A year ago, we started this podcast with a discussion of our epic trip to 17 Seattle-area bookstores for the first annual Independent Bookstore Day. Naturally, Emma had to make the trip out to Seattle for Year 2! 

BONUS EPISODE: #SEABookstoreDay Year 2

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 Epigraph Welcome to Episode 18, our first ever LIVE show, recorded on September 28th at King's Books in Tacoma, WA. We rapid-fire interviewed three booksellers and two authors. Surprisingly, the audio is better than episodes recorded in the comfort of our homes. Listen on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, our website, or subscribe using your podcatcher of choice. Support the show! All books in our show notes link to Indiebound, a website that connects you with your local independent bookstore. Purchases made through our affiliate links help fund Drunk Booksellers, so you can support your favorite indie bookstore and your favorite podcasting booksellers. #win If you want to get our show notes delivered directly to your inbox—with all the books mentioned on the podcast and links to the books we discuss—sign up for our email newsletter. This episode is sponsored by Soft Skull, Counterpoint, and Catapult. Special thanks to Joe and Stephanie Douglas, Big Hair Studios, Allen Watke, Phil Heaven and the  Midnight Mystery Players, and George Kaas for the equipment loan that made this recording possible. And of course thanks to Sam Kaas (who longtime listeners may recognize from Episode 7) our production manager without whom this whole episode would not have been amplified, recorded, nor kept on track. Chapter I: [2:51] In Which We Order a Mistress, Discuss Female Rage, and Are Def Profesh at This Whole Live Show Thing   Kim's Drinking: Hop Valley Citrus Mistress Emma's Drinking: Elysian Men's Room Kim's Reading:   The Book of Dust 1: La Belle Sauvage by Philip Pullman  Emma's Reading & Excited About:   Eloquent Rage: A Black Feminist Discovers Her Superpower by Brittney C Cooper  Good and Mad by Rebecca Traister  Emma is really into female rage right now, nbd.  Kim's Excited About:   Vanishing Twins: A Marriage by Leah Dieterich also mentioned,  And Now We Have Everything: On Motherhood Before I Was Ready by Meaghan O'Connell because (spoiler alert) we interview both authors later in the episode!  Chapter II: [7:25] In Which We Talk About Big Books and Definitely Lie, Kim Gushes Over Leah Dieterich, and We Suggest People Stop Listening to Us and Buy Books Instead sweet pea Flaherty, owner of King's Books in Tacoma, WA  For the record, A Room of One's Own is still a feminist bookstore  King's Books has fourteen book clubs, including one that only reads books about cults and one that only reads books about medical issues. They also have such unconventional events as virtual reality film showings and 80s workout nights (#Cher). sweet pea's Reading:   Before She Sleeps by Bina Shah  sweet pea's Excited About:   Training School for Negro Girls by Camille Acker Nanny Helen Burroughs (she's a person, not a book—but sweet pea wishes there was a book about her)  sweet pea's Desert Island Pick:  a book large enough to act as a sun hat     Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston  sweet pea's Bookseller Confession:  "being a bookstore owner and event planner and bookkeeper and etc... that I don't have a lot of time to read"  Uh, can all the booksellers whose "confession" this is raise their hands?  sweet pea's Favorite Bookstore:  a bookstore in the back of an antique store in Knoxville, TN (if you know what bookstore this is, tweet us!) Dixon Street Bookshop in Fayetteville, AR  Find sweet pea On the Internets:  Facebook Twitter Instagram King's Books  Facebook Twitter Instagram    Facebook doesn't let you have "queer" in your name and challenged sweet pea's legal name twice  Our first guest author, Leah Dieterich, is the author of  Vanishing Twins (Soft Skull)  Leah's Reading:   Amateur: A True Story about What Makes a Man by Thomas Page McBee  This is an artistic rendition of Kim's reaction to Leah's "what are you reading" answer:  The back covers of Soft Skull's galleys are on point:          Leah's Favorite Bookstore(s):  Skylight Books in Los Angeles, CA Powell's in Portland, OR  Find Leah on the Internets:  Facebook Twitter Instagram    Chapter III: [22:03] In Which We Discuss Sex With Frog Men, Realize America Is Doing Bookstores Wrong, and We Make the Audience Curse In Unison Ariana Paliobagis, owner of Country Bookshelf in Bozeman, MT  Ariana's Reading:   Mrs. Caliban by Rachel Ingalls  "a woman falls in love with a frog man; [he] shows up at her door... and she takes him in, in all the ways"     Ariana's Excited About:   Trinity by Louisa Hall (also mentioned,  Speak by Louisa Hall)  Ariana's Station Eleven Pick:   What Money Can't Buy: The Moral Limits of Markets by Michael J Sandel  We are impressed by Ariana's practicality and thus let her, and the audience, in on our secret post-apocalypse library.    Ariana's Impossible Handsell:   English, August: An Indian Story by Upamanyu Chatterjee (also mentioned,  My Year of Rest and Relaxation by Ottessa Moshfegh)  Ariana's Favorite Bookstore:  Librairie Actes Sud (it's in France, be jealous)  Find Ariana On the Internets:  Facebook Twitter Instagram Country Bookshelf  Facebook Twitter Instagram    Our second guest author is Meaghan O'Connell, author of  And Now We Have Everything (Little, Brown and Company) Photo by Kelly Searle Meaghan's Reading:   Hot Milk by Deborah Levy  Meaghan's Favorite Bookstore:  WORD (a bookstore that brings true love [Meaghan and Dustin, Emma and Kim] together)   Find Meaghan On the Internets  Facebook Twitter Instagram   Chapter IV: [38:38] In Which We Save Quarters to Buy Bookstores, Discuss Tricky Toddlers Who Sit On Toilets for Books, and Wrap This Shit Up  Jenny Cohen, co-owner of Waucoma Bookstore in Hood River, OR   Jenny's Reading:   Oh Crap! Potty Training: Everything Modern Parents Need to Know to Do It Once and Do It Right by Jamie Glowacki   Jenny's Excited About:   Survival Math: Notes on an All-American Family by Mitchell Jackson (out March 5, 2019)  Jenny's Wild Pick:   Juliet by Anne Fortier Fun fact, Waucoma Bookstore is only about 20 miles away from the Pacific Crest Trail where Cheryl Strayed ended her  Wild trip.  Quick plug for Books & Whatnot, a newsletter by the wonderful Beth Golay  Jenny's Book for Booksellers:   Dear America: Notes of an Undocumented Citizen by Jose Antonio Vargas  Jenny's Favorite Bookstore:  Burnside Powell's in Portland, OR (but before the remodel)   Find Jenny on the Internets:  Facebook Twitter Waucoma Bookstore  Facebook Twitter Instagram     Epilogue In which You See Us Shop for Booze and We Tell You Where to Find Us on the Internets   Twitter: @drunkbookseller Litsy: @drunkbooksellers Facebook Instagram Email  Newsletter Website  Emma tweets from @thebibliot and is working on a newsletter where she writes about books. Kim occasionally tweets from @finaleofseem, but not enough to justify you bothering to follow her. Subscribe and rate us on iTunes!

Ep 18: Drunk Booksellers LIVE

Epigraph Welcome to episode 17! We're interviewing the a.m.a.z.i.n.g Holland Saltsman, owner of The Novel Neighbor in Webster Groves, MO.   Listen on Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, our website, or subscribe using your podcatcher of choice. Support the show! All books in our show notes link to Indiebound, a website that connects you with your local independent bookstore. Purchases made through our affiliate links help fund Drunk Booksellers, so you can support your favorite indie bookstore and your favorite podcasting booksellers. #win If you want to get our show notes delivered directly to your inbox—with all the books mentioned on the podcast and links to the books we discuss—sign up for our email newsletter. This episode is sponsored by Books & Whatnot, the newsletter dedicated to books, bookselling, and bookish folk; check out their newsletter archive here. Follow Books & Whatnot on Twitter at @booksandwhatnot.   Chapter I In which We Discuss Bookstore Bathrooms, Discover that Staff Picks Work, and Talk About... Books... Before we start drinking, check out  Novel Neighbor's bathroom:  We’re Drinking It's too hot for bourbon, so we're rocking dirty gin martinis out of mason jars, coffee mugs, and martini glasses (apparently Kim's the classy one this episode).   Holland's Reading   Amazing Adventures of Aaron Broom by A E Hotchner (for Novel Neighbor's  Subscription program)  Paperback Crush: The Totally Radical History of '80s and '90s Teen Fiction by Gabrielle Moss (pubs 10/30/18)  The Good Neighbor: The Life and Work of Fred Rogers by Maxwell King (the  audiobook is read by LeVar Burton!)  Harry's Trees by Jon Cohen  The Anna Karenina Fix: Life Lessons from Russian Literature by Viv Groskop (pubs 10/23/18)  Emma's Reading   I'm Fine, But You Appear to Be Sinking by Leyna Krow  They Can't Kill Us Until They Kill Us by Hanif Abdurraqib  Betwixt-And-Between: Essays on the Writing Life by Jenny Boully  Educated: A Memoir by Tara Westover  Kim's Reading   Unbound: Transgender Men and the Remaking of Identity by Arlene Stein  When Katie Met Cassidy by Camille Perri  Juliet Takes a Breath by Gabby Rivera  Forthcoming & Newly-New Titles We're Excited About Hannah's Excited About   The Diary of a Bookseller by Shaun Bythell  What If This Were Enough? by Heather Havrilesky (pubs 2018 Oct 2)  The Disasters by M K England (pubs 2018 Dec 12) - The Breakfast Club meets Guardians of the Galaxy!  Hungover: The Morning After and One Man's Quest for the Cure by Shaughnessy Bishop-Stall (pubs 2018 Nov 20) Time's Convert by Deborah Harkness  Kim's Excited About   Washington Black by Esi Edugyan (author of Half-Blood for folks who love Sing Unburied Sing and The Underground Railroad. author of Half-Blood Blues)  Monstress Volume 3 by Marjorie Liu Vengeful by V E Schwab (follow up to Vicious) The Fifth Risk by Michael Lewis Shade: A Tale of Two Presidents by Pete Souza (author of Obama: An Intimate Portrait)  Emma's Excited About   Severence by Ling Ma  Rosewater by Tade Thompson  Also mentioned: The Murders of Molly Southbourne    Exit Stage Left: The Snagglepuss Chronicles by Mark Russell and Mike Feehan (author of the Flintstones comic reboot)  Bonus Podcast Recommendation: Super Skull    All You Can Ever Know by Nicole Chung (pubs 2 Oct 2018)  Friday Black by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah (pubs 23 Oct 2018)  Y'all. Hot take here. Staff picks work! Emma had a staff pick on All the Lives I Want and Holland actually picked it up at Elliott Bay while visiting Seattle before our episode! (Shout out to our episode with Amy Stephenson from The Booksmith, who initially recommended it to us, and to our favorite audiobook provider, Libro.fm.)             View this post on Instagram  Picked this up @elliottbaybookco from their #stafffavorite shelf, cracking it open tonight. #essays #hollandreads #literarytourism #shoplocal @grandcentralpub  A post shared by The Novel Neighbor (@novelneighbor) on Jul 29, 2018 at 4:54pm PDT     --- Chapter II [26:37] In Which No One Tells Holland She's Crazy, People Love Their Greeting Cards, The Drunk Booksellers Marvel at Novel Neighbor's Ability to Handsell Events, and We Reiterate that Bookstores are a Business (whaaaa?) The Novel Neighbor: More Than A Bookstore  The Novel Neighbor is not just a bookstore. In addition to author events, they host birthday parties, summer camps, bookstore yoga, and adult classes (like continuing ed, but sexier), among other things (sorry Amanda!). Recommended reading for staff retreats:   StrengthsFinder 2.0 by Tom Rath  168 Hours: You Have More Time Than You Think by Laura VanderKam  Beware of squirreling, y'all.    Chapter III [47:06] In Which We Move From Books to Books, Talk About Hybridity, and We Finally Meet a Bookseller Who Has Read Harry Potter Book Description Guaranteed to Get You Reading  Anything meets anything. NOT "It's the next" NOT EVERYTHING IS THE NEXT HUNGER GAMES, Y'ALL. Hybridity.  Holland loved a book that was Comic Con meets The Help. FYI, it's called The Almost Sisters by Joshilyn Jackson. Emma recommends Hawkeye by Matt Friction. It's Buffy meets Veronica Mars. Which apparently is listed on Emma's shelf talker. But, like, who reads those?  Desert Island Pick The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett Emma hasn't finished The Secret Garden, but The Little Princess might be Emma's Desert Island pick. That said, she hearts Mandy by Julie Andrews, which is kinda the same thing, so that counts, right?  Station Eleven Picks Practical: anything from the Did you Know shelf, such as How to Stay Alive in the Woods: A Complete Guide to Food, Shelter and Self-Preservation Anywhere by Bradford Angier Political: Destiny of the Republic: A Tale of Madness, Medicine and the Murder of a President by Candice Millard Wild Pick  The Amazing Adventures of a Nobody and The Kindness Diaries: One Man's Quest to Ignite Goodwill and Transform Lives Around the World by Leon Logothetis Book of Joy by the Dalai Lama Bookseller Confession Holland hated Fates and Furies by Lauren Groff and The Nest by Cynthia D'Aprix Sweeney. Also, she never read Catcher in the Rye, which both Kim and Emma are totally okay with. Emma says you should skip Catcher and read Franny and Zooey.  Shout out to a bookseller who has actually read Harry Potter.  Go-To Handsell Best book Holland has read since she opened the bookstore (whoa): The One-In-A-Million Boy by Monica Wood Kids of Appetite by David Arnold (if you liked Outsiders, read this) Go-To Picture Books: Lady Pancake and Sir French Toast by John Funk, illustrated by Brendan Kearney Interstellar Cinderella by Deborah Underwood, illustrated by Meg Hunt Impossible Handsell Good Luck of Right Now by Matthew Quick (author of Silver Linings Playbook and The Reason You're Alive)  FYI: Emma's really into Richard Gere.   Book for Booksellers Throw back to Laura VanderKam 10% Happier: How I Tamed the Voice in My Head, Reduced Stress Without Losing My Edge, and Found Self-Help That Actually Works by Dan Harris Favorite Bookstores  Flyleaf Books - Chapel Hill, NC Elliott Bay Book Company - Seattle, WA Strand Book Store - New York, NY novel. - Memphis, TN The Last Bookstore - Los Angeles, CA  Road Trips are for bookstores, right?  Favorite Literary Media  Shelf Awareness What Should I Read Next Podcast (hosted by Anne Bogel, author of Reading People: How Seeing the World through the Lens of Personality Changes Everything and I'd Rather Be Reading: The Delights and Dilemmas of the Reading Life) Book Riot Drunk Booksellers   Epilogue In which we tell you where to find Novel Neighbor on the Internets  Website: thenovelneighbor.com Facebook: @novelneighbor Twitter: @novelneighbor Instagram: @novelneighbor  You can find us on:  Twitter: @drunkbookseller Litsy: @drunkbooksellers Facebook Instagram Email  Newsletter Website  Join us for our FIRST EVER LIVE EPISODE on Friday, September 28th at 10pm at King's Books in Tacoma, WA. Also, spoiler alert, this will be our next episode. And it will be fucking incredible. Promise. Emma tweets from @thebibliot and writes bookish things for Book Riot. Kim occasionally tweets from @finaleofseem, but not enough to justify you bothering to follow her. Subscribe and rate us on iTunes!

Ep 17: Holland Saltsman - The Novel Neighbor

Epigraph Y'all. It's been a minute (or, ya know, 8 months). But we're back with a brand new episode featuring Julia Turner and Christen Thompson Lain, the founders of Itinerant Literate, a mobile bookstore in Charleston, SC.  Listen on iTunes, Stitcher, our website, or subscribe using your podcatcher of choice. Support the show! All books in our show notes link to Indiebound, a website that connects you with your local independent bookstore. Purchases made through our affiliate links help fund Drunk Booksellers, so you can support your favorite indie bookstore and your favorite podcasting booksellers. If you want to get our show notes delivered directly to your inbox—with all the books mentioned on the podcast and links to the books we discuss—sign up for our email newsletter.  This episode is sponsored by Books & Whatnot, the newsletter dedicated to books, bookselling, and bookish folk; check out their newsletter archive here. Follow Books & Whatnot on Twitter at @booksandwhatnot.  Chapter I In which a local coffee shop assists in alcohol acquisition, we want more spaceships and dragons, and a book brings Emma to tears. We’re Drinking Christen and Julia were given some free beer from their local coffeeshop, Orange Spot Coffee: Stillwater Artisinal's Stateside Saisan and Sake-Style Saison. As our cocktail for the evening, we're drinking the Lime of the Ancient Mariner from Tim Federle's Tequila Mockingbird.   Christen's Reading      War Storm by Victoria Aveyard   I’ll Be Gone in the Dark by Michelle McNamara  Shout out to Joan Didion's Slouching Towards Bethlehem    Julia's Reading        Girl in Snow by Danya Kukafka (audiobook via Libro.fm)   How to Change Your Mind by Michael Pollan   Monsoon Mansion by Cinelle Barnes   Daphne by Will Boast   Kim's Reading     Killers of the Flower Moon by David Grann (audiobook via Libro.fm) Amateur by Thomas Page McBee (pubs August 14, 2018)  McBee's previous book, Man Alive, is also excellent    Emma's Reading      Circe by Madeline Miller (audiobook via Libro.fm)   The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai    Forthcoming & Newly-New Titles We're Excited About Julia & Christen are Excited About       The White Darkness by David Grann (pubs Oct 30, 2018)  My Sister the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite (pubs Nov 20, 2018) Cult X by Fuminori Nakamura  Kim's Excited About     So Lucky by Nicola Griffith (audiobook via Libro.fm)  also check out her bestselling historical fantasy novel, Hild   Any Man by Amber Tamblyn  Emma's Excited About        There There by Tommy Orange  Fight No More by Lydia Millet Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik (pubs July 10, 2018)  her previous book, Uprooted, is one of Emma's faves   Half-Witch by John Schoffstall (pubs July 17, 2018)   Chapter II [23:30] In which we discuss how bookstores work (and how you keep books on the shelves in a bookstore that moves), Julia and Christen give advice to future bookmobile owners, and the mobile bookstore finds a forever home! Customer: So, is this a library?  Interested in breaking into publishing (then abandoning your fancy degree to become a bookseller)? Check out the University of Denver Publishing Institute. Julia and Christen met there, so that bodes well. Shout out to Blue Bicycle (founder of YALLFest, Charleston's Young Adult Book Festival) Fun fact: the aunt in Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson is described as itinerant. Maybe not the best role model, but not the worst! The bookmobile is so purrrrrrrrrty:      Books that Itinerant Literate must have in stock:    City of Thieves by David Benioff Kafka on the Shore by Haruki Murakami Man Called Ove by Fredrik Backman Ella Enchanted by Gail Carson Levine  Lunar Chronicles Series by Marissa Meyer Replica and Ringer by Lauren Oliver  Tips for potential bookmobile owners:  What's an SAN? Ok, go to www.bowker.com Have an accountant in the family. Indiegogo is your friend. (Kickstarter only gives you the funds if you meet your goal, whereas Indiegogo allows you to choose to still get your funds if you don't meet your goal.) Bungie cords are clutch. Know your legal obligations (you need separate business licenses for every municipality!) For the first few months, plan two hours more than you think you'll need. Ask someone who is not in your field to walk through your store and give you feedback. Don't take everything a customer says to heart. Engage sometimes, but not always. Bookstores are businesses too, y'all.   Chapter III [44:30] In which Julia, Christen, & Emma have the same wheelhouse; we debate Christen's concept of "feel-good" books; and Christen wants to be fierce & fearsome while naked Book Description Guaranteed to Get You Reading Christen loves fiction containing witches, dystopias, feminism, misandry, unreliable narrators, and anachronistic elements. Also, nonfiction books about product and content marketing. Highly recommend Building a Storybrand by Donald Miller.   Emma recommends We Were Witches by Ariel Gore, cause witches + misandry = win!  Julia digs retold fairy tales and pop science/medical nonfiction (shout out to This is Your Brain on Parasites by Kathleen McAuliffe). Desert Island Pick Christen: Harry Potter, natch  Julia: Young Adult faves, such as Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins   Station Eleven Picks Christen's practical book: Peterson's Field Guides to Medical Plants Christen's "feel-good" books: Letters to a Young Poet, One Hundred Years of Solitude by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Exit West by Mohsin Hamid, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer, and The History of Love by Nicole Krauss. Or, to go more apocalyptic: The Giver by Lois Lowry (aka "The Handmaid's Tale for children")   Julia: The Unbearable Lightness of Being by Milan Kundera Wild Pick Julia: Nature reading (The Soul of an Octopus by Sy Montgomery) or books about female resistance Christen wants a guidebook about how to be Lady Godiva. #legit  Lady Godiva, the ultimate Rebel Girl Bookseller Confession Christen actively doesn't finish things she doesn't enjoy. Real talk, this is a necessity for all booksellers. And readers. And humans. Neither Julia, Christen, nor Emma have read Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials. For the record, Kim loves this series and owns multiple editions of the books. Because it's awesome and Kim has great taste. Seriously, look at this pretty cover:   Impossible Handsell Julia: Getting Mother's Body by Suzan-Lori Parks Christen: Eligible by Curtis Sittenfeld Everyone: Hogarth's Shakespeare series  Book for Booksellers Julia: Jane Unlimited by Kristin Cashore Christen: Building a Storybrand by Donald Miller Favorite Bookstores  Avid Bookshop in Athens, GA Battery Book Exchange & Champagne Bar in Asheville, NC Flyleaf Books in Chapel Hill, NC Charis Books in Atlanta, GA Little Shop of Stories in Decatur, GA Tattered Cover (which is where Julia and Christen met! best #meetcute ever)  Favorite Literary Media  Shelf Awareness and Lit Hub On Twitter: Maris Kreizman (author of Slaughterhouse 90210 and judge for Book of the Month Club) Poet.org Poem of the Day    Epilogue In which we tell you where to find Itinerant Literate on the Internets  Website: itinerantliteratebooks.com or chsbookmobile.com Facebook: itinerantliteratebooks Twitter: @chsbookmobile Instagram: @chsbookmobile Tumblr: itinerantliterate.tumblr.com  You can find us on:  Twitter: @drunkbookseller Litsy: @drunkbooksellers Facebook Instagram Email  Newsletter Website  Emma tweets from @thebibliot and writes bookish things for Book Riot. She's also starting a newsletter called All the Books I'll Never Read, which you can subscribe to here. (Working on show notes is the first Kim has heard about this, and it sounds awesome.) Kim tweets from @finaleofseem less frequently than Drunk Booksellers posts new episodes. #sickburn #stilltrue Subscribe and rate us on iTunes!

Ep 16: Julia & Christen, Itinerant Literate

Epigraph We are thrilled to welcome our new BFF to Drunk Booksellers: Javier Ramirez, manager of The Book Table in Oak Park, IL and co-host of industry get-together Publishing Cocktails.  Listen on iTunes, Stitcher, our website, or subscribe using your podcatcher of choice. If you want to get our show notes delivered directly to your inbox—with all the books mentioned on the podcast and links back to the bookstore we’re interviewing PLUS GIFs—sign up for our email newsletter.  This episode is sponsored by Books & Whatnot, the newsletter dedicated to books, bookselling, and bookish folk; check out their newsletter archive here. Follow Books & Whatnot on Twitter at @booksandwhatnot.  Introduction In which we apologize profusely for the delay in our episode posting, bond over Kelly Link, and get excited about books that are... already out We had the pleasure of chatting with Javier nearly every week for a month while trying to record this episode (#techfail), then ran into a few other delays (#lifefail), but WE HAVE PREVAILED. That said, we talk about books that are already out as if they're forthcoming and we're drinking a nice "summer" drink because it was, you know, still summer when we first started this wild ride of an episode. Just pretend you're a time traveler visiting the halcyon days of late August 2017.    We’re Drinking Vodka & Tonics with NO FRUIT  Javier's Reading   a bunch of nonfiction for the Kirkus Nonfiction Prize   The Sun in Your Eyes by Deborah Shapiro   Heartbreaker by Maryse Meijer   The Seventh Function of Language by Laurent Binet   Ranger Games by Ben Blum   Kim's Reading   Mother of All Questions by Rebecca Solnit   (and check out the  Huffington Post article about being mansplained to while reading about Solnit's Men Explain Things to Me)     You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me by Sherman Alexie   The Store by James Patterson... 'cause Patterson is awesome, gives booksellers (including your grateful hosts) money for fancy things like student loan debt and ridiculous urban rent, trolls Amazon for funsies, and rocks a photoshopped Santa hat like a boss:      Kim's reading aloud: My Side of the Mountain by Jean Craighead George   Emma's Reading   MIS(H)Adra by Iasmin Omar   Her Body and Other Parties by Carmen Maria Machado... Emma's favorite story from the collection is “Inventory”   Lumberjanes: Unicorn Power! by Mariko Tamaki   Spinster by Kate Bolick     Forthcoming Titles We're Excited For Kim's Epic List of Titles that Are Already Out   The Golden House by Salman Rushdie   Sing, Unburied, Sing by Jesmyn Ward   Miss Kopp’s Midnight Confessions by Amy Stewart   What Happened by Hillary Rodham Clinton   Little Fires Everywhere by Celeste Ng   Afterglow by Eileen Myles   Never Stop by Simba Sana   The Origin of Others by Toni Morrison   Javier's Excited About   The Heart’s Invisible Furies by John Boyne   Release by Patrick Ness (if you haven't read Ness before, Javier recommends you start with The Chaos Walking series, which beginning with The Knife of Never Letting Go)   Dinner at the Center of the Earth by Nathan Englander (also mentioned The Ministry of Special Cases and What We Talk About When We Talk About Anne Frank)   The Gone World by Tom Sweterlitsch (pubs 2/6/18)   The Grip of It by Jac Jemc    Emma's Excited About   The Glass Town Game by Catherynne M Valente   In Other Lands by Sarah Rees Brennan   We Were Witches by Ariel Gore (How to Become a Famous Writer Before You’re Dead)   A Loving, Faithful Animal by Josephine Rowe    Chapter I [26:50] In which Javier conquers the Chicago bookselling scene Javier started at Tower Records (RIP) He currently manages the Fiercely Independent Chicago-area bookstore, The Book Table.  Javier has worked at pretty much every bookstore in Chicago. Other than the OG Powell's. Unless you're talking time travel. Javier's epic Tour de Bookselling (chronologically): Tower Books --> Crown Books --> Barbara's Bookstore --> The Book Cellar --> Seminary Co-op Bookstores --> 57th Street Books --> Newberry Library Bookstore --> Book Stall --> City Lit Books --> The Book Table   Chapter II [33:45] In which we talk Publishing Cocktails and how to network IRL in the internet age Publishing Cocktails, created by Javier and Keir Graff (senior editor at BookList) brings Chicago-area book industry folk from around the country together. They have two primary meetup events: Book Swap & Cash Mob.  Follow Publishing Cocktails on Twitter at @PubNight. Sign up for the Publishing Cocktails email list for future updates.    Chapter III [38:20] In which Emma is, once again, deeply disappointed Book Description Guaranteed to Get You Reading Anything not blurbed by Lena Dunham (shout out to  Gary Shteyngart’s epicly excessive blurbing). Anything blurbed by Kelly Link or George Saunders. Check the blurbs on Patrick Rothfuss’s Name of the Wind. Plus time travel! Kim and Javier bond over All the Birds in the Sky by Charlie Jane Anders (shout out to the Booze and Lasers Book Club at Third Place Books Seward Park), with references to Michael Crichton’s Timeline and, you know, Harry Potter. Emma ruins the ending of one of the stories in A Guide to Being Born by Ramona Ausubel. Desert Island Pick The entire body of work of Agatha Christie Station Eleven Pick Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, which has Javier’s favorite first line: It was a pleasure to burn. In case you were wondering, Emma’s favorite first (and second) line(s) come from Shirley Jackson’s The Haunting of Hill House. Javier’s posting staff’s favorite lines from literature in his store and he drunkenly promised Emma that he’d post hers too. Pics or it didn’t happen, Javier. Wild Pick The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben Bookseller Confession HAS ANY BOOKSELLER ACTUALLY READ HARRY POTTER? JESUS, YOU GUYS. Go-To Handsell Geek Love by Katherine Dunn Here's Javier's blurb, blatantly stolen from The Book Table's website: When confronted with the "What is your favorite book of all time?" query, most people will often pause, looking over the inquisitors head while thoughtfully scratching his or her chin. I, on the other hand, will not hesitate when I tell you this. Geek Love is my favorite book. Of all time. Period. This oddball masterpiece (a National Book Award Finalist in 1989) shaped me as a reader and more importantly as a bookseller 20+ years ago. It's one of those reading experiences that make you feel like you're in on some life-changing secret. A novel that will chill you, move you and make you laugh, often at the same time. Help celebrate the 25th anniversary of the publication of Geek Love, quite possibly the best novel you've never read. Master & the Margarita by Mikhail Bulgakov: There's a cat that drinks vodka and talks! Bonus Bookseller Confession from both Emma and Kim: They’ve never read either of Javier’s go-to handsells. #booksellerfail Impossible Handsell The End of Alice by A M Homes (author of This Book Will Save Your Life and Music for Torching) Also mentioned, the origin impossible handsell: Tampa by Alissa Nutting Book for Booksellers The Grip of It by Jac Jemc Still Life with Tornado by AS King (author of Ask the Passengers) Another stolen blurb from The Book Table's website: In Still Life with Tornado A.S. King captures the human condition we refer to as "being a teenager" with so little effort I found myself utterly floored. Exploring the way that memory affects grief and vice versa was second in genius only to how King manifests said memory/grief in the mind of 16 year old Sarah. King weaves family history, art and what our past, present and the future can tell us about ourselves into a perfect storm of a book. Favorite Bookstores Unabridged Bookstore The Last Bookstore in LA Favorite Literary Media This podcast you’ve probs never heard of called Drunk Booksellers. But really: Beth Golay’s Books & Whatnot Shelf Awareness The Millions   Epilogue In which we tell you where to find us, but not Javier, on the Internets Javier is a ghost and cannot be found on the internet. He has… a work email… and a telephone number… neither of which we are going to post here. You’re welcome, Javier. You can find us on:   Twitter at @drunkbookseller   Litsy at @drunkbooksellers   Facebook   Instagram   Email    Newsletter  Website    Emma tweets from  @thebibliot and writes bookish things for  Book Riot. Kim tweets from  @finaleofseem less frequently than Drunk Booksellers posts new episodes. #sickburn Subscribe and rate us on  iTunes!  

Ep 15: Javier Ramirez, The Book Table

Epigraph For the third year in a row, the Drunk Booksellers drove all over Seattle (and the surrounding regions) for Indie Bookstore Day. We asked booksellers at each of the 21(!!!) stores we visited to tell us what they're recommending in the current political climate. We also collected recommendations from past guests and #SEABookstoreDay Champions! (For an epic TBT, check out our episodes from Seattle Bookstore Day Year One and Year Two.)  Chapter 1 In Which Your Fearless Hosts Wake Up Far Too Early, Take a Ferry, Drink an Obscene Amount of Caffeine, and Get Our First Round of Bookseller Recommendations Emma, Eagle Harbor Book Co. American War by Omar El Akkad  Madison Duckworth, Liberty Bay Books Illuminae by Amie Kaufman and Jay Kristoff  Ron Woods, Edmonds Bookshop The Nix by Nathan Hill  Robert Sindelar, Third Place Books Exit West by Mohsin Hamid  Annie Carl, The Neverending Bookshop Ready Player One by Ernest Cline  Ruth Dickey, Seattle Arts & Lectures The Fire This Time by Jesmyn Ward  Chris Jarmick, BookTree Dark Money by Jane Mayer Red Notice by Bill Browder   Laurie & Marni, Island Books Why We March: Signs of Protest and Hope It Can't Happen Here by Sinclair Lewis What We Do Now: Standing Up for Your Values in Trump's America ed. Dennis Johnson The Book of Joy by Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu Hallelujah Anyway by Anne Lamott     Larry Reid, Fantagraphics Bookstore & Gallery American Presidents by David Levine  Amber, Seattle Mystery Bookshop Golden Age mysteries by authors like Agatha Christie and Elizabeth Daly   Chapter 2 In Which Kim and Emma Make it Back to Seattle-Proper and Still Have... a Lot of Bookstores to Visit Tegan Tigani, Queen Anne Book Company Your Heart Is a Muscle the Size of a Fist by Sunil Yapa  Georgiana Blomberg, Magnolia's Bookstore Bobcat & Other Stories by Rebecca Lee  Lara Hamilton, Book Larder Soup for Syria by Barbara Abdeni Massaad  Madison, Secret Garden Books Exit West by Mohsin Hamid (2nd mention!) I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith  Tom Nissley, Phinney Books Ghettoside by Jill Leovy  Billie Swift, Open Books: A Poem Emporium Whereas by Layli Long Soldier In the Language of My Captor by Shane McCrae Trophic Cascade by Camille T. Dungy The Boston Review's Poems for Political Disaster If You Can Hear This: Poems in Protest of an American Inauguration by Bryan Borland Resist Much / Obey Little: Inaugural Poems to the Resistance Water & Salt by Lena Khalaf Tuffaha Into Each Room We Enter Without Knowing by Charif Shanahan Sea and Fog by Etel Adnan    Pam Cady, University Bookstore Make Trouble by John Waters  Christina, Third Place Books Ravenna Against Equality: Queer Revolution, Not Mere Inclusion ed Ryan Conrad  Garrett, Ada's Technical Books No Place to Hide by Glenn Greenwald    Chapter 3 In Which Guests from Episodes Past Return to Give Their Recommendations Pete Mulvihill, Green Apple Books (episode 8) Dear Ijeawele, or a Feminist Manifesto in Fifteen Suggestions by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie Make Trouble by John Waters (2nd mention) Stranger in the Woods by Michael Finkel White Tears by Hari Kunzru The Dark Dark by Samantha Hunt    Leah Koch, The Ripped Bodice (episode 13) Prime Minister by Ainsley Booth & Sadie Haller A Promise of Fire by Amanda Bouchet   Paul Constant, The Seattle Review of Books (episode 14) Give Us the Ballot: The Modern Struggle for Voting Rights in America by Ari Berman Chapter 4 In Which the Seattle Bookstore Day Champions Tell Us What They're Reading Katie The Origins of Totalitarianism by Hannah Arendt The Fire Next Time by James Baldwin The Queen of the Night by Alexander Chee     Ed The Death and Life of Great American Cities by Jane Jacobs (which totes has a white cover) (also mentioned: The Color of Law: A Forgotten History of How Our Government Segregated America by Richard Rothstein)   Courtney, Three-Year Seattle Bookstore Day Champion(!!!) Borderlands by Gloria Anzaldua The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood (for the Book Club for Courtneys)   Kristianne, Shelf Awareness The Book of Joan by Lidia Yuknavitch  Kendra American Gods by Neil Gaiman Tony Hillerman Thinking Fast and Slow by Daniel Kahneman The Undoing Project by Michael Lewis  (check out Michael Lewis's episode on the Freakonomics podcast) Misbehaving: The Making of Behavioral Economics by Richard H. Thaler Nudge: Improving Decisions about Health, Wealth, and Happiness by Richard H. Thaler and Cass R. Sunstein      Epilogue What are you reading in the current political climate? Let us know at @drunkbookseller. Non-book political media that Emma recommends: The New York Times (support journalism, y'all) What the Fuck Just Happened Today? Wall of Us Flippable Indivisible Guide - A Practical Guide for Resisting the Trump Agenda Kim's listening to: Pod Save America Pod Save the World With Friends Like These Another Round You can find us on:  Twitter at @drunkbookseller Litsy at @drunkbooksellers Facebook Instagram Email  Newsletter Website  Emma tweets  @thebibliot and writes bookish things for  Book Riot. Kim tweets occasionally from  @finaleofseem, but don’t expect too much. Subscribe and rate us on  iTunes!   Kim went on a v weird youtube rabbit hole while procrastinating from editing, but had enough self control not to add this track to the end of the episode. You're welcome.    

BONUS EPISODE: #SEABookstoreDay Year 2

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