Where is my head?

Yikes. Obviously, I meant, book lover.

Oops!

Clearly this book (not bopk) didn't proofread the post below. Sorry 'bout that.

A bopk lover's treat

Booksellers love this book—for good reason. You will, too. That’s assuming that you love books and revere independent bookstores.

The Storied Life of AJ Fikry is set on an island (think:Nantucket or Martha’s Vinyard), where the sole independent bookstore is struggling. Maybe it’s because so many indys are struggling in our Amazon era. Or maybe it’s struggling because its owner, AJ Fikry, is often indifferent to customers and often drunk or hung over. A recent personal tragedy accounts for both. But Fikry is, in any case, by nature, cantankerous. He doesn’t take kindly to fools or customers who come looking for mass-market potboilers. And don’t get him started on e-readers or Amazon.

However, the arrival of an abandoned toddler begins to thaw this man’s frozen emotions. A note stuck in the baby’s basket says: "I want her to grow up to be a reader. I want her to grow up in a place with books and among people who care about those kinds of things."

Improbably, Fikry becomes a caring, if inexpert, parent, whose sense of responsibility for his daughter pushes him toward a more enthusiastic and successful role as bookseller to the island. No sentimental, goopy stuff here, though: Fikry remains mildly cranky. And, just as he begins to admit optimism, new obstacles rattle his happiness.

Musings on favorite books—in the style of the typical “staff notes”—preface each chapter. Each is intriguing in its own right, although the composite meaning of these notes isn’t revealed until the book’s end.

The author Gabrielle Zevin is better known for her young adult novels and screenwriting. This novel feels like a breakthrough for her, and the response in the industry and from reviewers has been uniformly enthusiastic. The Storied Life of AJ Fikry is a modest tale and wholly engaging. Especially if you love books. (And you wouldn’t be reading this blog if you didn’t!)

working in a bookstore--the fantasy and the reality

I’m taking a wild guess here—but I imagine that 90% of all writers have, at one time, fantasized about working in a bookstore.

You know the dream: getting to read all those ARCs and discovering the next great book, chatting up like-minded literary customers, leisurely wandering among all the stacks, deciding which book to take home to review. Ah, and if your dream store includes a café, sipping afternoon coffee or tea with a visiting author.

I hate to burst the bubble. But, as I found out during my one dip into retail bookselling, it is hard work. Hard physical work—hefting cartons of books up from the basement, breaking down cardboard boxes and carting them to the dumpster. Hard mental work—learning a new computer system for checkout and looking up obscure titles. And hard emotional work (at least for the introverts among us)—remaining unfailingly polite and helpful even when your feet ache from hours of standing and you’d really rather catch up on unpacking cartons than make small talk with yet one more customer who just wants to chat, not necessarily buy. (And let’s not even talk about the rats who snap photos of book covers with their smartphones so they can order on Amazon later.)

But those lessons were all ahead of me when I got the invitation to work part-time for a couple of months at my local bookstore, McIntyre’s Books in Fearrington Village near Chapel Hill. A valued employee was taking some family leave, and they needed someone to fill in over the Christmas holidays. Would I (a fan of the bookstore and frequent customer) be interested? Would I? You bet!

I started with enthusiasm, and appreciated the staff’s support and training, from the incredibly hard-working owner Keebe Fitch (she hoped to turn me into a bookselling Ninja—alas, I never lived up to that expectation); manager Pete Mock, mystery guru extraordinaire and, behind his grumpy persona, one of the kindest guys ever; and Katherine Pinard, who, with great patience and a sense of humor, showed me the ropes before she left for her brief Sabbatical.

To be fair to myself, I was pretty good at “hand selling”—encouraging customers to consider this or that favored book. And I had a good attitude, taking to heart the store’s mantra of positive customer service. But the computer system sometimes baffled me, and a couple of sales disappeared into cyberspace forever. The hard physical work, even for a part-timer, surprised me.

I came away from my experience with a renewed appreciation for what it takes to run a successful independent bookstore. The old cliché comes to mind: ducks appearing to sail serenely on a pond, while paddling madly under the surface of the water. Considerable work and nonstop attention to books and customers are critical to an indy’s success. Basically, you have to love what you do to make it worthwhile.

And the McIntyre’s team does. And it shows. This month, they celebrate 25 years of being in business—an impressive achievement for any small bookstore. Hats off to you, McIntyre’s, for working hard to make it look easy!

http://www.fearrington.com/village-shops/mcintyres-books/