only through this ghost from his past.  For me, the book becomes a bit of a stretch, but I discuss everything with my husband, he actually might like a little bit of Pearlie in his life.  Pearlie wonders about marriage and the role of a wife through the sentencing of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg.  Why didn’t Ethel turn on her husband to be with her kids?  To whom does she have the greatest loyalty?  The question of loyalty comes up in the Rosenberg’s marriage, Pealier and Holland’s marriage and the actions of the boys who did not fight in WWII, either as a result of conscientious objection or fear. Interwoven in the story is a picture of life for a black family at the end of the Korean War and a peek into the culture of a nation awakening to its promise after WWII.

The List of Qualities

Elliott Bay has an amazing amount of features that support its nationwide fame, here’s a bullet point list of what is wonderful:

• A coffee shop serving organic food and coffee that inhabits the entire basement.  Rumor has it that the coffee shop in “Frazier” is based on this one.
• Book clubs every Tuesday night at 6:30:  The Elliot Bay Book Club discussing contemporary fiction on the first Tuesday; The Global Issues and Ethics Book Club discussing modern problems and maybe even solutions on the second Tuesday; Speculation, the SciFi and Fantasy group on the third Tuesday; and, Stages, for readers of new and classic dramas on the fourth Tuesday.  The books for each group on the website, a handy recommendation guide if you love the genre but don’t live close enough to attend.
• Maiden Voyage First Edition Program – the store sends out a hardback first edition of an author’s debut novel.  One past choice was The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Diaz, winner of the 2008 Pulitzer Prize.  Membership is $150 a year.  Hmm, another holiday or birthday gift that would keep on giving all year long.
• Elliott Bay gives back to the Seattle community with Books for Change.  A percentage of sales from chosen books are donated to charity.  When I was there the choice of books related to the organization for that month, but also included several fiction and non-fiction bestsellers such as Master Pip by Lloyd Jones.
• The staff will assist with corporate sales, either arranging for the appropriate book for an entire office or client list or a variety of hand picked books for a particular business.
• Almost nightly author visits from the entire range of authors from the stature of Frank Rich and John Irving to the new unknown author who could be tomorrow’s Phillip Roth.  In fact, right now the opening page for the website is a recollection of the Obama’s visit when he toured the nation for The Audacity of Hope.
• Staged Play Readings occur from May to October (the less rainy months?), each month is a staged reading of a play.
• Last but certainly not least, each quarter Elliot Bay publishes Elliot Bay Booknotes a summary of recommended books of various genres.  Bookmark this page and remember to return to it on each Equinox and Solstice.

A Closing Gift

The entire time I was reading The Story of Marriage, I kept thinking of a poem I heard Mary Oliver read last winter.  I was in Royce Hall with hundreds of other people and you could have heard a pin drop, we all sat mesmerized by the poetry of this tiny woman.  After almost 20 years of marriage, I think this one is the most beautiful love poems:

The Whistler

All of a sudden she began to whistle. By all of a sudden

I mean that for more than thirty years she had not

whistled. It was thrilling. At first I wondered, who was

in the house, what stranger? I was upstairs reading, and

she was downstairs. As from the throat of a wild and

cheerful bird, not caught but visiting, the sounds war-

bled and slid and doubled back and larked and soared.

Finally I said, Is that you? Is that you whistling? Yes, she

said. I used to whistle, a long time ago. Now I see I can

still whistle. And cadence after cadence she strolled

through the house, whistling.

I know her so well, I think. I thought. Elbow and an-

kle. Mood and desire. Anguish and frolic. Anger too.

And the devotions. And for all that, do we even begin

to know each other? Who is this I’ve been living with

for thirty years?

This clear, dark, lovely whistler?

Thank you, Mary Oliver.

Elliott Bay Book Company
101 South Main Street
Seattle, WA 98104
T: 206.624.6600

After this near brush with literary greatness, I meandered around HeartFire

Isn't it lovely?

Books.  It was raining to almost snowing outside, making the roaring fireplace with rocking chairs all that more inviting.  The store is physically divided in half, with adult books on the entrance side and children and young adult books up a few stairs in the other half.  It is in this second section that the store really shines.

I visited with my girlfriend and fellow bookstore traveler, Leslie.  Between the two of us, we have three daughters who read faster than we can keep up with.  Keeping them stocked with books is a never ending task.  We ask bookstore employees at every store for recommendations.  It can be so embarrassing when our girls have read every book suggested.  Once we bought a book the girls already whipped through because the clerk worked so hard to find us a book and we just couldn’t say one more time “they already read that.”  The experience was different at HearthFire.  We talked with the manager, Janet Rhodes, and left with five books for the girls, all new to us, weighing down my carry-on so much Leslie had to help me lift it up into the overhead luggage compartment.

Janet said that she was focusing on strengthening the children and young adult section of the bookstore to encourage kids to read.  She succeeded.  HearthFire Books offers a ‘Kid’s Club’ which sends out a new book to a child monthly.  A membership can be purchased for a year or half year.  Janet’s knowledge of young adult and intermediate reader books was so extensive, I’m tempted to give a membership to my daughter for Christmas.  It’s gift that would keep on giving after the decorations were back in the garage.

The adult half of the bookstore is lovely also.  The fiction section has the recent bestsellers along with the books on the current Indie list.  I spent awhile talking with an employee about books for Veteran’s Day.  We started with Flags of Our Fathers by James Bradley and Ron Powers, then moved to discussing the Iraqi War, to our opinion on Bob Woodward‘s latest tomb on President Bush, The War Within:  A Secret White House History 2006-2008, to how the country should proceed in Iraq, here we disagreed.  But that is the beauty of independent bookstore life, just these types of interactions.  The website for HearthFire Books includes the following quote from John King of the San Francisco Chronicle which describes exactly what I experienced there:

“[A] good bookstore is like a good city block:  varied and rich, with layers that bear evidence of imagination and pride.  There’s a tactile connection to the ephemeral world of ideas.  This is merchandise, but it’s not something to be worn for a season or hung up on a wall; it’s something to be discussed and shared, maybe even something that will shape your thoughts and actions.  There’s more going on than the creation of a scene.  It’s the slow formation of identities, of thoughts and passions and who knows what else.”

HearthFire Books successfully created just such an atmosphere.

HearthFire Books

Bergen Village Shopping Center

1254 Bergen Pkwy, STe D-118

Evergreen, CO 80439

One of the employees was so excited about Neil Gaiman and his graphic novels that she convinced me to try one.  I know that graphic novels are a huge publishing phenomenon, but comic books never appealed to me (but I did like Chabon’s The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay) and I don’t like scary stories (I’ve never read King or Straub), so imagine my enthusiasm, but hers was so genuine and it’s almost Halloween, what better time to try one?  On her advice, I bought Neil Gaiman’s The Doll’s House from The Sandman series. 

The introduction described two types of fantastic fiction, one is a reality similar to our own but an alien element arrives that either must be eliminated or assimilated (like Superman), the other is haunted and mysterious where there isn’t a reality to hold onto, just a relative reality among the characters (like Poe).  The Doll’s House is of the second variety.  There are familiar aspects that feel normal such as family relationships, transportation and housing, but how they interact is just weird.  The story straddles a dream world and reality with characters in each that are creepy, but some that care about each other.  I think that is what struck me the most, there were more instances of characters watching out for each other than I’ve experienced in a comic book or in Poe’s writings.  The artistry in a graphic novel is equally important as the writing.  I think the creep factor, for me, comes through more with the pictures than the storyline.  Pictures of stares devoid of emotion, skeletal images and inflicted pain abound.  Take out my reaction to the subject matter, The Doll’s House contains an enormous amount of excellent illustrations that justify its $20 cost.  While I’m glad I tried a graphic novel, and it wasn’t as scary as I feared, I’m not going to be a fan.

In the children’s section, the employee spent a half an hour talking to me and my girlfriend about books for our daughters, who read as much as we do, so finding a book they haven’t read is no easy feat.  In the children’s section, there are recommendation cards for kids to fill out and place on the shelves, I love the idea of kids concisely telling why they like a book and communicating to each other about its merits.

There are three locations, I visited the new store on Colfax Avenue.  It’s located in a

The former orchestra pit and the original theater chairs

renovated theatre, it’s huge.  What a joy to be in a store where space isn’t an issue.  There are alcoves all over the store with comfy chairs and couches to curl up on.  Each section housed a separate topic with a front table or bookshelf highlighting specific books.  Plays and theater books surround the former orchestra pit complete with the original theatre chairs for reading.  I went with one of my favorite former pastors and she found the religion and psychology sections excellent.  The cookbook section was huge, the largest I’ve ever seen outside a specialty cook bookstore.  I chuckled when I found the form requesting that patrons recommend cookbooks or recipes, what a way to spread the word about a cookbook without spreading your hips by trying recipe after recipe.

The Tattered Cover is a prime example of using a bookstore as a catalyst to create community interaction:

• Author events occur almost daily with a combination of well known and lesser known authors, October 2008 included T.A. Barron, Louis Sachar and Dennis Lehane.
• Regularly held series include the Rocky Mountain Land Series which highlights environmental books and issues, the Active Minds Lectures on various topics, the Senior Sunday Presentations, the Tattered Cover Film Series showing classic films and the Out of the Book Film Screenings featuring shorts on authors and books.
• The Tattered Cover offers book groups on a variety of topics including travel, politics and mystery and employees a Book Club Outreach Coordinator who will meet with book groups to recommend books for them and also distributes an extensive list of recommendations available via the website.
• The Colfax location sponsors an annual Educator’s Night complete with information about books, discussions on how the store can work with the school and publisher give aways for the classrooms.
• Tattered Cover monetarily supports the community in a variety of ways, members of the Tattered Cover Gives Back program chose a local non-profit to donate 1% of the proceeds of their purchases (membership is free and comes with a 10% discount coupon), over $31,000 has been donated to local charities through this program.  Children’s book drives are held in June and December (for every 10 books donated in December, Tattered Cover contributes a new book).
• The Family Reader Card provides that for every 10 children or young adult book purchased, the card holder receives a 25% discount card and Shea Homes donates a book to a local literacy program.  I love how two business are working together to aid literacy.
• Tattered Cover promotes youth writing with a variety of contests:  an essay contest during Banned Book Week for teenagers, a scary story contest and a bookmark contest for elementary school students and a poetry contest for all ages.
• A special book club I’m tempted to join, members of the Autograph Book Club receive a collectible autographed first edition signed book once a month selected by the Tattered Cover Staff.  The books are a combination of fiction and non-fiction, hmmm . . .

Denver citizens have something to be proud of with Tattered Books.  In my opinion, it’s worth traveling to Denver just to visit.

The Tattered Cover

2526 Colfax Ave.

Denver, CA 80206

T:  303.322.7727

F:  303.399.2279

W.T. Warwick started bookselling in Mankato, MN and bought Redding’s Book Store in La Jolla in 1939, renaming it Warwick’s somewhere over the years.  His son took over the business in 1950 and the third generation started running the business in 1964.  One of the clerks told me that the fourth generation of Warwicks is involved with the store.  The stock harkens back to a time when reading and writing went hand in hand, yet with an updated feel.  Throughout it’s history, Warwick’s has had a similar combination of products:  excellent stationery (we bought air mail stationery with Nancy Drew illustrations), quality pens (my husband, a fervent pen collector, noted the ones he liked and the fact that they will be 20% off after Thanksgiving Day) and half of the store was books.  Only 12 La Jolla postcards.

I poked around the recommendation section intrigued by the entire freestanding bookshelf of recommendations of mass paperbacks.  I’ve never encountered that before, usually recommendations are limited to “high brow” fiction.  I picked up The Eight by Katherine Neville, a historical thriller published in 1988 that takes place in 1972 New York City and 1790 France, the connecting device is an ancient chess set (no knowledge of chess needed to enjoy the book).  This is a book to shut out the world.  (Confession, Warwick’s had the book in a mass paperback form and the wider page ‘literature’ format, I bought the literature format.)

I encountered my most impressive recommendation to date.  On top of one of the several recommendation bookshelves was Darkmans by Nicola Barker with a note that the author dedicated the book to Scott Ehrig-Burgess, an employee of Warwick’s.  The dedication reads “for Scott Ehrig-Burgess in Del Mar, who filled out that comment card.”  The bookstore note stated that Scott guaranteed that the buyer would like the book, if not, then he would refund your money.  Scott wasn’t working the day I visited, but I asked for the story behind the dedication–what is the relationship between Scott and Ms. Barker and what comment card?  Apparently, Scott received an advance copy of the book and sent a comment card to the author with suggestions for revisions.  They have never met.  I would love to know what the comment card said because I send witty, kind, supportive e-mails to Claire every day and I have yet to get a shout out in any of her books.  Darkmans was short listed for the 2007 Man Booker Prize, the prize that I happen to most respect, and, to quote the back, “is an epic novel of startling originality–a story of invasion, obsession, possession, art, prescription drugs and chiropody.”  I have no idea what chiropody is, but I’m going to read the book just to figure it out.  The employee I talked with said he was enjoying Darkmans because it’s written how he thinks, in tangents.  The author introduces a character, then gives the history of the character and then moves on with the story.

One of the reasons I’m passionate about independent bookstores is that they not only contribute to their community, but they create community.  Bookstores are a gathering place for the exchange of ideas and knowledge.  Warwick’s impressively fulfills this role.  In addition to constant author readings and visits, Warwick’s began the ‘Year of Giving’ last October.  Warwick’s pledged to give 1% of its total sales to a different charitable organization each month, alternating between domestic and international organizations.

Warwick’s has a ‘Books for Schools,’ program whereby every time a children’s author visits, Warwick’s notifies the school and the school arranges for their parents to pre-order the books which will be waiting for them at the event ready for the author to sign.  The school receives a store credit equal to 20% of the sale proceeds. It’s their attempt to help stock the school library and classrooms with good books.

Warwick’s supports the local book groups in several ways, when I was there I noticed stacks of book group guides for a wide range of books, from McEwan to Binchy novels.   Each year the store holds a Reading Group Night when several employees recommend books for the next year’s meetings and point out that ”extra special life-changing book that has eluded them for all time.”  Nothing like setting the bar high.  Additionally, registered books groups receive 20% off their choices.

As I was paying for our stack of purchases, I asked how the store was doing.  The employees said it’s hard, but the community strongly supports the store.  Just as generations of the Warwicks have served the La Jolla community; generations of residents have shopped there.

Warwick’s

7812 Girard Avenue

La Jolla, CA 92037

Tel:  619.454.0347

Fax:  619.454.9325

When I walked into Wessel and Lieberman Booksellers Inc. it felt like an English library (except for the bongo street musician outside).  The store is elegant and quiet (discounting for the crowds of fans walking to the Seahawks game), it even has an employee sitting behind a large wood desk in the front of the store.  It was such a sophisticated atmosphere, I was surprised to discovered it was a used bookstore.  This isn’t your paperback romance novel used store, it is truly a treasure trove. 

What caught my eye was a line of books on top of a bookshelf, each title a different state.  I love to travel and one of my many traveling goals is to visit each state (along with each Great Lake, each mission on the California Mission Trail, each baseball stadium, etc), so I was intrigued.  They were a collection of the American Guide Series, a  WPA project during the depression that employed writers to write a book about each state; it’s history, culture, landmarks, potential driving tours.  The project was expanded to include major cities and landmarks.  I fell in love with them, both with the books and the fun of hunting for a collection that was large enough to last my lifetime.  We picked up the Death Valley book and I mentioned to my husband and kids, several times, that I would love these for Christmas presents.

Wessel and Lieberman has an extensive selection of poetry books and art books.  I looked through the poetry section for any Ted Kooser selections (he’s my favorite poet) and my husband went on the prowl for Edward S. Curtis art books.  I came up empty, but we hit a Curtis jackpot.

Our good friend, Bruce Kapson, is an art dealer specializing in Edward S. Curtis works (more on Bruce in an upcoming post) so over the years we’ve seen some beautiful Curtis works, but not at used bookstore prices.  At Wessel and Lieberman we found a two foot by three foot art book of portraits, Edward S. Curtis:  Portraits from North American Indian Life.  Curtis is frequently criticized because of the anthropological roots of his work (he would dress up an Indian from one tribe in the native wear of another tribe), but his work wasn’t for academic purposes, it was artistic and the portraits are stunning.  While I loved the book, and the price, figuring out how to get it on the plane home defeated me.  I shouldn’t have worried, Wesseland Lieberman have the best shipping prices I’ve encountered in years.  In fact, if you order from their website, they ship for free, way to compete with Amazon!

As I wandered around the back room, one side fiction, the other non-fiction, I tripped across the perfect book for me, Brady & Lawless’ Favorite Bookstores by Frank Brady and Joann Lawless published in 1978.  Mr. Brady and Ms. Lawless traveled around the country visiting bookstores and wrote a book reviewing their favorites.  I cheered along with every sentence in the preface, most of which I’m sure I’ll quote at one time or another on this blog.  Today’s favorite:  “Bookstores are an important part of our literary culture.  They have also served, since the Renaissance, as social and historical centers–quiet marketplaces for ideas.”

Of the bookstores we’ve reviewed so far, only Kramer Books & Afterwords Cafe shows up, the book describes how the owner, William Kramer, liked the tascas in Spain where people leisurely gathered, chatted and snacked before heading to dinner.  He created a similar atmosphere in DC which the community enjoys to this day.  Interestingly, the authors reviewed of Barnes and Noble in New York City as a single entity store on 5th Avenue (my son bought the latest Harry Potter there several years ago) with an annex at Rockerfeller Square and a new store in Boston.  My, things have changed.

Wessel and Liberman Booksellers Inc.
208 First Avenue South
Seattle, WA 98104
Tel:  888.383.3631
Fax:  206.682.2391

I wondered as I visited Pacific Avenue in Santa Cruz how a city of 55,000 supported two independent bookstores within four blocks of each other with a Borders plopped in between them — almost a bookstore for each block of this quaint street. It’s easier to understand once you visit them, Bookshop Santa Cruz and Logos Books and Records have distinct personalities and Borders, well, is Borders, I didn’t need any magazines so I didn’t stop there.

Bookshop Santa Cruz

Bookshop Santa Cruz is a wonderful example of a community bookstore. When I asked for recommendations, the clerk pointed out the community member recommendations bookshelf. Every month a name of a community member is drawn who then recommends several books. The current community member is a friend of the clerk and she enjoyed all of the recommended books. I found an interesting book that I’ll be talking aobut in a later post. Additionally, there are staff recommendations shelves, recommendation cards throughout the store and signs pointing out which books are most popular in Santa Cruz.

This summer the store started a monthly Community Book Group with a local author, a moderator and whoever from the community can attend that evening. The store gives a 10% discount on the chosen book the month before the event. In August, Jonathan Frazen discussed The Corrections, it’s nice to see that he is more open to book discussions since the Oprah debacle. The sense of community interaction with Bookshop Santa Cruz goes on and on, they have a photograph contest for local photographers, an annual short story contest for local writers, a readers club that awards repeat purchases along with exclusive invitations, a gift service (Bookshop Santa Cruz Selects) where hand selected books are sent (gift wrapped, I love it when other people wrap) to the recipient quarterly, bimonthly or monthly.

One of my favorite community aspects is Trusted Source, a list of recommendations from local experts about their area of expertise. When I visited, the Trusted Source was the Music Director and Conductor of the Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music and he recommended five books, two of which I’ve read so I felt intellectually affirmed. I so fell in love with this idea that Claire and I are planning to add a similar page to the website, if you have any ideas about who to contact as an expert, be sure to let us know.

Bookshop Santa Cruz recently celebrated its 40^th anniversary and management was passed to a new generation as the owner’s daughter took over running the store. The store was hard hit by the 1989 Loma Prieta quake and had to exist in a tent (Booktent Santa Cruz) for three years until its present location on Pacific Avenue was ready. On moving day, scores of volunteers showed up to carry books from the tent to the new store. Community involvement flows both ways in Santa Cruz.

The store is a delight to wander through, it’s large airy and light. A friend who visited the store took a great inside shot; check it out on her blog. A few organizational tidbits I really liked – there were Young Adult bookshelves in both the adult fiction section and the children’s section. YA books have an adult following (especially among those of us who are in book groups with our kids) and it’s terrific to see shelves of books that have a crossover appeal. In the children’s section, there are tables dedicated to specific genres such as mystery or historical fiction, plus lists on the walls of the top ten books in the genres. What a gift to adults looking for books for children. My daughter has specific tastes, so I scanned the lists to see what she hadn’t read and actually came up with one or two choices.

Bookshop Santa Cruz is very supportive of local book clubs. They have a set of bookshelves with the club’s monthly picks, and if the club is registered with the store, the members receive a discount with on the book. What really impressed me was the quarterly book club mixer where there is a presentation, in the past a publisher has spoken, and people who are searching for a book group attend along with providing an evening out for an existing book group.

Logos Books and Records

I’m always hesitant about used bookstores, some have gems just waiting to be found while others feel like someone’s crammed garage. Logos Books and Records is an excellent example of a used bookstore. It was huge, the size of a large local library, extremely well organized with interesting books, not stacks of old textbooks or paperbacks with wrinkled covers. The front half of the top floor had shelves of fiction, but most prominent are the shelves of art books, truly beautiful books. The back half of the store was music. We showed the kids an old 45 and explained what an A side and a B side meant, they looked bewildered. One of them asked, is that like an iTune on each side? The people around us chuckled. We described how you put an extra gadget in the larger hole of the 45 so it would fit on the record player; my daughter has little to no experience with a record player (we gave ours away years ago) so she looked at it like I examine a crank to start a car.

Logos has the type of books you’re looking for in a used bookstore, lovely hard back editions of Winston Churchill’s History of World War II, or The Decline of the Roman Empire by Edward Gibbon, I was tempted to buy them because they would look good on my bookshelves. I have a rule that I can’t buy something that I’m not going to read or it’s very likely that I’m not going to read (I have lots of books that I haven’t read, but I intend to read them), but maybe it’s time to re-think that rule.

Bookshop Santa Cruz
1520 Pacific Avenue
Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Tel: 831.423.0900

Logos Books and Records
1117 Pacific Avenue
Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Tel:831.427.5100

So, as we cruised from one port to another in Alaska last week, I was disappointed to find the streets lined with jewelry stores. Jewelry, in Alaska? I don’t know a lot about shopping for jewelry, but when I think of diamonds Juneau doesn’t pop straight to the front of my brain. Nevertheless, the streets were packed as our boat with 4,000 people joined two other floating cities. Luckily, I had done my research, and I knew where to escape the madness, Hearthside Books & Toys downtown by the clock.

We had about an hour between visiting dogs on a glacier and heading out to look for humpback whales, so we dashed to Hearthside and entered what I believe was closer to the Juneau community than store after store of shiny bling. Hearthside permeates a golden color due to the walls and bookshelves, but it stood out more in stark contrast to the grey cloud covered streets and surrounding mountains. It was bustling (more so than many of the jewelry stores, yahoo!) with tourists looking at books and cards. It is fairly small with the front section featuring books on Alaska and the wilderness, including books written by local authors. A raised platform area contained fiction that appeared to cater to the tourist trade, many were vacation reads. There was a nice sized children’s section with toys, my teenager laughed through Peter and the Cruise Ship by Hans Mateboer, if I had a 5 year-old on my Christmas list, I would have snapped it up.

I had fun talking with Darlene, a long time resident of Juneau who worked at Hearthside. I was looking for another book on the Southeast section of Alaska. I had read Into the Wild by Jon Krakauer, several of Muir’s essays on the area and John McPhee‘s excellent book Coming into the Country, but realized I was getting more of a feel for the northern sections of Alaska. She had several suggestions, but what struck me was Blonde Indian, An Alaska Native Memoir by Ernistine Hayes. It’s a memoir by a local Native American woman interwoven with Tlingit oral history. I found that most of the books on Alaska are from the point of view of white people, men for that matter, who have well written observations of the Native Americans, but the joy of reading is experiencing a different point of view. Blonde Indian gave me that insight.

Back at home, I checked on their website and found a whole section on the “Battle of the Books.” I had never heard of it, but discovered it’s a non-profit program run nationwide where kids grades 3 through 12 read a list of books and then participate in a family feud style competition. Hearthside provides a list of the books for each grade level and sells them to the participants. I’m forwarding the information for the competition to our school librarian and a few teachers I know. Check it out.

Hearthside Books & Toys
(Downtown by the clock)
254 Front Street
Juneau, AK 99801
Tel: 907.586.1726

The clerk was terrific, she recommended various books but I was particularly interested in The Writing Class by Jincy Willett because of the story the clerk told me. Apparantly, Ms. Willett wrote a book of short stories, Jenny and the Jaws of Life published in 1987, which went out of print. A few years ago, David Sedaris was asked which book that is out of print would he like to see republished, and he named Jenny and the Jaws of Life. As a result, that book was republished in 2002, she then came out with a novel, The National Book Award (for the longest time I thought the title of the book was Jincy Willett and that it received the National Book Award) and then her latest book, The Writing Class. It is the story of a writing class at UCSD extension (the University isn’t named, but I’m an alumni and I recognized the descriptions) in which a series of murders occur. I had so much fun reading it, I just blasted through. The description of the teacher and what “success” did to her along with the students, some of whom are there to write, others to pick up on writers, was hilarious. I gave the book to my writing teacher, when she’s done I’m going to “confirm” that I’m not like any of the students in the book, right? Ms. Willett lives close to The Book Works in Del Mar and teaches writing classes there. Through her website you can order The Writing Class from The Book Works and request a personal inscription.

The Book Works offers a variety of writing classes from several teachers. It also organizes several book groups, the usual fiction (current and classical), but also history, business and non-fiction. It holds a unique Mind-Brain Series on science which draws on the expertise from science community at UCSD and Scripts Institute. Every Friday night live music is played. The store specializes in literature, childrens books, current non-fiction, cookbooks (some of which were works of art themselves) and art books. The store rewards repeat customers with a patronage program, for every ten purchases, the customer receives a free book. Last but certainly not least, the website mentions that San Diego Magazine named the “sexy, smart Book Works employees” as one of the sexiest features of Del Mar in May, 2007.

The Book Works
Flower Hill Promenade
2670 Via De La Valle, Ste. A230
Del Mar, CA 92014
Tel: 858.755.3735

The Poisoned Pen in Scottsdale AZ is primarily a mystery bookstore. I’m not a huge fan of mysteries, I’ve read Agatha Christie but I gave up at “C” for the Sue Grafton series. I was relieved when I asked the owner for a recommendation and she handed me The Historian by Elizabeth Kostova. It was a bestseller in 2005 when it was published, but I never got to it. The owner described the book as a re-telling of the Dracula story that’s suspenseful, but not creepy. It occurs to me that this could be a good complement to the Twilight series by Stephanie Meyer that my daughter is reading over and over again.

The store itself is mostly glass walls so it’s sunny and bright (and possibly boiling at times, but it was early in the day and lovely). It has light stained bookshelves lining the solid walls, lots of free-standing bookshelves and several tables scattered throughout the store. One table was reserved for the next author event (a look at the calendar showed a constant flow of authors, so if you’re in the area, check to see if one is occurring), another table had new arrivals (not all of which were mysteries) and a large table with stacks of staff recommendations.

The store has a nice collection of signed and collectible books. Not all of the books were mysteries, nor were they all from author events, it appeared that some of them were sent from other sources. A check on the website confirmed that The Poisoned Pen receives collectible books on a regular basis. The website is terrific; if you’re interested in mysteries head over. There are recommendations, lists of newly arrived collectible books and dozens of interviews with authors. There is a six part interview with Diana Gabaldon that I’m in the middle of and will probably write about soon.

A unique aspect to this bookstore, in addition to being primarily a specialty bookstore, is its association with the Poisoned Pen Press. There are shelves and shelves of mystery books published by Poisoned Pen Press. The clerk I asked about the Press said that it was separate from the bookstore, so I looked on the website (be careful to look at Poisoned Pen Press, not Poison Pen Press which is a press for medieval cookery, a title which isn’t a great recommendation for medieval cookery in my opinion). The owner of the bookstore constantly bemoaned the fact that so many great mysteries were out of print, so her employees suggested she open a press to re-print them, and she did. The Press expanded to printing new works and several have been nominated for awards. The submission guidelines for new works are included on the website. Additionally, the Press runs a Mystery of the Month Club, join it and you’ll receive a new mystery each month.

Now that I’m back home, I wish I had specifically asked for a good mystery, maybe something with a historical fiction angle, I might have discovered a whole new area of reading!

The Poisoned Pen
4014 N. Goldwater Blvd., Ste 101
Scottsdale, AZ 85251
Tel: 888-560-9919

When I first went three years ago and asked the owner for a recommendation, we discovered we had similar tastes, everything she liked I had read. That made for a terrific conversation, and I spent an enjoyable half hour talking about books with her; but this is in part a community experience and in part a quest. Finally, she found The Brothers K by David James Duncan, a New York Times Notable book from 1992. As a Dostoevsky fan, I was immediately intrigued. This find feels extra special because people rarely talk about a great book they read ten or twenty years ago, to the extent they talk about books, it’s mostly classics or current fiction. Sometimes I’ll ask a clerk is there an older book you loved, not a classic, but something terrific you haven’t thought about in awhile and come up with a great read.

When we visited the store last spring, there was a tall bookshelf with staff recommendations, we bought five of them. The owner mentioned that she doubted the store would continue and she was right, it no longer exists as a storefront. After 35 years in Bend, The Book Barn is now a virtual store located at bendbooks.com. Their specialties throughout the years, local history, literary fiction, young adult, local authors, can be purchased online (with limited free shipping). Staff picks appear on the opening page and they send out a monthly newsletter with book recommendations and events held locally. I’ll feel the loss next year when I’m in Bend, but I’ll drown my sorrows in an extra piece of pine nut tart while reading their newsletter.

The Book Barn
541.389.4589