Photo Shots

 I. Happy in BOOK's

After feeling run-down at work the past coupla weeks, I had a great day in BOOK's yesterday.
A woman asked me if we had an architecture section. We get so few books on the topic, I told her, we don't: I put them in the Art section, and there were none at all yesterday.

She was telling she was shopping for her boyfriend's upcoming birthday, when another woman came in with a book bag over her shoulder, bulging with books she wanted to donate.
"Can I give these to you? I want the bag back."

(I understand, but it's a pain when donors want their bags back--it means we have to stop and find something and some place to put their donations. A bag of books is not such a pain, but several bags of awkward toys or fragile dishes is.)

"They're all art books," the donor continued, and the shopper said, "Oh! Can I see them?"
She chose out of the woman's bag a worn, old book of Norman Rockwell drawings and the shiny Pop Art, published by Taschen (German publisher of shiny art books).

I charged her the standard two bucks hardback price for the Rockwell, because she was so happy about it, it reminded me of why I love my work and I just wanted to give it to her.
And five for Pop Art, because shiny books sell better at the store than dull-looking geodes.

Another woman came over and chose out Hamilton and Burr (2011), illustrated by Minnesota artist Betsy Bowen.
"How much is it?" she asked.

I started to look it up, then stopped and said, "Since you like it, you can have it for the usual hardcover price, one-ninety-nine." [$1.99]

Well, how bout that: I just now looked it up, here at home, and you can buy Hamilton and Burr from the press––"Note the special overstock price!"––for two bucks, knocked down from twenty.
Well, but a bird in the hand, ya know...

This sort of thing--customers being excited about books--is the best thing. I left work feeling happier. I left at 3:45, one whole hour before it gets dark, and I think that arriving home while it was still light cheered me up a lot too. I will try to keep doing that. (I'm taking the bus because my bike has a flat, and also it's slippery and cold out--only 18ºF today!)
I've been sleeping from 8 p.m. till 5 a.m., so have plenty of time in the mornings for myself.

II. This morning I'm clearing off my desktop of photos from work.

BELOW: I didn't notice until I worked in BOOK's that publishers use different colors and sizes to signal different kinds of books.
Example: these sci-fi/fantasy books (on top shelf) in yellow-orange-golds with white titles. Not an accident.
The best color that philosophy books (on shelf below) can hope for is a dental minty-green. Mostly they are desert camouflage.

BELOW: The week before Thanksgiving, our front window still displays some Halloween leftovers. Because we're like that. No coordinated retail team here!
This skeleton makes a fitting backdrop for the bullet hole in the glass, patched with packing tape since this summer. The gunshot was probably from random street action of the people Big Boss calls "our neighbors"––dealers of drugs and sex, and their associates––not intended for us, specifically.
Not that stray bullets care who or what they hit.
This is a reason we close at 5:30. After rush hour, it gets scary.

BELOW: Isn't this a great illustration? Animal choir on the title pages of German book of children's poems, with inscription dated 1968.

BELOW: Front of House. Not that we call it that. The store doesn't use retail terms. These pretty glass cases by the cashier replaced old, worn ones that were broken when protestors smashed up the store after the murder of George Floyd. (A weird silver lining...)

Manageress does the jewelry, and it always looks nice.

I took the photo to show the vintage dolls, right. I'd just put them in the glass case, and someone came along and bought them immediately for $25 each.

BELOW: Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God is a commonly donated novel. Four copies on the shelf at once is unusual--and with different covers too, so I set them face-forward.

Commonly donated novels are usually classics, book group selections, or books taught in school. Their Eyes is a trifecta.

"In the 1970s, Alice Walker went on a mission to revitalize the works and reputation of Zora Neale Hurston, [whose] books, including the now-classic Their Eyes Were Watching God, were out of print" [--via Wash Post].
It became one of Oprah's Book Club books--and movies--and is on her list of  Classics That Made a Difference.
Harper Collins' Teacher's Guide says it "meets the standard for Range of Reading and Level of Text Complexity for grades 11-12. It is an excellent anchor text for American or Multicultural Literature."

I read it in the 1980s, and it was beyond me. As the NYT says,
"Pushing through the novel's 1920's dialect and plot gaps takes stamina. Hurston's novel, frankly, is homework."

BELOW: Those crazy kids. They love to line toys up! I look for signs of it now.
I especially admire the perpendicular placement of the truck on the far left. "This far, and no farther you may come."  (That's Job, not Gandalf.)

BELOW: I love to line things up too! Here, on my Minnesota shelf.
The game Acquire was made by 3M (Minnesota Mining and Manufacturing ).
The fondue pot and recipe book don't have a MN connection, they just looked nice there.