The Boswell Book Company annotated sales list for week ending June 8, 2019

Here's what's selling at Boswell.

Hardcover Fiction:
1. The Summer Country, by Lauren Willig (signed copies available)
2. On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous, by Ocean Vuong
3. Murder in Bel Air V19, by Cara Black (Register for event Wed Jun 12, 7 pm)
4. Fall; or Dodge in Hell, by Neal Stephenson
5. City of Girls, by Elizabeth Gilbert
6. Black Leopard, Red Wolf, by Marlon James
7. Normal People, by Sally Rooney
8. Where the Crawdads Sing, by Delia Owens
9. Walking Backwards, by John Koethe
10. This Storm, by James Ellroy

We had a great sales pop this week on Ocean Vuong's On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous, perhaps due to last week's front page New York Times Book Review plus profile plus several NPR writeups, including a review from Maureen Corrigan on Fresh Air: "Like so many immigrant writers before him, Vuong has taken the English he acquired with difficulty and not only made it his own — he's made it better." Boswellian Olivia Valenza called it her favorite book of 2019.

Hardcover Nonfiction:
1. Milwaukee: A City Built on Water, by John Gurda
2. Educated, by Tara Westover
3. The British Are Coming, by Rick Atkinson
4. Siege: Trump Under Fire, by Michael Wolff
5. Bad Blood, by John Carreyrou
6. An American Summer, by Alex Kotlowitz
7. Working, by Robert A Caro
8. Stay Sexy and Don't Get Murdered, by Karen Kilgariff and Georgia Harstack
9. Becoming, by Michelle Obama
10. Spying on the South, by Tony Horwitz

Father's Day means the big guns of history come out, and this week we're selling a good amount of Rick Atkinson's The British Are Coming: The War for America, Lexington to Princeton, 1775-1777, the first in a trilogy about the American Revolution. From the Winchester Star (syndicated by the Washington Post) - George Will's take on Atkinson's take: "Atkinson is clear: No George Washington, no United States." And here is Scott Simon's NPR interview - thanks Minnesota Public Radio.

Paperback Fiction:
1. Vintage 1954, by Antoine Laurain (read last week's blog post)
2. The Bostonians, by Henry James
3. Washington Black, by Esi Edugyan (In-Store Lit Group Mon Aug 5, 7 pm)
4. Milkman, by Anna Burns (In-Store Lit Group Mon Jul 1, 7 pm)
5. Milwaukee Noir, edited by Tim Hennessy
6. A Gentleman in Moscow, by Amor Towles
7. There There, by Tommy Orange
8. Ohio, by Stephen Markley
9. The Great Believers, by Rebecca Makkai
10. The Overstory, by Richard Powers

Out in paperback this week is Stephen Markley's Ohio, which is one of Boswellian Chris Lee's favorite books of 2018, if not his favorite. He calls it "a portrait of incredible depth that tells the truth of a generation doomed from the start but still swinging for the fences as they run out the strings of their wrecked lives." I still have my copy waiting to be read! From Michael Schaub on the NPR website: "There's a lot going on in Ohio — a sprawling cast of main and supporting characters, and a series of interconnected events that doesn't come together until the book's shocking conclusion. But Markley handles it beautifully; the novel is intricately constructed, with gorgeous, fiery writing that pulls the reader in and never lets go. It's obvious that Markley cares deeply about his characters, even the unsympathetic ones — he treats them with respect, never writing condescendingly about these people whose lives have been battered and bruised by circumstances they don't quite understand."

Paperback Nonfiction:
1. Calypso, by David Sedaris (signed copies available)
2. Great Lakes Water Wars, second edition, by Peter Annin
3. The Mueller Report, by US Department of Justice and Washington Post
4. Black Theology and Black Power, by James H Cone
5. Theft by Finding, by David Sedaris
6. Revenge of the She Punks, by Vivien Goldman
7. The Death and Life of the Great Lakes, by Dan Egan
8. The Untethered Soul, by Michael A Singer
9. Healing the Thryoid with Ayurveda, by Marianne Teitelbaum (event at Boswell Mon Jun 10, 7 pm)
10. The End-of-Your-Life Book Club, by Will Schwalbe

Osher Lifelong Learning at UWM is doing a summer focus on water, which is possibly why we have three books on water and the Great Lakes in our top 10. I'm actually doing a talk on water books on June 24, so I'll have to go beyond things like Great Lakes Water Wars and Milwaukee: A City Built on Water. I warned them that I will doing a lot of cramming novels into the theme - so expect me to discuss We're All in This Together, by Amy Jones, set on Lake Superior. I should have a blog that talks more about this book this week (if I have the writing time and energy).

Revenge of the She Punks is reviewed on the NPR website by Marissa Lorusso: "There's a thread of messiness that runs throughout She-Punks: songs that could easily slip from one of the book's chapter-defining themes to another...But attempting to encompass the entirety of this broad view of punk — and the diversity of women's lives — in one volume is an ambitious mission. And for it to succeed, that messiness is inevitable; it only further underscores Goldman's central argument that women's contributions to punk are too important and varied to fit neatly into a clichéd article or two about 'women who rock'; that womanhood is too complex and rich to be so easily categorized."

Books for Kids:
1. The Astronaut Who Painted the Moon, by Dean Robbins, with illustrations by Sean Rubin
2. The Littlest Mountain, by Barb Rosenstock
3. Margaret and the Moon, by Dean Robbins, with illustrations by Lucy Knisley
4. Two Friends, by Dean Robbins, with illustrations by Sean Qualls
5. Hollow Earth V1, by John Barrowman and Carole E Barrowman
6. Celebrate You, by Sherri Duskey Rinker, with illustrations by An Kang
7. Through the Window, by Barb Rosenstock
8. Just Jaime, by Terri Libenson
9. Nevermoor V1: The Trials of Morrigan Crown, by Jessica Townsend
10. The Complete Cookbook for Young Chefs, by America's Test Kitchen

Terri Libenson, who visited Milwaukee-area schools with Boswell for Positively Izzy, is back with Just Jaime, a graphic novel about two seventh graders, one whom is upset that her best friend has found new friends and interests, and the other who thinks that her friend is "positively babyish." Booklist writes: "this story is simultaneously incredibly original and utterly universal. The emotional roller-coaster of navigating friendships as they change shape, particularly in middle school, is portrayed with admirable sincerity, gentle humor, heartbreaking pain, and of course plenty of texts and emojis."

Featured in the Journal Sentinel this week is Amy Schwabe's feature with children's books focusing on women's suffrage. Featured titles:
--Elizabeth Leads the Way, by Tanya Lee Stone
--Around America to Win the Vote, by Mara Rockliff
--Miss Paul and the President, by Dean Robbins
--Marching with Aunt Susan, by Claire Rudolf Murphy
--A Lady Has the Floor, by Kate Hannigan
--I Could Do That!, Linda Arms White
--Lillian's Right to Vote, by Jonah Winter
--Bold and Brave, by Kristin Gillibrand
--Madam President, Catherine Thimmesh
--She Persisted, by Chelsea Clinton
--Little Dreamers, by Vashti Hamilton
--What is the Women's Rights Movement?, by Deborah Hopkinson

Carole E Barrowman rounds up her favorite books of the season. Check out this list!
--Black Jersey, by Jorge Zepeda Patterson
--Recursion, by Blake Crouch
--The Satapur Moonstone, by Sujata Massey
--One Small Sacrifice, by Hilary Davidson
--Bad Axe Country, by John Galligan
--Speaking of Summer, by Kalisha Buckhannon
--The Need, by Helen Phillips
--The Churchgoer, by Patrick Coleman
--Miami Midnight, by Alex Segura

Mark Athitakis reviews Mary Miller's Biloxi, originally published in USA Today: "Miller, with two story collections and a novel behind her, has crafted a Southern version of ’80s minimalists like Ann Beattie and Raymond Carver. Her prose is clear and resonant as a church bell, and her critique of blinkered men like Louis is natural and collected." Note that Mary Miller will be at Boswell for her mini Live Through This tour of the Upper Midwest on Saturday, July 13, 6 pm.

From the Associated Press is Tracee Herbaugh's Leaving the Witness: Exiting a Religion and Finding a Life, a memoir about growing up as a Jehovah's Witness. On how she and her husband tried to reinvigorate their marriage: "Jehovah’s Witness activities are illegal in China, so the pair had to conduct their missionary work in secret. The couple’s proselytizing most often started as an outside-the-faith relationship and this is where things unfurled."

It's crisp! It's fruity! And what a finish! - the refreshing new novel from Antoine Laurain, Vintage 1954, is in bookstores

I am not going to bury the lede here. Antoine Laurain's newest novel, Vintage 1954, has arrived stateside and it's just gone on sale at Boswell.

Here's my rec: "When a resident of an old apartment building gets locked in the cellar that’s been in his family for generations, he celebrates his rescue by opening a bottle of 1954 Beaujolais Nouveau with his new friends, a ceramics restorer, a bartender, and a tourist from Milwaukee(!). They have no idea that this batch of wine was touched by aliens, except the UFO-obsessed bartender has a clue, because his grandfather disappeared in 1978 after a similar fermented encounter. One sip and the next morning they are back in the Paris of 1954, which is only made a little confusing because Paris was in the middle of celebrating Heritage Days. How the heck are they going to get back? And will they learn a little about themselves in the process? Laurain’s latest features a charming quartet of protagonists, a love story, some philosophical asides, and a number of Easter-egged extras, drawn from 1950s French culture. You just have to accept the offbeat time travel theorizing, but having just read Jack Finney’s Time and Again, that’s just par for the genre. In all, Vintage 1954 is positively grapey, which in my book, means it’s a complete delight and a must-read for fans of The President’s Hat and The Red Notebook."

Now a little backstory. Boswell first fell in love with Antoine Laurain with the publication of The President's Hat in 2013. I was able to read it early when it was nominated for the Indie's Introduce program - it had an enthusiastic recommendation from Betsy Burton at King's English, and I take her recommendations seriously. We wound up having six reads (apologies to our customer who hates when I use 'reads' in this manner) and were even able to host a very delightful event with Laurain.

Then The Red Notebook was released and we sold just as many. I think that even sold better in the market, perhaps because on top of everything else, it works as a romance. Both books were so easy to hand-sell and because the books were both in translation and from an independent press, they would be less likely to explode nationally such that the books were in huge displays in chain stores.

We were thrilled to have Laurain return to Milwaukee for his book French Rhapsody, which like his first two novels published stateside, centered on a lost artifact, not a hat or a notebook this time, but a cassette tape. Another great novel, a little darker, but still completely Laurainy. Once again we worked with our great partners, Alliance Française de Milwaukee. (Love Paris? We're working with AF on our Cara Black on June 12, with celebratory blood orange tartlets from North Shore Boulangerie. Register here).

But it was the research project that Laurain set up while he was traveling that was the most interesting. Laurain asked for help visiting the Harley Davidson archive for another book he was working on. With the help of Liam Callanan, who was working on a Paris book of his own (you know how that story ended!), we visited the archive and Jim Fricke helped Laurain find the information he needed.

The result is that the book features a Milwaukee character, Bob, an engineer at Harley Davidson. What I particularly love about this is that when I visited Paris, some 30 (yeeks) years ago, no Parisian knew what a Milwaukee was. I told them I lived near Chicago, which they did mostly know. But when I told them it was the home of Harley Davidson, that they knew. I even passed a Harley Davidson store.

In between, Gallic has released two of Laurain's earlier novels, The Portrait and Smoking Kills. 

One last note on Bob. It was not referenced in the finished book, but in the galley letter, Laurain noted that Bob was vaguely based on two people, one of whom was our good friend and sales rep, John Mesjak. The other model was me. I am nothing if not honored! But I should probably note that when our fearless foursome goes back in time, there's only one person who doesn't get that Paris of 1954 is not the Paris of today. Can you guess who that is?

This is not the last you'll hear of Vintage 1954. I think it's impossible to be sad after reading this book. And who can't use a little happiness?

Boswell events - Dean Robbins, Lauren Willig, plus what you need to know about the free David Sedaris signing after the sold-out ticketed event on Wednesday

Let's get right to the heart of this week, shall we?

Wednesday, June 5, 7 pm, at Boswell:
Reading Portion Sold Out - David Sedaris, author of Calypso

David Sedaris is coming to Boswell. David Sedaris's tickets for the reading portion sold out in the week. Folks who have tickets also get to be first online. Is there an advance waiting list? No, but sometimes seats open up, due to cancellation. Attendees had the ability to cancel through Tuesday. Tickets are $19.00 and include a paperback of Calypso. The ticket link is sedarismke19.bpt.me. Limited to two tickets to order. ID required at check-in.

After Sedaris’s talk (around 8:30 pm), Boswell will open again to the public for a free and open-to-all signing. Anyone who would like to meet Sedaris, get a book signed, or just say hi is welcome to do so free of charge. We will stay open as long as it takes to get through the signing line. Yes, long into the night! Sedaris spends quality time with every attendee who waits in line.

You'll have to wait whenever you arrive, but we can pretty much guarantee he'll still be signing at 9 pm. You can call us (414) 332-1181 and ask how long the line is.

Can you bring books from home to be signed? Yes. Can you bring Sedaris a hand-made card? Absolutely? That said, Mr. Sedaris does not pose for photos and there are no photos or videos allowed at his events. Please use your inner camera for this event - it's called a memory.

Tuesday, June 4, 6:30 pm, at Boswell:
Dean Robbins, author of The Astronaut Who Painted the Moon: The True Story of Alan Bean

Madison-based childrens book author Dean Robbins comes to Boswell to take a journey to the moon with Alan Bean, the fourth astronaut to walk on the lunar surface and the only one to paint its beauty firsthand. Kids are welcome at this event, but the talk is targeted to adults - educators and parents and science geeks and Dean Robbins fans.

As a boy, Alan wanted to fly planes. As a young navy pilot, Alan wished he could paint the view from the cockpit. So he took an art class to learn patterns and forms. But no class could prepare him for the beauty of the lunar surface some 240,000 miles from Earth. In 1969, Alan became the fourth man and first artist on the moon. He took dozens of pictures, but none compared to what he saw through his artistic eyes. Alan's paintings allowed humanity to experience what it truly felt like to walk on the moon.

Robbins's tale of this extraordinary astronaut is masterful with illustrations that are whimsical and unexpected. With back matter that includes photos of the NASA mission, images of Alan's paintings, and a timeline of lunar space travel, this is one adventure readers won't want to miss.

Thursday, June 6, 7 pm reception, 7:30 talk, at Lynden Sculpture Garden, 2145 W Brown Deer Rd:
Lauren Willig, author of The Summer Country

Milwaukee Reads presents the Lynden Sculpture Garden's Women's Speaker Series, featuring Lauren Willig and her sweeping, dramatic Victorian epic of lost love, lies, jealousy, and rebellion set in colonial Barbados. Tickets cost $31, $26 for Lynden members, and include an autographed copy of The Summer Country, light refreshments, and admission to the sculpture garden - come early and stroll the grounds. Tickets are available online, at lyndensculpturegarden.org/laurenwillig or by phone, at (414) 446-8794. Online registration usually closes out the day before the event.

In 1854, Emily Dawson and her cousin arrive on the island of Barbados in the British West Indies, he to secure contracts for the family shipping company and she to take possession of Peverills, the plantation she unexpectedly inherited from their late grandfather. Publishers Weekly says, "The physical and emotional passions of the characters keep the stakes high and the pages turning, making this a powerful exploration of slavery and reformation on Barbados."

Love Lauren Willig? You'll also want to register for Beatriz Williams's Lynden appearance on July 14. Info at lyndensculpturegarden.org/beatrizwilliams

sneak peek at next week -
Monday, June 10, 7 pm, at Boswell:
Marianne Teitelbaum, author of Healing the Thyroid with Ayurveda: Natural Treatments for Hashimoto's, Hypothyroidism, and Hyperthyroidism

Marianne Teitelbaum, recipient of the Prana Ayushudi Award, addresses thyroid disease from the perspective of the Ayurvedic tradition. Cosponsored by Bodhi Ayurveda.

In a comprehensive guide for practitioners and those concerned with thyroid health, Teitelbaum integrates the ancient medicine of Ayurveda with modern scientific findings. Based on the treatment of thousands of patients, Teitelbaum shares success stories of thyroid healing and the scientific studies that support the author’s Ayurvedic thyroid protocols, showing that optimum thyroid health as well as overall health are within everyone’s reach.

Revealing how the thyroid is the victim of many factors that conspire to create ill health, Teitelbaum focuses not only on treating thyroid problems and symptoms but also on diagnosing them at their earliest, most reversible stages. She outlines the basic principles of Ayurveda, including pulse diagnosis, a key tool for early detection, and explains the successful treatment protocols she has developed over more than 30 years of Ayurvedic practice.

More upcoming events on our upcoming events page

Photo credits:
--Lauren Willig - Amanda Suanne

Boswell bestsellers, week ending June 1, 2019

Sorry friends. I'm having trouble uploading images to the blog. Hope to add them later.

Hardcover Fiction:
1. Beneath the Flames, by Gregory Lee Renz (also paperback)
2. If She Wakes, by Michael Koryta
3. The Sentence Is Death V2, by Anthony Horowitz
4. Resistance Women, by Jennifer Chiaverni
5. Cara Mori, by Thomas Harris
6. Normal People, by Sally Rooney
7. The Flight Portfolio, by Julie Orringer
8. The Guest Book, by Sarah Blake
9. The Farm, by Joanne Ramos
10. Ask Again, Yes, by Joanne Ramos

New this week is the second installment featuring author/mystery solver Anthony Horowitz, The Sentence Is Death. The book is an Indie Next Pick and has also received raves from the trades, with Booklist notes: "the overall voice of the series is fresh and original, Horowitz writing with the effortless élan that distinguishes all his work."

Hardcover Nonfiction:
1. A Good American Family, by David Maraniss
2. Tribe, by Sebastian Junger
3. Under Pressure, by Lisa Damour
4. Educated, by Tara Westover
5. Braving the Wilderness, by Brené Brown
6. Letters to My Palestinian Neighbor, by Yossi Klein Halevi
7. Fraternity, by Alexandra Robbins
8. Spying on the South, by Tony Horwitz
9. The Second Mountain, by David Brooks
10. Stay Sexy and Don't Get Murdered, by Karen Gilgariff and Georgia Hardstark

Several Boswellians are fans of the comedy true crime podcast My Favorite Murder so they've been gung ho on Stay Sexy and Don't Get Murdered: The Definitive How-To Guide. Barbara VanDenburgh writes in USA Today: "It feels less like reading a book and more like hanging out with your cool aunts, who will slip you a wine cooler or two and listen without judgment while you spill your guts."

Paperback Fiction:
1. Beneath the Flames, by Gregory Lee Renz
2. A Gentleman in Moscow, by Amor Towles
3. The Overstory, by Richard Powers
4. There There, by Tommy Orange
5. Milwaukee Noir, edited by Tim Hennessy
6. For Whom the Bell Tolls, by Ernest Hemingway
7. The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, by Kim Michele Richardson
8. Vintage 1954, by Antoine Laurain
9. Washington Black, by Esi Edugyan
10. Paris by the Book, by Liam Callanan

It's here! Vintage 1954 is the new novel from Antoine Laurain and I love it. Hope to have a full blog post on this in the next week or two. From Eric Patterson in Foreword Reviews: "The book’s descriptions are a must for any Francophile, who will be able to meet Dali, Edith Piaf, Audrey Hepburn, and other luminaries in these pages. A character’s walk through the legendary market of Les Halles at a time when it was in its full glory, all on the way to dinner at Au Veau qui Tete: such scenes are written beautifully, entering fully into the busyness of their settings."

Paperback Nonfiction:
1. Can Francis Change the Church?, by Thomas Sweetser
2. When Pride Still Mattered, by David Maraniss
3. The Mueller Report, by US Department of Justice (Melville House)
4. The Mueller Report, by US Department of Justice and Washington Post (Scribner)
5. Black Theology and Black Power, by James H Cone
6. How to Change Your Mind, by Michael Pollan
7. Writing Fiction, 10th edition, by Janet Burroway (event at Boswell Wed June 19, 7 pm)
8. The Death and Life of the Great Lakes, by Dan Egan
9. At the Entrance to the Garden of Eden, by Yossi Klein Halevi
10. Healing the Thyroid with Ayurveda, by Marianne Teitelbaum (event at Boswell Mon June 10, 7 pm)

We're celebrating the release of the 10th edition of Writing Fiction with a conversation with Janet Burroway and Kim Suhr.  Here's a taste of what you might hear in this interview by Julianne Hill in TriQuarterly for an older edition. On what writer Burroway has learned the most from: "George Eliot, above all. I’ve learned that depth of emotion can come out of minute observation and that repetition and motif are hugely satisfying to the reader."

Books for Kids:
1. The Place for Pluto, by Stef Wade, with illustrations by Melanie Demmer
2. The Land of Permanent Goodbyes, by Atia Abawi
3. Darius the Great Is Not Okay, by Adib Khorram
4. An Abundance of Katherines, by John Green
5. On the Come Up, by Angie Thomas
6. The Runaways, by Ulf Stark, with illustrations by Kitty Crowther
7. Endling the First V2, by Katherine Applegate
8. The Great Milwaukee Hamburger War, by Paul Bialas
9. A Beautiful Day in the Neighborhood, by Fred Rogers, edited by Luke Flowers
10. Oh, the Places You'll Go, by Dr Seuss

From Gecko Press comes The Runaways, a picture book from Sweden about a grandfather who wants to leave the hospital and escapes with the help of his grandson Gottfried. Oddly enough, this is also one of the plotlines of the novel I am currently reading, We're All in This Together. Of the kids book, Kirkus Reviews offers this praise in its starred review: "A touching, realistic, gently humorous story of how a sensitive boy copes with his treasured grandfather's decline." Of the art, Booklist observes that "expressive full-page illustrations add color to the pages while supporting the story's tone."

The Journal Sentinel book page features these reviews.

Two girls go missing in in Siberia in Disappearing Earth the "splendidly imagined" (Simon Winchester) thriller from Julia Phillips. Barbara VanDenburgh of the Arizona Republic's take: "It has the makings of a lurid thriller, but first-time novelist Julia Phillips (who has long worked as a journalist, her work appearing in many publications, including the Moscow Times) does something more sophisticated than that and turns her unshakable debut into a meditation on the lives of women in a far-flung corner of the world, spanning generations and ethnicities, in the months that follow the disappearance."

Todd Goldberg from USA Today reviews The Obsoletes, a novel from Simeon Mills. He writes: "Though The Obsoletes ends up feeling like a book made of too many parts that don’t fit firmly together, there is something inherently charming about the effort. Mills clearly loves this world he’s created, and if his plot doesn’t quite sustain close examination, the author’s big imagination certainly does."

Ann Levin of The Associated Press writes about Gabriel Garcia Marquez's posthumous essay collection, in which she notes that the author always considered himself a journalist. Levin continues: "That may well be the case. What’s also true is that the 50 pieces in The Scandal of the Century and Other Writings, selected by Cristobal Pera, who helped edit García Márquez’s memoirs, and with an introduction by journalist Jon Lee Anderson, are more than just a little literary."

The bookseller ramble - Ask Again, Yes, from Mary Beth Keane

Title/Author: Ask Again, Yes, by Mary Beth Keane

Previous books: The Walking People and Fever, both novels. Fever is based on the life of Typhoid Mary. Both books draw on Irish American culture.

The setup: Two New York City cops, one just over from Ireland, the other second generation, meet on the job and befriend each other. They wind up becoming neighbors in Gillam, a suburb that I think is in Rockland County. If I had taken better notes, I might know better. Something bad happens that drives the familes apart, but it can't keep away the next generation, who are doomed to inherit the burdens of addiction and mental illness.

Did I like it?: Yes, and you can ask again. After all, I'm writing this really long blog post, and we're not even hosting the author. Here are the stores on the tour.

Who would read this book: Of course, the answer that every writer and publisher wants to hear is, "Who wouldn't?" But there are a few key names that come up, most notably J. Courtney Sullivan and Matthew Thomas, whose recent books, Saints for All Occasions and We Are Not Ourselves, would be great matches (and I read them both, so I'm not fudging). Both gave quotes for this book too. Thematically, you can certainly add Alice McDermott and Colm Tóibín, though to me, they are a bit different stylistically.

How the book and I collided: My rule of thumb is that when I go to a publisher dinner with authors, it's my responsibility to read one of the books beforehand. For the life of me, I do not know how other attendees seem to have read all of them. Several options run through my head - they are incredibly fast, they don't actually work at a job, they are either fibbing or doing that thing where you say "I read it," but you really are saying "I read 50 pages."

I started reading a couple of other books for the Winter Institute Dinner in Albuquerque, but I didn't connect with either of them. So I contacted Wendy at Simon and Schuster and asked her what I should do. She told me to read Ask Again, Yes. She's a long-time bookseller and has a good handle on matching people and books.

Was anybody impressed that I read the book?: Not really. I wound up seemingly talking to everyone but Keane at the dinner. I really liked all my dining companions, one so much that I went back and read her book, even though it was out of my comfort zone. After the dinner, I got her to sign my book and moved on. I could tell she had just interacted with forty some booksellers, and unless she's the most extroverty of extroverted writers, that was probably enough for the day.

How have I done with hand-selling it so far?: It's only been out a day! In advance, I set my sites on getting early reads from two authors. The first (recommended via correspondence) always has a lot on her plate, but at least one of the quotes was from someone she knows and admires. That can sometimes help. The other author was visiting and we were chatting about books, and she had read all my comparison titles. And then she realized she already had a copy. I don't know how that turned out, but I really feel like I might have won her over. In my brain, I'm batting .500. In reality, TBD.

What did I learn from the acknowledgments?: What, you don't read the acknowledgments? I now get irritated if they are missing from a book. I'd like to know the editor, the agent, the writing teachers, the friends, and who gets thanked in the family. Was a bookseller thanked? Now that this has happened to me a couple of times, I know this is possible, and I sort of like it when our profession gets a shout out. Chris Calhoun was the agent, Nan Graham and Kara Watson were the editors (the acquirer and the shepherder, so to speak). Eleanor Henderson gave her quotes for both Ask Again, Yes and Fever and is also thanked. If they are not best friends, they should be!

Cover treatment: I can't help but think that the art director was hoping for a Little Fires Everywhere connection. Not just because of the imagery of suburban houses, but also with the very similar blue-green color story. That story looms large for me because on the day of our Celeste Ng event, Olivia noted that I had dressed to match the book.

What's the best quote?: Louis Erdrich clearly gets top billing. "Mary Beth Keane takes on one of the most difficult problems in fiction – how to write about human decency. In Ask Again, Yes, Keane makes a compelling case for compassion over blame, understanding over grudge, and the resilience of hearts that can accept the contradictions of love."


Would I read another book by Keane: Yes, I would. I would also read this book again if she were visiting and I was doing the conversation. Sometimes I change the facts in my head in novels, and it takes another read to sort that out.

Our best chance for the author to come to Milwaukee: Our friends at the Irish Fest Literary Tent should invite Keane. They do ask you to hang out there a long time, but you do sell a lot of books, or so I'm told. We just hosted Carl Baehr for his book, From the Emerald Isle to the Cream City: A History of the Irish in Milwaukee: A History of the Irish in Milwaukee.

Boswell bestsellers, week ending May 25, 2019

Boswell bestsellers, week ending May 25, 2019

Hardcover Fiction:
1. Resistance Women, by Jennifer Chiaverini
2. Where the Crawdads Sing, by Delia Owens
3. The Satapur Moonstone V2, by Sujata Massey
4. The Guest Book, by Sarah Blake
5. Courting Mr. Lincoln, by Louis Bayard
6. The Stone Circle V11, by Ruth Galloway
7. Machines Like Me, by Ian McEwan
8. Disappearing Earth, by Julia Phillips
9. Normal People, by Sally Rooney
10. Orange World and Other Stories, by Karen Russell

Who remembers Sarah Blake's last-minute visit to Boswell for The Postmistress? Though I don't have every event scenario memorized, this sticks out because we picked up the event when Borders announced the closing. It turns out there were already three other book events going on in town. The good news is that we got some extra press and had a very nice turnout. Her latest, The Guest Book, is a historical saga centered in Maine that was the #1 Indie Next Pick for May. Booklist called it "brilliant and ravishing;" Library Journal compared it to The Winds of War, which I think would have been considered an obscure reference if Wouk had not just passed away. But prior to his passing, did The Winds of War still have significant library circulation that you would comp it?

Hardcover Nonfiction:
1. Tribe, by Sebastian Junger (paperback moved to 2020)
2. The Hot Young Widows Club, by Nora McInerny
3. The Brisket Chronicles, by Steven Raichlen (see below)
4. Special Brew, by Tom Haudricourt
5. Bad Choices, by Ali Almossawi
6. No Happy Endings, by Nora McInerny
7. Educated, by Tara Westover
8. Furious Hours, by Casey Cep
9. The Pioneers, by David McCullough
10. Howard Stern Comes Again, by Howard Stern

Talk about a concept! As soon as Knopf introduced Casey Cep at our Winter Institute bookseller conference, to talk about Furious Hours: Murder, Fraud, and the Last Trial of Harper Lee, it had to be a hit if it was as well done and promised. And it is - Michael Lewis wrote in The New York Times Book Review: "She’s written the true-crime story that Harper Lee never figured out how to write." I so wanted to read it before publication, but this Boswell stuff keeps getting in the way, and I only say that because a legendary bookseller just stopped by the store this morning, and the only book-related question she and her husband had for me was whether Nick Petrie was as wild as Peter Ash in his novels. Did I mention Petrie is in conversation with Michael Koryta on Tuesday, May 28, 7 pm?

Paperback Fiction:
1. Milwaukee Noir, edited by Tim Hennessy
2. There There, by Tommy Orange
3. The Book Woman of Troublesome Creek, by Kim Michele Richardson
4. The Seven and a Half Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle, by Stuart Turton
5. The Widows of Malabar Hill V1, by Sujata Massey
6. The Overstory, by Richard Powers
7. Milkman, by Anna Burns
8. Paris by the Book, by Liam Callanan
9. Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett
10. American Gods, by Neil Gaiman

Sourcebooks is in the news, and not just because they have two books in this week's top five paperback fiction. Penguin Random House bought 45% of the company, keeping control with CEO Dominique Raccah. Stuart Turton's The Seven and a Half Deaths of Evelyn Hardcastle has been one of their many successes - our Books and Beer Book Club is discussing it on Monday, June 17, 7 pm, at Downer's Cafe Hollander. Lots of bookseller and fellow author love on this one - A.J. Finn called it "Agatha Christie meets Groundhog Day." But it's more than smart escapism - Turton's book won the Cost First Novel Prize. Last year's winner was Eleanor Oliphant Is Completely Fine. The Costa is considered the more populist equivalent of the Booker Prize, but unlike that prize, Americans still can't win a Costa, even though their sponsor is now owned by Coca Cola.

Paperback Nonfiction:
1. The Brisket Chronicles, by Steven Raichlen
2. Moving Mountains Every Day, by Dan Steininger
3. Crash, by Rich Redmond
4. The Future Is History, by Masha Gessen
5. The Fire Next Time, by James Baldwin
6. It's Okay to Laugh, by Nora McInerny
7. How to Change Your Mind, by Michael Pollan
8. Master of the Grill, by America's Test Kitchen
9. The Barbecue Bible, by Steven Raichlen
10. The Mueller Report, by the U.S. Department of Justice and The Washington Post 

Several appearances on the lists for both Steven Raichlen and Nora McInerny this week. McInerny appeared at Boswell for The Hot Young Widows Club, but it was only several months since her last book, No Happy Endings. While I am not one to judge whether someone or not is hot (I think in today's world, you get to decide your own hotness), but their were a lot of widows in the audience, and even a widower. We have signed copies of Raichlen's The Brisket Chronicles.

Books for Kids:
1. Sport: Ship Dog of the Great Lakes, by Pamela Cameron, with illustrations by Renée Graef
2. City of Ember V1, by Jeanne Duprau
3. The Land of Permanent Goodbyes, by Atia Abawi
4. The Fourteenth Goldfish V1, by Jennifer L. Holm
5. The Story of Civil Rights Hero John Lewis, by Jim Haskins, with illustrations by Aaron Boyd
6. Because of Mr. Terupt, by Rob Buyea
7. The Storm Runner V1, by J.C. Cervantes
8. The Sword of Summer: Magnus Chase V1, by Rick Riordan
9. Aru Shah and the End of Time V1, by Roshani Chakshi
10. Calling the Water Drum, by Latish Redding, with illustrations by Aaron Boyd

We had some classroom purchases this week. As you can see, the new Rick Riordan Presents imprint has been quite popular, with new series from J.C. Cervantes and Roshani Chakshi. In The Storm Runner, Zane, who lives near a live volcano in New Mexico, accidentally unleashing a Mayan God. And then the new girl at school turns out to be a shape shifter. In Aru Shah and the End of Time, young Shah, whose mom does archeological digs for the Museum of Ancient Indian Art and Culture, unwittingly frees a demon from the Lamp of Bharata. As the publisher notes, the only way to stop the demon is to find the reincarnations of the five legendary Pandava brothers, protagonists of the Hindu epic poem, the Mahabharata.

Over at the Journal Sentinel, Barbara VanDenburgh of the Arizona Republic (USA Today network) reviews The Farm, the new novel from Joanne Ramos (signed copies still available) about a resort that hosts women with wombs for hire. VanDenburgh writes: "What’s so striking about The Farm isn’t that it imagines a frightening dystopia. This isn’t a hundred years in the future, it’s next week. This is reality, nudged just a touch to its logical extreme. Its very plausibility is a warning shot." It gets worse - Ramos was at an event when someone came up to her and thought the book's premise was a great idea for a business.

Ragan Clark of the Associated Press reviews Ani Difranco's memoir, No Walls and the Recurring Dream: "No Walls and the Recurring Dream is unapologetic, steadfast and vulnerable. It’s as if DiFranco has invited you into the living room of her New Orleans home to have a long discussion about how she got to where she is, from creating her first record to meeting Prince and recording in his home. I still think of her as a Buffalonian. She's at the Pabst Theater on June 5.

And here's a lovely profile of Worzalla Publishing, who prints the Wimpy Kid series, and most recently, Diary of an Awesome Friendly Kid: Rowley Jefferson's Journal. Caitlin Shuda of The Stevens Point Journal writes: "Worzalla is very familiar with Kinney and his books. The company has published every domestic copy of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid book since the first batch of 25,000 copies in 2007. Last year, Kinney made a special stop at the Stevens Point plant to celebrate the 200 millionth copy of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series." Whenever they finish the first printing, the plant has a pizza party.

Michael Koryta, what are you doing to me? - a little more about his new novel, If She Wakes

To be clear, sometimes I think my staff recommendations, should be color coded, like emails. If you liked my recommendation for Park Avenue Woman, I'm hoping you don't think that means you will automatically like There There. I consider myself a reader of wide-ranging tastes, and judge books based on how what I think the author was trying to write. So today I'm writing about a thriller, but even then, that doesn't tell everything. I think the scare quotient is higher for thrillers than mysteries, and if you're not in noir territory, so is the violence. But a lot of what I'd call thrillers (not in series, you know who the villain is, it's more about the chase than the puzzle) can be downright civilized, with a relatively low body count, let alone splatter count.

Michael Koryta's just-out If She Wakes is, warning to those who just took my advice to read Sujata Massey, high on the body count. It's not necessarily that graphic, but it will certainly have readers questioning their own safety, including people I know, because Tara Beckley, the person at the center of the story, is what we call a media escort. Beckley is bringing a speaker to a talk at a college in rural Maine. After the dinner (there's often a dinner, which is why a lot of our authors show up just before start time), Amandi Oltamu asks Tara to take him on a detour, and at a not-particularly-picturesque bridge, asks her to stop the car and take some photos.

Things go downhill from there. There's a terrible accident. Beckley is in a coma. An insurance claims adjuster named Abby Kaplan is called in - is Hammel College to blame? Well, that's the tip of the iceberg, because pretty soon Kaplan knows too much and the chase is on to find the phone that holds the secret that Oltamu stashed away.

One thing that's very different for me about reading these kinds of thrillers is the way I go about the reading process. When I read a family drama, or a comedy, or a historical, or even a more traditional mystery, I usually stop reading every 50 pages or so to get a drink, load the dishwasher, or check my phone. Then there comes a certain point, for usually the last 100-150 pages, where I read the book straight through. But for this sort of thriller (how do you distinguish a more pulse-pounding, threat-of-violence-lurks story from the others?), I am constantly stopping, pushing the book away, taking a walk to clear my head, and then heading back for another 10-20 pages. Even moreso as the book comes to a climax. Is that common? Is that why so many books of this type have short chapters?

Like many a mystery-thriller, the lead, and I guess Abby the insurance adjuster is the lead, there's a backstory in there. I feel like this is particularly important in psychological suspense, where there's always the question, "What is this quasi-protagonist running away from?" In this case, Kaplan was a race car driver, who had an unfortunate accident that led to the death of her boyfriend, an up-and-coming actor. Yes, she was that good a driver that she ran with celebrities. She's suppressed that drive, such that at one point, she takes a long train ride into Boston for a hospital visit - she's got great reasons not to drive. Great ones. But those driving instincts are still there and they will be at the heart of some chase scenes. And its really her knowledge of the road that first unlocks the cover up.

Needless to say, there's a terrible conspiracy going on. Because all the killers are at least one step removed, we don't get that much more than a short recap of the why. I refer back to the beginning of the book where Tara Beckley wonders what exactly her charge does, anyway? Something about batteries.

One other thing of note about If She Wakes is the sociopath assassin. I can't exactly call him the villain because there are several villains, but he certainly is the prime adversary (goes by Dax), and I'm not giving much away as you'll figure this out pretty quickly. He's very young - in fact, I'd call this my first encounter with a millennial sociopath assassin. He's got all the tropes of that generation on top of his killer instincts. And he's got those killer instincts from being raised by his dad and uncle, also assassins. It's a case where nature and nurture work together.

It seems like Michael Koryta sells production rights on just about every novel. Here's The Prophet, here's Cypress House, her's So Cold the River. Most recently, there's been a flurry of news about Those Who Wish Me Dead with Angelina Jolie being attached.  I wouldn't be surprised if a deal is in the works for his latest. He'll likely hint at one when he visits Boswell on May 28*, when he'll talk to fellow pulse-pounder, Nick Petrie.

--Marilyn Stasio's review of If She Wakes in The New York Times Book Review
--Starred Kirkus - Michael Koryta has never been better
--Oline Cogdill's Associated Press review in Chicago Daily Herald - Dax is the son of the villain in Those Who Wish Me Dead
--Colette Bancroft in The Tampa Bay Times, who notes that this "inventive" new thriller "accelerates like one of Abby's beloved race cars"

Photo credit for Michael Koryta is Jonathan Mehring.

*May 28, 2019, to be exact, at 7 pm. Hope to see you at Boswell! More on our upcoming event page.

Retail report from Taiwan

As readers of the blog know, I love visiting bookstores and getting ideas from other booksellers. Sometimes, however, inspiration can travel beyond the bookstore, and even beyond the border, as this note from my sister Claudia reveals. She was recently in Taiwan for a conference and visited her long-time friends. When she was a grad student in Chinese, you weren't able to go to mainland China for study.

"Yesterday I spent the evening with my old friends from Taiwan, Tsungling and Hsinming, along with their daughter. When I had visited two years ago, Hsinming was following his dream and had opened a small record store in Keelong, a port city north of Taipei. It didn't work out, and he opened a small bakery in Taipei with some friends. As he has developed the business, he has been taking inspiration from you. He told me he reads your bookstore newsletter regularly.

"The bakery has begun hosting community events such as a tea tasting (he and Tsungling know a lot about Chinese tea) and music events featuring seniors who revive traditional music. Recently they've re-opened the record store within the bakery. He seems really happy with the direction things have moved in.

"The last time I saw the daughter she was nine years old and spent the whole day giving me a detailed plot summary of Frozen. Now she is a young lady, and we talked about popular music. She knows the K-pop groups and I showed her videos of Beyoncé** and some other American singers. Hsinming confirmed that they were important American pop singers, and she was dutifully impressed."

If I were writing a business book (or perhaps I have caught business inspiration fever after selling books for Daniel Steininger's Moving Mountains Every Day this week*), my take-away from this would be that inspiration is everywhere. Hsinming, hope to someday visit you in Taiwan!

*Hey, you know I have to link to at least one book.

**Shout out to Teasha. Don't say I never mention Beyoncé in this blog.