I must say, he has large pockets. It’s also the advantage computers and Kindles offer; you can have things to read and write as long as you have power.
Of course, that’s their disadvantage, innit?
Another Robert Said
Food Suggestions
Have you ever been reading something, and the characters are eating, and you find yourself wanting what they were eating?
In a book I was reading, the main character had oatmeal and avocado. Now I want to try oatmeal and avocado.
I also enjoyed the many times in the book where the hero showed up and handed others coffee, and they were all, “Coffee!” It was instant, but still.
Simplest
After all his travels and experiences around the world, and the many things he’d eaten, drank, and sampled, he realized his favorite activity was to fall asleep reading a book with a cat as his company.
Book Find
Don’t you love it when you go into a book store, especially a used book store, for a specific book, and go right to the location and find it on the shelf within seconds of beginning to look?
Sweet feeling. Today’s target was The Darwin Elevator by Jason Bough. A friend recommended it as a fast, enjoyable read.
Downer
You ever tell someone about a television show that you really enjoy, and they say, “Oh, I started watching the first, and couldn’t finish it, it was so ridiculous.”
Kind of a downer, isn’t it?
Happens with books, too.
The Australian Dream
It was another wild night of dreams, with this one making a deeper and more lasting impression.
I found myself in another land. After meeting a man and speaking with him, I realized I was in Australia. My wife was also present. No reason for being in Australia was given, but I was pleased. I’ve always wanted to go to Australia, and have just missed several times. I still plan to go.
Anyway, in the dream, I was given some papers that turned out to actually be a little book. I didn’t know what to do with it or why I had it. Reading it didn’t help because it seemed incomplete, and my wife couldn’t figure it out, either. Finding another fellow, I asked him about it, and he showed me how it was a continuation of other documents. He said they were living documents, and took me to a huge wall of like documents. After he explained it, I was excited and explained it to my wife. She wasn’t interested.
I was then informed I had to get to another part of Australia. I hopped into a car and began driving, trying to figure out where I was going as I went. The roads were holed and shoddy. Most of them were like slick mud. As I complained about them to myself and merged onto a highway that was also like slick mud, I was overtaken by cars. They passed at shockingly high speeds. “I forgot they don’t have speed limits here,” I said to myself in the dream car, accelerating to match the pace while I looked for signs and directions.
I found myself out of the car and running. Everyone was running. Instead of driving, we were running everywhere. I was still on the highway and looking for where I was going. Somehow, running, I found it and arrived.
People were there, but it was no one that I recognized. They gave me more books. Where all the other books were white, these books were red. I immediately understood that these were new books, and that I had to take them back to the other location, which I did right away. That pleased the people on the other end. Understanding the books and system at a fast rate, I took on the role of explaining to others how these books continued the stories.
Everyone was told to line up to go somewhere else, part of some planned activities. I got in line and found that I was at the line’s beginning, with my wife beside me. As I started to go, I encountered the first man that had given me the books in the beginning. He and I exchanged some comments, and I told him that I knew how the books worked. That made him happy, and he let me go. As I walked through the gate with my wife into a green field bordered by a white picket fence, I realized that he’d been my teacher.
Wally Said
I hold to Wally’s words, but they trouble me. I write for myself, so the book has an audience. I’d like my novels to have more than an audience of one.
Know what I mean?
How Cool
I’d finished my writing and was doing my post-writing walk. Going up Main Street, I passed the Starbucks. A woman was reading at a table. I glanced up, stopped, and stared.
Yes, she was reading my book.
I was pleased.
She looked at me.
“Sorry,” I said. “I was trying to see what you’re reading.”
She glanced at the cover. “I just started it last night. I’m not familiar with the author.”
It took a lot for me to reply, “Well, I feel I should warn you that I’m the author so that you don’t accidentally insult me. Now that you know, you can deliberately insult me.”
She said, “No way. Are you really?”
“Yes. You probably got the book from one of the little libraries around town.”
“No, my friend gave it to me. Maybe she got it from a little library. She finished reading it and thought I would enjoy it.”
We chatted a little longer about the book and the little libraries, and my other novels. I didn’t know her or her friend. I walked away thinking, “How cool is that?” I was so pleased and engrossed, I almost walked in front of a car.
That would have definitely not have been cool.
Fill It Up
We can add, eat chocolate (and pie), drink wine (and beer), and listen to music, but let’s not be greedy.
The Bookstores
We’d read about another book store to check out in Eugene. “Better than Smith Family Bookstore,” they claimed.
Photo: Smith Family Bookstore, Eugene, Oregon
What? Better than Smith?
We love Smith. A re-purposed fire station, it reeks with books. Attempts to organize the books are ongoing. Well, they are organized, but they spill out everywhere.
We checked out J. Michaels Books, on Broadway. It’s a good book store, and well worth an hour of browsing, but it would not supplant Smith for us.
We drove on to Barnes and Nobles on our book quest – the last resort in our efforts to find several books. I know I’m a writer. I’m supposed to make money from selling books. But my wife likes finding used books, reading them, and then selling them to another book store for credit.
I’m ambivalent about that. She and I enjoy reading. We’re spreading the wealth by keeping used books in circulation. And, we’re sparing the environment (some) by keeping the need to publish more books down. But, we know we could do more to reduce books’ impacts on the environment by going digital, but…sigh…we’re in love with the feel, smell and practice of reading physical books. It goes beyond logic.
All that book store visiting prompted thinking about which book store is my favorite. First, what makes a good book store? Books, of course – selection, prices, condition. But there’s often more. A spirit of reading and writing is embedded in the best book stores.
Powell’s Books in Portland remain marginally in first place on my list. One, talking with the folks working there, you can tell that they enjoy books. Two, it’s so damn big and impressively organized. Used and new books co-exist for sale. Both are reasonably priced.
Second place is more difficult. I like, on equal levels, Bloomsbury Books and Bookwagon New and Used Books in Ashland, but I also like Smith Family Bookstore in Eugene. I guess I mark the three establishments as tied for second. All have knowledgeable, book-friendly personnel working there. Bookwagon is the smallest, but we enjoy the owner, Karl.
In third place, then, is another Ashland book store, the Book Exchange. Dark and crowded with tall shelves of books, the Book Exchange feels like an old book store, and offers excellent prices and selections.
In ranking my book stores, I dismissed things like coffee shops, pastries, parking and locations. They’re just nice accouterments to a proper book store, but it’s really about the books.
What about you, readers and writers? Are there any book stores that draw your love and loyalty?
Michael Seidel, writer 