Completist - finishing what you started, author's ouevre category

It's about a week after we booked our in-person event with Andrew Sean Greer for Less Is Lost (September 30, ticketed, presented in partnership with the Friends of the Milwaukee Public Library, and in conversation with Liam Callanan - details here) that I decided I was going to fill in the gaps and read each of his novels. I give myself an out on these things - once you start looking at nonfiction and short stories, are you obligated to search out anthologies and articles and reviews? I will make this decision on a case-by-case basis.

For a number of years this was a hard task because I felt so pressured to read event books and new releases that have strict deadlines of two months before pub date which follow the American Booksellers Association Indie Next schedule. But by adding a new rule to my reading list that in any month where I read five or more books, one of the titles had to be more than three years old from first publication, it suddenly made it easier for me to catch up. 

I had already read The Story of a Marriage, The Impossible Lives of Greta Wells (for which he led the Boswell audience in a kazoo chorus), and Less (in which he was in conversation with fellow Pulitzer winner Jennifer Egan, so I set my sights on The Confessions of Max Tivoli, and in the spirit of our event, I borrowed the book from the Milwaukee Public Library. If you've read Less and nothing else, I should note that while his early books share the spirit of his Pulitzer Prize winner, the humor, so much at the forefront of Less, is more stylized. Max Tivoli's story is that he is born an old man and grows backwards. Some people share his secret, but much like the protagonist of Matt Haig's How to Stop Time, Max shields his identity to avoid suspicion. His mother knows, as does his close friend Hughie, but the love of his life Alice, never suspects, giving him more than one chance to win her heart. The story is wistful and romantic and offers a unique way to look at other-ness. Next up? The Path of Minor Planets, his debut novel. By my ground rules, I am not obligated to read How It Was for Me, his story collection, but I still might.

Speaking of other-ness and being a completist, I am still gushing over our recent event with Megan Giddings for The Women Could Fly. She's only at book #2, but I am already confident that I will follow her around for three, four, and five. Giddings was one of those authors I read during the COVID lockdown, and we chased some programming that, due to the weirdness of that time when folks at home responded more enthusiastically than they normally did to our recommendations, turned out to be a great success. It was so great to meet Giddings in person, and to my delight, I encouraged the Boswellians to read The Women Could Fly and my colleague Oli turned out to be a huge fan. Watch the video of Giddings's Boswell visit here.

My completion program has been in my mind for a few years, after realizing I had started regularly reading Anne Tyler again after a two-book break. It came to a head last year when I read the missing entries for several of my favorite writers, including Michelle Huneven and Tom Perrotta, only to find out shortly afterwards that each had a new novel in 2022. I have gone on at length about Search, a shoo-in for one of my top favorite books of the year, and like for Giddings, I was thrilled to finally meet Huneven this spring. Search has been a hit not just with my fellow bookseller friends around the country, but with the extended Goldin household. Both my sisters read and loved it. 

While we didn't get the opportunity to host Tom Perrotta for Tracy Flick Can't Win (it usually stops just south of the Wisconsin state line), I finally realized, after listening to him talk about the book again this week on Here and Now (here's the recording) that in the post-COVID age, I could also talk to him virtually. How many other interviewers have read all eight of his novels and both collections of his stories? Will that give me a more insight than the professionals and the other authors who have all had a crack at Tracy Flick Can't Win? I doubt it, but I'm trying anyway - that virtual event is scheduled for Tuesday, September 29, 7 pm Central time. You can register here.