Boswell bestsellers for the week ending October 30, 2021

Boswell bestsellers for the week ending October 30, 2021

Hardcover Fiction:
1. The Lincoln Highway, by Amor Towles
2. Harlem Shuffle, by Colson Whitehead
3. Cloud Cuckoo Land, by Anthony Doerr
4. State of Terror, by Hilary Clinton and Louise Penny
5. An Elderly Lady Must Not Be Crossed, by Helene Tursten
6. Crossroads, by Jonathan Franzen
7. Beautiful World, Where Are You?, by Sally Rooney
8. Oh, William!, by Elizabeth Strout
9. Under the Whispering Door, by TJ Klune
10. The Judge's List, by John Grisham

Somebody will have to explain to me how we sold almost as many copies of Helene Tursten's An Elderly Lady Must Not Be Crossed in the first week as we did of An Elderly Lady Is Up to No Good for the three year life of the book. From the starred Booklist: "Tursten effectively juxtaposes a cozy, Agatha Christie-like tone against the often surprisingly dark nature of Maud's recollections, which are rife with clever satirical jabs and delicious ironies. This absorbing dive into the mind of a ruthless pragmatist posing as a Swedish Miss Marple will please psychological-thriller fans, once they realize that Maud isn't nearly as cozy as she looks."

Hardcover Nonfiction:
1. Hip Hop and Other Things, by Shea Serrano
2. Peril, by Bob Woodward, and Robert Costa
3. Giannis, by Mirin Fader
4. Going There, by Katie Couric
5. Squirrel Hill, by Mark Oppenheimer (Register for November 4 event here)
6. The Book of Hope, by Jane Goodall and Douglas Abrams
7. A Confederacy of Dumptys, by John Lithgow
8. Renegades, by Barack Obama and Bruce Springsteen
9. Gastro Obscura, by Cecily Wong and Dylan Thuras (Register for November 15 event here)
10. Cooking at Home, by David Chang

I listened to Shea Serrano on NPR's It's Been a Minute with Sam Sanders where he discussed things like the 1995 Source Music Award, which likely prefigured the deadly shootings of Tupac Shakur and Biggie Smalls over the next year, and Missy Elliott's iconic black blow-up vinyl suit. Hip Hop (and Other Things) is #1 on our list this week and it will likely follow Serrano's Basketball (and Other Things) and Movies (and Other Things) to the top of national charts too. Kirkus noted: "This quirky, wide-ranging collection of essays, paired with gorgeous art, is a well-informed love letter to hip-hop."

Paperback Fiction: 

1. Dune, by Frank Herbert
2. Death at Greenway, by Lori Rader-Day
3. Piranesi, by Susanna Clark
4. Son of Good Fortune, by Lysley Tenorio
5. Monstress, by Lysley Tenorio
6. Anxious People, by Fredrik Backman
7. The Glass Hotel, by Emily St John Mandel
8. Dune Messiah, by Frank Herbert
9. The Night Watchman, by Louise Erdrich
10. The Secret of Snow, by Viola Shipman

The UWM Creative Writing Program sponsored an in-person appearance with Lysley Tenorio, author of Monstress (for which he visited Boswell with Michael Lowenthal) and his new-in-paperback novel The Son of Good Fortune. From Terry Hong in The Christian Science Monitor: "A fierce, revelatory literary experience...Tenorio has written a resonant story about what one family is willing to do to protect the child. It’s seamlessly interwoven with cogent explorations of hybrid identity, racism, immigration history, shifting familial bonds, parental sacrifice, socioeconomic disparity, and even alternative social models."

Paperback Nonfiction:
1. Troubled Water, by Seth M Siegel
2. Sapiens: A Graphic History, by Yuval Noah Harari
3. Milwaukee River Greenway, by Eddee Daniel
4. Talking to Strangers, by Malcolm Gladwell
5. Outside the Box Cancer Therapies, by Mark Stengler
6. On Story Parkway, by Jim Cryns
7. Best Hikes Milwaukee, by Kevin Revolinski
8. Voices of Milwaukee Bronzeville, by Sandra E Jones (Register for in-person November 18 event here or register for Zoom broadcast here)
9. The Book of Chakras, by Ambika Wauters
10. The Hidden History of Milwaukee, by Robert Tanzilo

There just doesn't seem to be any narrative nonfiction or memoirs catching folks fancy in paperback of late. We've got six regional titles on this list this week. Kevin Revolinski has a relatively new (2021) updated version of Best Easy Day Hikes Milwaukee, but the book that made our list is the 2019 Best Hikes Milwaukee, which I guess aren't necessarily easy!

Books for Kids:
1. Chez Bob, by Bob Shea
2. Mr. Wolf's Class, by Aron Nels Steinke
3. Anne of Green Gables, by LM Montgomery
4. Big Shot V16, by Jeff Kinney
5. Besties, by Kayla Miller and Jeffrey Canino, with illustrations by Kristina Luu
6. Lulu and Rocky in Milwaukee, by Barbara Joosse, with illustrations by Renée Graef
7. The Beatryce Prophecy, by Kate DiCamillo, with illustrations by Sophie Blackall
8. Daughter of the Deep, by Rick Riordan
9. A House, by Kevin Henkes
10. Norman Didn't Do It, by Ryan T Higgins

The nice thing about kids picture books is that I can honestly say I've read them. Yes, I've all but memorized, Chez Bob, A House, and Norman Didn't Do It, three of our booksellers' favorites for this fall, and then of course there is Lulu and Rocky in Milwaukee, whose 2021 sales have more than doubled 2020 - it's a popular book for visitors! The Bulletin for the Center on Children's* Books on Norman Didn't Do It: "Wide-eyed, prickly-tailed Norman carries a frantic energy, resembling a manic preschooler with quills, and Higgins nails the expressions and body language as Norman launches himself and his big feelings through the pages. Bold lines and saturated colors make even the more complicated scenes storytime ready, and the tale could easily lend itself to some lively (one-person) readers theater."

Over at the Journal Sentinel, Jim Higgins reviews Mark Oppenheimer's Squirrel Hill: The Tree of Life Synagogue Shooting and the Soul of a Neighborhood: A taste: "While in many other cities Jews have dispersed to the suburbs, that's not so true in Pittsburgh, where about half of the area's Jews live in either Squirrel Hill or adjacent neighborhoods. While Squirrel Hill has multiple synagogues, the shooter targeted this building because Dor Hadash, the Reconstructionist group, had been involved in the National Refugee Shabbat." Higgins looks at everything from the bargain to value healing over politics, to the comparative lack of attention given to Black victims, especially when their deaths are spread out over time. As noted above, we are hosting Mark Oppenheimer on Zoom, in conversation with Rachel N Baum. Cosponsored by the UWM Sam and Helen Stahl Center for Jewish Studies and the Harry and the Rose Samson Family Jewish Community Center.

*I'm not a fan of the apostrophe here. It's not indicated ownership here and it's not a contraction. It means books for children. To my thinking, the usage should be child or kid books, much like we say adult books, not adults' books. We could spend hours on this. I know I'm not going to change the world, but I can leave out the apostrophe when it's not in a title, even though Word gets mad at me.

Boswell bestsellers for the week ending October 23, 2021

Here's what's selling at Boswell this week.

Hardcover Fiction:
1. The Lincoln Highway, by Amor Towles
2. State of Terror, by Hilary Clinton and Louise Penny
3. Cloud Cuckoo Land, by Anthony Doerr
4. Shoulder Season, by Elizabeth Strout
5. Truth of the Divine V2, by Lindsay Ellis
6. Oh William, by Elizabeth Strout
7. Bewilderment, by Richard Powers
8. The Invisible Life of Addie Larue (regular and deluxe), by VE Schwab
9. The Judge's List, by John Grisham
10. Harlem Shuffle, by Colson Whitehead

Beating Oh William! out by price point (that's how I break ties), Truth of the Divine comes in as our top debut. SF and fantasy titles tend to front load sales, so I expect to sell more of Elizabeth Strout next week than of Lindsay Ellis, but we'll see. Ellis's is the sequel to Axiom's End in the Noumenta series. Winning raves from John Scalzi, Hank Green, and just-returned-to-Boswell Ogi Ubiparipovic. Her newest has a starred Publishers Weekly review: "Ellis draws skillful parallels between her science-fictional politics and real world issues, gracefully navigating the difficult topics of discrimination, violent extremism, mental health, and addiction. This thought-provoking novel will linger long in readers’ minds."

Hardcover Nonfiction:
1. Play Nice but Win, by Michael Dell
2. Giannis, by Mirin Fader
3. The Book of Hope, by Jane Goodall and Douglas Abrams
4. Peril, by Bob Woodward and Robert Costa
5. The Storyteller, by Dave Grohl (last week's NYT #1)
6. Baking with Dorie, by Dorie Greenspan
7. Taste, by Stanley Tucci
8. Where the Deer and the Antelope Play, by Nick Offerman
9. Midnight in Washington, by Adam Schiff
10. This is Ear Hustle, by Nigel Poor and Earlonne Woods

We've already got our best books of 2021 in order and one of Tim's top five makes our top 10 for the week. The Book of Hope: A Survival Guide for Trying Times, from Jane Goodall and Douglas Abrams. From the starred Booklist review: "Goodall, world-renowned naturalist, humanist, and environmental advocate, is hope incarnate. Her podcast is even titled Hopecast. Goodall elucidates her commitment to hope in conversation with Douglas Abrams in this companion volume to The Book of Joy (2016) in which Abrams spoke with His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Archbishop Desmond Tutu."

Paperback Fiction:
1. Dune (two editions), by Frank Herbert
2. The Second Home, by Christina Clancy
3. The Overstory, by Richard Powers
4. The Night Watchman, by Louise Erdrich
5. Payback's a Witch, by Lana Harper
6. The Great Gatsby, by F Scott Fitzgerald
7. How to Stop Time, by Matt Haig
8. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, by Taylor Jenkins Reid
9. The Thursday Murder Club, Richard Osman
10. Send for Me, by Lauren Fox

Recently Laurie Colwin's backlist was rejacketed, a coordinated effort between Vintage and Perennial. But someone needs to figure out how to coordinate rejacketing and updating Matt Haig's backlist. I'm loving that How to Stop Time is back in our top ten with a new matching-The-Midnight-Library cover. Next up, I'm hoping that the rejacketed and re-priced edition of The Humans, of which Jason is a fan, can do the same. It's another variation on Haig's philosophy of living in the present by writing a story about beings (alien or otherwise) who have particularly long lives.

Paperback Nonfiction
1. The Milwaukee River Greenway, by Eddee Daniel
2. So You Want to Talk About Race, by Ijeoma Oluo
3. Braiding Sweetgrass, by Robin Wall Kimmerer
4. The Settlement Cookbook, by Milwaukee Settlement House
5. Care Work, by Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha
6. Wow, No Thank You, by Samantha Irby
7. Regeneration, by Paul Hawken
8. 111 Places in Milwaukee that You Must Not Miss, by Michelle Madden
9. Born a Crime, by Trevor Noah
10. On Tyranny graphic edition, by Timothy Snyder

It's actually hard to find a relatively new book in this top 10 which we haven't featured previously, but Regeneration: Ending the Climate Crisis in One Generation was released on September 21, 2021 so close enough. Environmentalist entrepreneur Hawken (of Smith and Hawken - you can still find it as a private label line at Target) has an endorsement from Jane Goodall (see above), who writes: "Regeneration is honest and informative, a rebuttal to doomsayers who believe it is too late." From Allison Arieff in The San Francisco Chronicle: "Regeneration covers an impressively broad range of topics from food safety to the war industry, electric vehicles to mangroves, which serves to demonstrate how all-encompassing the challenge is. But it’s prescriptive, too, featuring reasoned calls to action from writers, activists, scientists and numerous other experts"

Books for Kids:
1. Chez Bob, by Bob Shea
2. Animal Architects, by Amy Cherrix
3. How to Find What You're Not Looking For, by Vera Hiranandani
4. Playing with Fire, by April Henry
5. The Fisherman, the Horse, and the Sea, by Barbara Joosse, with illustrations by Renée Graef
6. Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World V2, by Benjamine Alire Saenz
7. Egg Marks the Spot V2, by Amy Timberlake, with illustrations by Jon Klassen
8. Spy School at Sea, by Stuart Gibbs
9. Eyes of the Forest, by April Holt
10. Ghostly Tales of Milwaukee, by Anna Lardinois

Port Washington's Barbara Joosse's latest collaboration with Renée Graef is The Fishermen, The Horse, and the Sea, a retelling of how fishermen used a horse to save the shipwrecked crew of the Mary Ludwig in 1895. Per the marketing notes: "This beautifully illustrated children’s book based on a true story recounts a dramatic rescue on Lake Michigan and introduces young readers to Lester Smith and his family, who founded Port Washington’s long-running and beloved Smith Bros Fish Shanty." I still fondly recall the planked whitefish and take-home jars of caviar.

It's the second week in the top 10 for Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World, and it should have a few more appearances with it being in Oli's top 5 for 2021. Booklist recs with a star: "The result is a brilliant, character-driven novel that challenges its readers themselves to think about life while falling in love with those two unforgettable characters, Aristotle and Dante."

And from Alex Chunn in School Library Journal: " Nearly double in length to its predecessor, this book packs a lot into its five parts as the gay teens contend with the realities - and work - of relationships. Ari's sensitive first-person narration, which includes beautifully reflective journal entries, encapsulates struggles with internalized homophobia and its intersections with masculinity and Mexican American identity. Slow-paced and poetic, this emotional rollercoaster is buoyed by hope, swoonworthy kisses, and exquisite characterization. Verdict: This literary romance will woo hearts and minds alike. A must-purchase for all libraries."

Over at the Journal Sentinel, Jim Higgins profiles Dean Robbins, who will have four books out from major publishers this year:
--The Fastest Girl on Earth!: Meet Kitty O'Neil, Daredevil Driver!, illustrated by Elizabeth Baddeley
--Thank You, Dr. Salk!: The Scientist Who Beat Polio and Healed the World, illustrated by Mike Dutton
--¡Mambo Mucho Mambo! The Dance That Crossed Color Lines, illustrated by Eric Velasquez (in stores November 23)
--You Are a Star, Ruth Bader Ginsburg!, illustrated by Sarah Green (in stores December 28)

Boswell bestsellers, week ending October 16, 2021

Boswell bestsellers, week ending October 16, 2021

Hardcover Fiction:
1. Cloud Cuckoo Land, by Anthony Doerr
2. Raft of Stars, by Andrew J Graff
3. State of Terror, by Hilary Clinton and Louise Penny
4. Harlem Shuffle, by Colson Whitehead
5. The Lincoln Highway, by Amor Towles
6. Bewilderment, by Richard Powers
7. Crossroads, by Jonathan Franzen
8. We Are Not Like Them, by Christine Pride and Jo Piazza
9. Silverview, by John Le Carre
10. The Last Graduate V2, by Naomi Novik

A Clinton and a writer walk into a writing conference - so goes the story - but this time it's not Bill and James Patterson but Hilary and Louise Penny. The State of Terror collaboration chronicles a fictional Secretary of State teaming up with a journalist and a foreign service officer to defeat a rogue group of terrorists that come into possession of nuclear weapons. Sarah Lyall in The New York Times writes: "State of Terror may bring Penny into new fictional territory, but her imprint is everywhere. The emotional cast to the writing, the tendency to dangle portents and wait some time before resolving them, the depiction of friendship, the short paragraphs, the philosophical aperçus - these are all marks of Penny’s writing. " They speak to Scott Simon on NPR Weekend Edition here.

Hardcover Nonfiction:
1. Hero of Two Worlds, by Mike Duncan
2. Taste, by Stanley Tucci
3. Midnight in Washington, by Adam Schiff
4. Jew Ish: A Cookbook, by Jake Cohen
5. All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days, by Rebecca Donner
6. Peril, by Bob Woodward and Robert Costa
7. There Is Nothing for You Here, by Fiona Hill
8. The Storyteller, by Dave Grohl
9. Where the Deer and the Antelope Play, by Nick Offerman
10. A Confederacy of Dumptys, by John Lithgow

Two political players make debuts this week in the top 10 and if you listen to news programs, you already know about them. Adam Schiff's Midnight in Washington: How We Almost Lost Our Democracy and Still Could has endorsements from Ron Chernow, Jon Meacham, and Timothy Snyder, and by the way, it's out of stock everywhere. Fiona Hill's There Is Nothing for You Here: Finding Opportunity in the Twenty-First Century also has a Timothy Snyder quote (someone's busy reading political memoirs!) as well as Robert Putnam and Drew Gilpin Faust, and guess what? It's out of stock everywhere. That's the way things are going to go this fall. We warned you!

Paperback Fiction:
1. The Night Watchman, by Louise Erdrich
2. Circe, by Madeline Miller
3. Leonard and Hungry Paul, by Rónán Hession
4. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, by Taylor Jenkins Reid
5. People We Meet on Vacation, by Emily Henry
6. The Lying Life of Adults, by Elena Ferrante
7. Dune, by Frank Herbert
8. Black Sun, by Rebecca Roanhorse
9. The Song of Achilles, by Madeline Miller
10. The Silence, by Don Delillo

One reader wrote to me and noted that last week, eight of the top ten fiction books were penned by men. Was that unusual? Lately, yes it is. This week we're down to seven, but the reverse is true in paperback fiction where it's seven women to three men, with Madeline Miller holding two slots, a not unusual feat for her. It was released in paperback in late June, but this is the first week in the top 10 for Black Sun, the first volume in an epic fantasy series from Rebecca Roanhorse featuring a number of queer and nonbinary characters and inspired by Indigenous Cultures. Petra Mayer spoke to Roanhorse on NPR, where Roanhorse noted: "I have been reading epic fantasies inspired by European settings since I was a child, and while I'm still a fan of many of these works, I longed to see something different," she says. "So I wrote it. I never made a conscious decision to go in that direction. That direction was simply the natural culmination of my love of the architecture, poetry, politics, and history of these places and people that I've been learning about forever."

The follow-up novel, Fevered Star, releases April 19, 2022.  

Paperback Nonfiction:
1. Little Pieces of Hope, by Todd Doughty
2. Fading Ads of Milwaukee, by Adam Levin
3. The Body Keeps the Score, by Bessel van der Kolk
4. Best American Essays 2021, by Kathryn Schulz/Robert Atwan
5. American Birding Association Field Guide to Birds of Wisconsin, by Charles Hagner
6. Voice of Milwaukee Bronzeville, by Sandra E Jones (Register for November 18 event here in person, or here to watch the Zoom webinar)
7. Talking to Strangers, by Malcolm Gladwell
8. Milwaukee River Greenway, by Eddee Daniel (Register for October 21 event here in person or here to watch the event on Zoom webinar)
9. Vegan for Everybody, by America's Test Kitchen
10. Homo Deus, by Yuval Noah Harari

With Houghton Mifflin Harper's trade division now owned by HarperCollins and renamed Mariner under the William Morrow direction, it will be interesting to see where they go with the Best American series, which has defeated all comers in the years since it's been published. For Best American Essays 2021, I looked at numbers since we've been open, and at the Downer numbers from 2005-2008 (they generally had the best number in the series of the Schwartz locations), and can definitively say that at least for the past 16 years, the numbers have followed no predictable trajectory, ranging from 10 to 29 copies. Our worst sales were 2009 with Mary Oliver editing and our best was 2014 with John Jeremiah Sullivan. But lest you think that's about the 2009 year when Boswell was just getting its feet wet and had yet to find its audience, when it comes to short stories, there were five years that did worse than 2009, all by the way, after Boswell was open. If you're wondering, our best Short Story year was 2012, followed by 2005.

Books for Kids:
1. Chlorine Sky, by Mahogany L Browne
2. Aristotle and Dante Dive into the Waters of the World, by Benjamin Alire Saenz
3. Lulu and Rocky in Milwaukee, by Barbara Joosse, with illustrations by Renée Graef
4. Change Sings, by Amanda Gorman, with illustrations by Loren Long
5. Construction Site Road Crew, Coming Through, by Sherri Duskey Rinker, with illustrations by A.G. Ford
6. Regina Is Not a Little Dinosaur, by Andrea Zuill
7. The Beatryce Prophecy, by Kate DiCamillo, with illustrations by Sophie Blackall
8. Chez Bob, by Bob Shea
9. Pony, by R.J. Palacio
10. The Bad Seed Presents the Good, the Bad, and the Spooky, by Jory John, with illustrations by Pete Oswald

I was talking to FOB (Friend of Boswell) Noah, who came in to buy two copies of Construction Site: Road Crew, Coming Through (one for their child, one for a friend) and I mentioned that when my family was visiting, we bought a copy of Goodnight, Goodnight Construction Site for my great nephew and he loved it enough that we got a second book in the series. I can't sell it better than the publisher: "This new adventure focuses on the importance of teamwork in building a new road and features all of the original vehicles as well as new road-building specific ones. Also has a focus on bridges of safe wildlife crossing which has become a necessary part of road construction." You may know the original is illustrated by Tom Lichtenheld, but later books in the series have illustrations by NAACP Image Award recipient A.G. Ford.

Over at the Journal Sentinel, Kristine Kierzek has a profile of Madison restaurant owner turned cookbook writer Barb Pratzel, author of Manna Café and Bakery Cookbook.

Tomorrow - Boswell events

What a Boswell Week! Christine Pride and Jo Piazza, Todd Doughty, Anthony Doerr, Mike Duncan (signing only), Andrew J Graff (at Elm Grove Library)

Boswell events for the week of October 11, 2021

Monday, October 11, 7 pm
Christine Pride and Jo Piazza, authors of We Are Not Like Them

in Conversation with Nancy Johnson for a Virtual Event
Register for this event here.

Join us for an evening with Pride and Piazza, coauthors of a powerful and poignant new novel that explores race in America today and its devastating impact on two childhood friends, one Black and one white. In conversation with Nancy Johnson, author of The Kindest Lie. Don't forget to ask foryour signed bookplate.

Jen and Riley have been best friends since kindergarten, though their lives have taken different directions. Jen married young and, after years of trying, is finally pregnant. Riley pursued her childhood dream of becoming a television journalist and is poised to become one of the first Black female anchors of the top news channel in their hometown of Philadelphia. But the deep bond they share is severely tested when Jen’s husband, a city police officer, is involved in the shooting of an unarmed Black teenager.

On getting the Philadelphia setting for the book just right, from Philadelphia Magazine: " There were little things that Jo insisted on getting into the book that Christine didn’t get. There’s a line about how people in Philly ask where you went to high school before they ask what you do - Christine tried to take it out a dozen times, and Jo was insistent." This is also a St. Louis thing. I've never noticed it in MilwAUkee.

Christine Pride has held editorial posts at imprints such as Doubleday, Crown, and Simon & Schuster. As an editor, Christine has published a range of books, including numerous New York Times bestsellers. She pens the Race Matters column for Cup of Jo. Jo Piazza is author of books such as Charlotte Walsh Likes to Win, How to Be Married, and The Knockoff. Her work has appeared in The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and CNN.

Tuesday, October 12, 6 pm
Todd Doughty, author of Little Pieces of Hope: Happy-Making Things in a Difficult World
in conversation with Chelsea Cain and Chuck Palahniuk for a virtual event
Register for this event here.

Boswell Book Company presents an event featuring Todd Doughty for his new book, Little Pieces of Hope, an enchanting collection of lists, musings, and illustrations that will inspire you to cherish all of the things, from the extraordinary to the everyday, that bring hope into our lives. Don't forget to ask for your signed bookplate. This event is brought to you by Watermark Books & Café of Wichita, Anderson's Book Shop of Naperville and Downer's Grove, and Boswell.

On March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus a global pandemic, and our lives began to change in unprecedented ways. Todd Doughty knew he needed to do something to help him stay connected to the everyday joys of daily life. So he wrote down a list of things that make him happy: The musical intro to All Things Considered. Someone forgiving you. Someone believing in you. Your foot sticking out from under a blanket in order to find the cool spot. Freshly cut yellow tulips. A really good burger.

From Associated Press: "This should be a book you keep around when you need a little jolt, something to lift you up if you’re feeling down. As even Doughty suggests in the opening pages, you can read the book in order or flip to random pages." (This link is to ABC News)

Todd Doughty is currently SVP, Deputy Publisher of Doubleday and has worked at Penguin Random House for more than two decades. Doughty is a graduate of Southern Illinois University (Carbondale) and former bookseller.

I love the fact that one of our delightful customers worked with both Christine Pride and Todd Doughty when they were both at Doubleday!

Wednesday, October 13, 7 pm
Anthony Doerr, author of Cloud Cuckoo Land
in Conversation with Quan Barry for a Ticketed Virtual Event
Tickets for the event here.

Boswell Book Company is thrilled to host the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of All the Light We Cannot See. Doerr joins us for a conversation about his latest novel, Cloud Cuckoo Land, which is a triumph of imagination and compassion, a soaring novel about children on the cusp of adulthood in a broken world, who find resilience, hope, and story. Doerr will be in conversation with Quan Barry, Professor of English at UW-Madison and author of the novels We Ride Upon Sticks and She Weeps Each Time You're Born. Cosponsored by the Friends of the Milwaukee Public Library.

Tickets cost $30, and each includes a copy of Cloud Cuckoo Land and admission for one electronic device. Signed copies and bookplates no longer available. $5 from each ticket will be donated back to the Milwaukee Public Library Foundation, in the spirit of Cloud Cuckoo Land's celebration of libraries.

From Marcel Theroux in The New York Times: "Cloud Cuckoo Land...is, among other things, a paean to the nameless people who have played a role in the transmission of ancient texts and preserved the tales they tell. But it’s also about the consolations of stories and the balm they have provided for millenniums. It’s a wildly inventive novel that teems with life, straddles an enormous range of experience and learning, and embodies the storytelling gifts that it celebrates. It also pulls off a resolution that feels both surprising and inevitable, and that compels you back to the opening of the book with a head-shake of admiration at the Swiss-watchery of its construction."

The heroes of Cloud Cuckoo Land are trying to figure out the world around them: Anna and Omeir, on opposite sides of the formidable city walls during the 1453 siege of Constantinople; teenage idealist Seymour in an attack on a public library in present-day Idaho; and Konstance, on an interstellar ship bound for an exoplanet, decades from now. An ancient text - the story of Aethon, who longs to be turned into a bird so that he can fly to a utopian paradise in the sky - provides solace and mystery to these unforgettable characters. Doerr has created a tapestry of times and places that reflects our vast interconnectedness - with other species, with each other, with those who lived before us and those who will be here after we’re gone. Dedicated to “the librarians then, now, and in the years to come,” Cloud Cuckoo Land is a hauntingly beautiful and redemptive novel about stewardship - of the book, of the Earth, of the human heart.

Anthony Doerr is author of All the Light We Cannot See, winner of the Pulitzer Prize and the Carnegie Medal, as well as The Shell Collector and Four Seasons in Rome. He has won five O Henry Prizes, the New York Public Library’s Young Lions Award, and the Story Prize. Quan Barry is author of two novels and four poetry books, including Water Puppets, winner of the AWP Donald Hall Prize for Poetry and a PEN/Open Book finalist. She has received NEA Fellowships in both fiction and poetry and is the author of a new novel, out February 2022, titled When I'm Gone, Look for Me in the East. 

Thursday, October 14, 4 pm
Mike Duncan, author of Hero of Two Worlds: The Marquis de Lafayette in the Age of Revolution
Outdoor Book Signing
Register for this signing here.

Mike Duncan, the bestselling author of The Storm Before the Storm and host of the Revolutions podcast, is coming to Boswell for an outdoor book signing. His latest book tells the thrilling story of the Marquis de Lafayette’s lifelong quest to defend the principles of liberty and equality. Admission to the signing line is free with purchase of Hero of Two Worlds or $5, which can be applied to any other book purchase at Boswell. Please note that Mike Duncan is not giving a talk at this event.

Few in history can match the revolutionary career of the Marquis de Lafayette. Over fifty incredible years at the heart of the Age of Revolution, he fought courageously on both sides of the Atlantic. He was a soldier, statesman, idealist, philanthropist, and abolitionist. From enthusiastic youth to world-weary old age, from the pinnacle of glory to the depths of despair, Lafayette never stopped fighting for the rights of all mankind. His remarkable life is the story of where we come from, and an inspiration to defend the ideals he held dear.

From The Wall Street Journal: "Mr. Duncan’s Hero of Two Worlds offers, in readable prose, much informative description alongside measured interpretation. The author’s sympathetic yet balanced and sensible rendering, some may think, mirrors Lafayette’s eventful life in a revolutionary age." And from Adam Gopnick in The New Yorker: "Duncan’s biography is written in a loose, colloquial style that sometimes startles with its informality but more often delights with its directness."

Mike Duncan is author of The Storm Before the Storm: The Beginning of the End of the Roman Republic, and his award-winning series, The History of Rome, remains a landmark in the history of podcasting. Duncan’s current podcast series, Revolutions, explores the great political revolutions that have driven the course of modern history.

Saturday, October 16, 1 pm
Andrew J Graff, author of Raft of Stars
In Person at Elm Grove Public Library, 13600 Juneau Blvd
Register for this event here.

Elm Grove Public Library, along with Boswell Book Company, present an afternoon with Wisconsin native Andrew J Graff, author of Raft of Stars, the debut novel that Richard Russo calls “a rousing adventure yarn full of danger and heart and humor.” When two hardscrabble young boys think they’ve committed a crime, they flee into the Northwoods of Wisconsin. Will the adults trying to find and protect them reach them before it’s too late? Please click here to visit the Elm Grove Public Library website and register for this event.

Raft of Stars was one of our big books of spring, it's going to make a great holiday gift. If you bought a copy from us and didn't paste in your signed bookplate, maybe you should head over to Elm Grove for the event.  

Andrew J Graff grew up in in Wisconsin’s Northwoods. Graff earned an MFA from the Iowa Writer’s Workshop, teaches at Wittenberg University, and has published work in Image and Dappled Things.

More at Boswell's upcoming events page.

Photo credit

Christine Pride and Jo Piazza by Bench

Nancy Johnson by Nina Subin

Todd Doughty by Michael Lionstar

Chuck Palahniuk by Alan Amato

Mike Duncan by Brandi Duncan

Boswell bestsellers, week ending October 9, 2021

Here's what's selling at Boswell for the week ending October 9, 2021

Hardcover Fiction:
1. The Lincoln Highway, by Amor Towles
2. Cloud Cuckoo Land, by Anthony Doerr (Tickets for October 13 event here)
3. Crossroads, by Jonathan Franzen
4. Harlem Shuffle, by Colson Whitehead
5. We Are Not Like Them, by Christine Pride and Jo Piazza (Register for October 11 event here)
6. Bewilderment, by Richard Powers
7. The Midnight Library, by Matt Haig
8. The Every, by Dave Eggers
9. The Man Who Died Twice, by Richard Osman
10. What Storm What Thunder, by Myriam J.A. Chancy (Register for October 28 event here)

Our biggest non-event sales in this category this week is Jonathan Franzen's Crossroads, with reviews that are rather ecstatic. Constance Grady links to several of these in her Vox piece on a history of Jonathan Franzen controversies, and why he seems less controversial this time out. She didn't like to the AV Club review from Erin Somers: "Sorry to Franzen’s haters, but Crossroads is an excellent novel."

Hardcover Nonfiction:
1. Taste, by Stanley Tucci
2. The Storyteller, by Dave Grohl
3. Peril, by Bob Woodward and Robert Costa
4. The Secret History of Food, by Matt Siegel
5. Giannis, by Mirin Fader
6. All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days, by Rebecca Donner
7. The Sum of Us, by Heather McGhee
8. Home: A Celebration, by Charlotte Moss
9. A Carnival of Snackery, by David Sedaris (Tickets for December 10 event here)
10. Hero of Two Worlds, by Mike Duncan (Register for October 14 signing here)

Here come the fourth quarter memoirs! First up is Stanley Tucci's Taste: My Life Through Food, which has gotten a lot of press over Tucci's revelation that cancer has changed his sense of taste. The same thing happened to my dad. The New York Times review from Frank Bruni is mixed, but Bruni comes in with a bad taste for celebrity food memoirs, calling the genre bloated. He should read Matt Siegel! Dave Davies is more enthusiastic in the Fresh Air interview. Hey, Dave Grohl's The Storyteller also made a splash this week.

Paperback Fiction:
1. The Night Watchman, by Louise Erdrich
2. People We Meet on Vacation, by Emily Henry
3. Hamnet, by Maggie O'Farrell
4. Payback's a Witch, by Lana Harper
5. Normal People, by Sally Rooney
6. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, by Taylor Jenkins Reid
7. Second First Impressions, by Sally Thorne
8. Plain Bad Heroines, by Emily M Danforth
9. A Deadly Education, by Naomi Novik
10. The Ex Hex, by Erin Sterling

If you told me that in X years, our paperback fiction list would be half genre, I would have been surprised, but the decline of literary fiction in paperback for us during COVID has opened an opportunity for romance, horror, and fantasy, some of which is paperback original but some is reprint. October brings Halloween-themed romance with Payback's a Witch and The Ex Hex. Similar color palates, too. The Ex Hex has a rec from Rachel: "If you are wanting Practical Magic, Halloweentown, Hocus Pocus vibes with a huge helping of banter and off-the-charts chemistry, this is the one for you." Oh, and I should note that Erin Sterling is also YA writer Rachel Hawkins. There's a lot of YA/Romance crossover.

More romance news. Thanks to Rachel's enthusiasm, we are the #2 independent bookstore in sales on Edelweiss for Second First Impressions, by Sally Thorne.

By the way, The Night Watchman just surpassed The Round House in paperback sales, which had trumped the last few Erdrich sales, as well as the Downer Schwartz sales for a number of titles before that.

Paperback Nonfiction:
1. The Art of Gathering, by Priya Parker
2. Braiding Sweetgrass, by Robin Wall Kimmerer
3. Voices of Bronzeville, by Sandra E Jones (Register for November 18 event here - in person or via Zoom)
4. Consumed, by Aja Barber
5. Northwest Side Community Development Corporation, by Howard Snyder
6. Milwaukee River Greenway, by Eddee Daniel (Register for October 21 event here - in person or via Zoom)
7. The Best of Me, by David Sedaris
8. Having and Being Had, by Eula Bliss
9. Walking Milwaukee, by Royal Brevvaxling and Molly Snyder
10. Ten Patterns That Explain the Universe, by Brian Clegg

Eula Biss's Having and Being Had hits our top ten after about a month floating around the new paperback tables. Considering that the book is about colluding in capitalism, she got a nice review from Emily Bobrow in The Wall Street Journal: "This book is essentially an account of Ms. Biss’s contradictions, her ambivalence as a relatively well-off consumer in a rich and richly unequal country. But instead of being humorless and apologetic, Having and Being Had is incisive, impressive and often poetic."

Books for Kids:
1. What's Inside a Flower?, by Rachel Ignotofsky
2. The Beatryce Prophecy, by Kate DiCamillo, with illustrations by Sophie Blackall
3. Chez Bob, by Bob Shea
4. Ada Twist, Scientist, by Andrea Beaty, with illustrations by David Roberts
5. Lulu and Rocky in Milwaukee, by Barbara Joosse, with illustrations by Renee Graef
6. Little Blue Truck's Halloween, by Alice Schertle, with illustrations by Jill McElmurry
7. Ghostly Tales of Milwaukee, by Anna Lardinois
8. Egg Marks the Spot V2, by Amy Timberlake, with illustrations by Jon Klassen
9. Beasts and Beauty, by Soman Chainani
10. How to Find What You're Not Looking For, by Veera Hiranandani (Register for October 20 event here)

Rachel Ignotofsky's Women in Art, Science, and Sports have been big crossovers from Crown Books for Young Readers, enough that they sister adult division, now, like the kids program, folded into the equivalent Random House division, has spun off postcards sets, calendars, and most notably, jigsaw puzzles. Ignotofsky's What's Inside a Flower?. which was released last winter but was featured in some virtual school visits from Ignotofsky, is a beautiful book that like her other titles, works for both kids and adults. Nicola Davies wrote in The New York Times: "The challenge of igniting children’s curiosity is akin to lighting a fire. You can’t put something as large as a log on a spark; you have to start with something smaller. What’s Inside a Flower?... is the best kind of tinder for little sparks. It is a highly accessible gateway to botany that doesn’t shy away from real scientific words but doesn’t overload readers with too much information."

Over at the Journal Sentinel, Jim Higgins talked to Chris Ward of Feral House (who is nonetheless Milwaukee based) and Boswell's Jason Kennedy about the looming stock shortages in books this holiday season. We're out of Bewilderment, and you'll be hearing more of that in the coming weeks.

Boswell bestsellers for the week ending October 2, 2021

Boswell bestsellers, week ending October 2, 2021

Hardcover Fiction:
1. Cloud Cuckoo Land, by Anthony Doerr (Tickets for October 13 event here)
2. Harlem Shuffle, by Colson Whitehead
3. Bewilderment, by Richard Powers
4. Beautiful World, Where Are You, by Sally Rooney
5. The Last Graduate V2, by Naomi Novik
6. The Man Who Died Twice V2, by Richard Osman
7. Project Hail Mary, by Andy Weir
8. The Book of Form and Emptiness, by Ruth Ozeki
9. Shoulder Season, by Christina Clancy
10. Morning Star, by Karl Ove Knausgaard

Nowadays you expect that week #1 will be the big sales pop, especially with the rise in preorders. That's certainly the case for Cloud Cuckoo Land, for example. And we've had three strong weeks of sale for Harlem Shuffle, but the debut week still had the best sales. Beautiful World, in week four, still peaked in its debut. But both Bewilderment and The Book of Form and Emptiness increased in sales for week two, though despite our huge sales of A Tale for the Time Being in paperback (over 200), I'd still consider her a sleeper, especially in a season as packed as this one is. Patricia Gilman in The Boston Globe called Ozeki's book "an ambitious and ingenious novel that presents a stinging exploration of grief, a reflection on our relationship to objects, a potent testament to the importance of reading, writing, and books."

Our buyer Jason thinks the Oprah pick for Bewilderment might have helped that second week increase.

Hardcover Nonfiction:
1. Feed the Wolf, by Jon M Sweeney
2. Peril, by Bob Woodward and Robert Costa
3. Vanderbilt, by Anderson Cooper and Katherine Howe
4. No Cure for Being Human, by Kate Bowler
5. All the Frequent Troubles of Our Days, by Rebecca Donner
6. Please Don't Sit on My Bed in Your Outside Clothes, by Phoebe Robinson
7. Fuzz, by Mary Roach
8. Bourdain, by Laurie Woolever
9. Unbound, by Tarana Burke
10. Crying in H Mart, by Michelle Zauner

Vanderbilt: The Rise and Fall of an American Dynasty is the book that Anderson Cooper was meant to write, aside from a memoir or perhaps a foray into thrillers, not uncommon for newscasters. Until his mother's death, Cooper is said to have downplayed his connection to the family. As Christopher Buckley notes in the enthusiastic Washington Post review: "It probably helped that by the time Cooper fils came of age, the Vanderbilt fortune, once among the greatest in American plutocracy, had pretty much gone pfft. His mother was a serial spendthrift who burned through an inheritance that came to her in 1945 of about $4 million, the equivalent today of nearly $60 million. 'No one can make money evaporate into thin air like a Vanderbilt,' Cooper and Howe observe."

Paperback Fiction:
1. A Long Petal of the Sea, by Isabel Allende
2. Send for Me, by Lauren Fox
3. Dine, by Frank Herbert
4. The Kingmaker's Redemption, by Harry Pinkus
5. The Lying Life of Adults, by Elena Ferrante
6. The Night Watchman, by Louise Erdrich
7. The Dutch House, by Ann Patchett
8. The Seven Husbands of Evelyn Hugo, by Taylor Jenkins Reid
9. People We Meet on Vacation, by Emily Henry
10. The House in the Cerulean Sea, by TJ Klune

Our paperback fiction numbers have come back to Earth after the we're-all-traveling bump in bestseller numbers this past spring and summer. National lists are being driven by BookTok and we're seeing that as well. Maybe there's a bunch of folks crying as they read Lauren Fox's Send for Me. It's sad, so please consider a good public weeping. There was sort of a black-and-white-and-red theme going on this week for the featured book jackets, which would have been more consistent if Vintage hadn't colorized the Knopf Send for Me jacket. So much fudging - I'm aware that Ozeki's jacket is highlighted with blue, but I'm pretending it's gray.

Last year the paperback fiction category was invigorated when it turned out that both the National Book Award and Booker Prize had early paperback releases in Interior Chinatown and Shuggie Bain. So far we're not seeing a replay of that.

Paperback Nonfiction:
1. Talking to Strangers, by Malcolm Gladwell
2. Braiding Sweetgrass, by Robin Wall Kimmerer
3. Shipwrecks of the Great Lakes, by Anna Lardinois
4. The Price of the Ticket, by James Baldwin
5. Madame Fourcade's Secret War, by Lynne Olson
6. Come As You Are, by Emily Nagoski
7. One Life, by Megan Rapinoe
8. Dressmakers of Auschwitz, by Lucy Adlington
9. White Rage, by Carol Anderson
10. A Cook's Tour, by Anthony Bourdain

The Price of the Ticket: Collected Nonfiction: 1948–1985 is a reprinted (just out for two weeks) collection of essays by James Baldwin from Beacon. From the 1985 Kirkus review: "It is a stunning achievement, violently personal, gifted, distilled from a lifelong mediation on race, sometimes less intelligent than given to big generalizations and intellectual grandiosity, yet ever a whiplash on the national conscience, if steadily remote in its fury." And if you're wondering if the current paperback price ($24.95) is more than it was originally published for in 1985, it isn't. St. Martin's original price was $29.95, and then it raised to $35. Just shows how little inflation there has been for hardcover books in the last few decades.

Books for Kids:
1. Willodeen, by Katherine Applegate
2. How to Find What You're Not Looking For, by Veera Hiranandani (Register for October 20 virtual school visit here - open to all)
3. The Last Kids on Earth and the Doomsday Race V7, by Max Brallier
4. Crenshaw, by Katherine Applegate
5. Fast Pitch, by Nic Stone
6. A Bend in the Road, by Sara Biren (Register for October 4 event here)
7. Superman Smashes the Klan, by Gene Luen Yang
8. Ghostly Tales of Milwaukee, by Anna Lardinois
9. Steelstriker, by Marie Lu (Signed copies available)
10. Peace Train, by Cat Stevens and Peter H Reynolds

Several folks have multiple books appearing on the list this week, but only Anna Lardinois has both an adult and kids book represented. Anna did our first outside event - weather permitting, it seemed like a better idea for kids who weren't already vaccinated. Tim's a big fan of Ghostly Tales of Milwaukee, noting: "Lardinois writes their mysterious stories at a level just right for kids about eight to ten years old, but she kept this old guy captivated with details about very familiar places. As a baseball fan, I was stunned to learn that the Pfister Hotel ghost has frightened so many well-known pro baseball players that some now refuse to stay there, and one admitted to keeping a baseball bat in his bed at night for protection."

Tomorrow will have a preview of this week's events, with some recommendations and review links to whet your appetite.