Porter Square Books Blog

My Most Anticipated Books of 2012

2012-01-25T13:28:00.005-05:00

The literary website The Millions has put together an extremely thorough list of most anticipated books of 2012. If you love books and especially love staying on the cutting edge of literature it is a fantastic resource. But to be thorough it has to be long and detailed and your eyes can go a little cross-eyed scanning through the whole thing. So I’ve pulled out three books on the list that are, for whatever that’s worth, Josh’s Most Anticipated books of 2012.

Varamo by Cesar Aira: In some ways you could say Cesar Aira does the same thing over and over; he writes short, strange, beautiful, intelligent, mysterious, philosophical novels. But each novel is different. They have different tones, different themes, even different prose styles, and they are all fantastic. I’ve read three of them; Ghosts, set in an apartment complex still under construction on New Year’s Eve, The Literary Conference, which involves pirate treasure, cloning, and works in translation, and How I Became a Nun, which starts with an accidental poisoning by cyanide-laced ice cream and goes, well...elsewhere. Whatever Varamo is, it’s sure to challenging, interesting, and exciting. Varamo is scheduled to be released in February.

A Naked Singularity by Sergio De La Pava was originally self-published and is now being brought out by the University of Chicago Press. It’s gathering comparisons to some really big, really amazing, really ambitious books, such as Infinite Jest, Underworld, and even Moby-Dick. Following a New York City public defender who has never lost a case, De La Pava explores the underpinnings of our understanding of justice and order. What excites me about the book is the praise from critic Steven Moore, author of The Novel: An Alternative History (volume 2 please!). If he’s excited about this book then so am I. A Naked Singularity is scheduled to be published in May.

Your Name Here by Helen DeWitt and Ilya Gridneff: I’ve read much of this book as a PDF on my computer so I am thrilled to see it come out as a printed book. Playing with language, translation, narrativity, and the construction of words into books, and featuring a pretty great running joke about If On a Winter’s Night a Traveler (can there be any other kind of joke about If On a Winter’s Night a Traveler?). Your Name Here will (I hope) finally earn Helen DeWitt the attention and acclaim she deserves as one of our most innovative writers of fiction. It follows her daring, scathing, satirical novel Lightning Rods (which was a staff pick here) and picks up with the innovation and exploration that made The Last Samurai such a compelling book. Your Name Here is scheduled for publication some time this fall.

A Tale of Two Apps

2012-01-04T13:25:00.005-05:00

Odds are, this holiday season some of you got some fancy gadget on which ebooks can be read. If you got a Kindle Fire or a Nook Tablet, please see our post from last week about how to read our ebooks on those devices. Regardless of what device you’ve got (or are going to get), there are two apps for reading our ebooks on both Android and iOS devices. Both apps have their strong points, so which one you use depends on what you want out of reading ebooks.

IndieBound Reader App: If you use an Android device, this is the app for you. It allows you to shop with Porter Square Books (or the indie bookstore of your choice) directly through the app and since we added stored credit card information, you can buy and read PSB ebooks in mere moments. The app also supports highlighting and annotation and has a whole range of display settings, from font size to brightness. It also plays well with other ebooks sites like Project Gutenberg and NetGalley. (And probably any site that uses .epub ebooks, but I haven’t tried any of those yet.) With Project Gutenberg and NetGalley, at least, when I chose to download the ebooks I was given the option of importing them directly to my IndieBound Reader app library. I got the five-volume complete works of Edgar Allen Poe in about a minute. It also supports PDFs so you can download PDFs directly to your library and read, bookmark, and annotate them, making it a useful tool for readers and writers.

If you’ve got an iPad or iPhone or other iOS device, you still have to purchase ebooks through your browser and then download them into your app. Once you’ve purchased the ebook click on “download” and the ebook will download to your IndieBound Reader app library.

IndieBound Reader App for Android and iOS

Google eBooks: The Google Books app is really handy if you plan on reading ebooks on multiple devices. Because the books are stored in the cloud, if you start reading something on your iPhone on the train, you’ll be able to pick up where you left off on your iPad at home. It’s also a good choice if you want to conserve memory space on your device. You still have to use your browser to purchase the ebooks, but once purchased, you can instantly access them on every device with the app.

Google Reader App for Android and iOS

Both apps have their strong points and both apps give you the freedom to get ebooks from many different sources. Of course, there’s nothing stopping you from using both of them for different books or situations. Also, because our ebooks are .epub, you can read them on all kinds of other software like Adobe Digital Editions and Calibre.

Someone Gave You a Kindle Fire

2011-12-28T13:23:00.010-05:00

Whatever your opinion of Amazon might be, they have done a great job making sure people think of Kindles first when they think of ereaders. And the reviews of their various devices all pretty much say the same thing; for the price, Amazon makes decent devices. This means that a lot of readers over the last year have gotten Kindles, either as gifts or for themselves, without knowing how the device can limit where you shop for ebooks. If the reports that we’re hearing are accurate, a lot of you will be unwrapping Kindle Fires this year, whether or not you asked for them.

The good news is that you can use the IndieBound Reader app on the Kindle Fire, so even on your Amazon device, you’ll have the option to shop at independent bookstores for your ebooks. Though the IndieBound Reader app wasn’t designed to be used on the Kindle Fire, the staff at the American Booksellers Association have tested it and the results are good. Here is how you put the IndieBound Reader app on your Kindle Fire.

• First, configure your Kindle to allow sideloaded apps. Tap the Settings gear at the top right of the home screen, and then tap the “More” button.

• From the Settings menu, select “Device”

• Toward the bottom of this screen is a toggle that says “Allow Installation of Applications From Unknown Sources.” Switch this toggle from Off to On.

• A nasty security warning appears. Tap OK. You can now install sideloaded apps.

• Point your browser to http://www.indiebound.org/reader

• Tap the green button that reads “Download IndieBound Reader for Android”

• When the download is complete, a banner notification will appear at the top of the screen saying, “Download Complete” and a new notification will appear. Tap this notification at the top of the screen, and then tap on the successful download message to begin installation.

• You now have the IndieBound Reader app on your Kindle Fire! It will appear with your other apps on the “Apps” screen.

• (Optional) If you would like to disable sideloaded apps again, simply follow the first few steps and change the “Allow Installation of Applications From Unknown Sources” toggle back to Off again.

Check back next week for a post with a lot more details about using the IndieBound Reader app.

Or maybe you got a Nook Tablet. If so, you can use Adobe Digital Editions to move PSB ebooks onto your Nook Tablet just like with the older versions of the Nook.

Sideloading the IndieBound Reader app is, unfortunately, not as easy on the Nook Tablet as it is on the Kindle Fire, but once installed the app runs great thanks to the Nook Tablet’s superior hardware. Please note that a microSD card is required to run IndieBound Reader. However, if you still want to use the app, here’s how.

• You must have an SD card in order for the IndieBound Reader app to run. Because of the Nook’s unique file permissions sytem, it cannot write to your Nook directly. Make sure that a microSD card has been inserted before beginning this procedure.

• Unlike the Kindle Fire, the “Allow Installation of Applications From Unknown Sources” toggle is not available in the Nook’s settings menu. Instead, you must first try to sideload an APK in order to access this screen. So, point your Nook’s browser to http://www.indiebound.org/reader.

• Tap the green button that reads “Download IndieBound Reader for Android”

• “Starting Download” appears. Nothing further seems to happen!

• Tap the three-arrow icon in the lower left corner. This pulls up a notifications dialog.
Tap on the IBReader-x.x.apk download.

• Complete action using… choose Package Installer

• A security dialog appears. Choose “Settings.”

• You are taken to a hidden settings page on your Nook where you can enable the
installation of sideloaded apps. Check the box next to “Unknown sources.”

• A scary security warning appears. Click OK.

• Tap the Back button next to the Application Settings page title. You will be returned to your web browser.

• Tap the arrow icon in the bottom right again. Tap on the downloaded IBReader apk
again.

• Complete action using… choose Package Installer

• Install the application.

Running the application subsequently

Unfortunately, the Nook does not display sideloaded apps together with other apps on the system. There are two means of accessing sideloaded apps on your Nook Tablet.
1) The Search
Use the search to look up your app. You will need to search for “IB Reader” (with caps) to find it.
2) Sideload an app manager
This is a great solution if you plan to add more sideloaded apps in the future.

Sideloading the IndieBound Reader app on these devices can be a bit of a hassle, but it means you’ll have the freedom to chose where you want to shop for ebooks. Furthermore, I think it’s a really good reading app in general. It supports annotation and plenty of formatting options and makes buying ebooks really easy. More on the app next week.

The Perfect Book Part 3

2011-12-14T19:40:00.004-05:00

Part 3 of The Perfect Book. Check out Part 2 and Part1.

Hockey’s Original 6: Breathtaking, vivid photos make this perfect for book for the hockey fan.

Hard Way Around and Atlantic: For the seafarer, whether actual or would-be.

The Art of Medicine: For that doctor or medical student in the family:

One Writer’s Garden: For Eudora Welty fans, horticulturalists, and lovers of American literature. A beautiful gift book, the perfect companion to One Writer’s Beginnings.

The Exegesis of Philip K. Dick: For the delusion paranoid member of the family in search of the universal order and/or the hardcore Phillip K. Dick fan.

A History of the World in 100 Objects: For the perpetually curious interested in history.

The Art of Asking Your Boss for a Raise by Georges Perec: For the office worker in search of a new perspective on his/her toil.

ABA Open Letter

2011-12-08T16:58:00.004-05:00

Like many independent booksellers we are a proud and active member of the American Booksellers Association. The CEO of our organization, Oren Teicher, has written an open letter in response to a new app promotion just announced by Amazon. I thought it important enough to share.

This week Amazon.com announced that customers who go into bricks-and-mortar stores on Saturday, December 10, use the company’s smartphone price check app on select products, and then purchase that product from Amazon will receive a discount of up to $5.

While books were not included in the promotion, indie bookstores, like other Main Street retailers, were outraged by the online giant’s latest move.

Dear Jeff Bezos,

We’re not shocked, just disappointed.

Despite your company’s recent pledge to be a better corporate citizen and to obey the law and collect sales tax, you created a price-check app that allows shoppers to browse Main Street stores that do collect sales tax, scan a product, ask for expertise, and walk out empty-handed in order to buy on Amazon. We suppose we should be flattered that an online sales behemoth needs a Main Street retail showroom.

Forgive us if we’re not.

We could call your $5 bounty to app-users a cheesy marketing move and leave it at that. In fact, it is the latest in a series of steps to expand your market at the expense of cities and towns nationwide, stripping them of their unique character and the financial wherewithal to pay for essential needs like schools, fire and police departments, and libraries.

But maybe we’ve misunderstood.

Even though you’ve spent millions on lobbyists, fired affiliates in seven states, and threatened to shut warehouses to avoid collecting sales tax, maybe you really mean it now when you say you support a level playing field.

It’s up to you to show us.

In the meantime, indie retailers remain the heart of countless communities — offering discovery, energy, support, and unique experiences. See you on Main Street.

Sincerely,

Oren Teicher, CEO
American Booksellers Association

2011-12-08T16:55:00.001-05:00

While books were not included in the promotion, indie bookstores, like other Main Street retailers, were outraged by the online giant’s latest move.

ABA CEO Oren Teicher has written an open letter (below and here in PDF format) to Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos that highlights the glaring discrepancy between the company’s recent statements in support of sales tax fairness and this latest exploitation of an inequitable strategic advantage.

The Perfect Book Part 2

2011-12-07T13:50:00.005-05:00

Here is Part 2 of our holiday help series, The Perfect Book. Click here to visit Part 1.

I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith: The perfect ‘comfort book’ says Booker Prize winner Julian Barnes.

One Writer's Beginnings byEudora Welty: The perfect book for those yearning to write a memoir. This is a treasure.

Collected Poems of W. B. Yeats: The perfect collection of poetry for the nostalgic romantic in your life.

Swimming to Antarctica: Tales of a Long-Distance Swimmer by Lynne Cox: The perfect book to inspire the female athlete.

Aspects of the Novel by E.M. Forster: For all who appreciate good writing. A friendly approach to literary criticism and perfect for those would-be writers.

A Distant Mirror by Barbara W. Tuchman: The perfect read for the popular history enthusiast who loves copious set-pieces, anecdotes, perceptive observation and excellent writing.

Parallel Stories by Peter Nadas: For the reader in search of brilliance relatively unknown in the states and the reader looking to bite off more than they can chew.

The Perfect Book 2011

2011-11-30T14:39:00.006-05:00

We all know books make great gifts in general, but there is something really special about finding the perfect book for someone on your list. Here are some suggestions to help you find those books. (And check out our lists from last year. These books are still perfect for the right person.)

Crafting with Cat Hair: Fun, eco-friendly crafting projects mixed with information about cat grooming and care. Definitely a neat gift for all cat lovers, whether they're crafty or not!

Design Sponge: For those who like to adorn their homes and personal spaces with a unique touch--and on a budget.

Spencer Tracy: Anyone who loves Old Hollywood will find the new biography of Spencer Tracy by James Curtis a special treat.

Flip Flop Flyball: The intellectual sports fan and/or anyone interested in graphic design.

Train Dreams: For the reader in search of America.

Ready Player One: It is perfect for the techie and gaming guru in your life; the one who has the latest and greatest of everything, both in this world and in galaxies far, far away. No batteries required.

Noir, Fatale, and He Died with his Eyes Open: Perfect for the reader who likes a little smarts and a lot of edge in their mysteries.

More to come. And while you're thinking about books, check our What a Book is Worth posts for some wonderful and inspiring meditations on the importance of books in our lives.

Giving Ebooks as Holiday Gifts

2011-11-23T10:13:00.011-05:00

Want to give ebooks this holiday? Want to support PSB? Here are some devices and how they work with us, along with some other ebooks info.

TABLETS

iPad2 (16G/Wi-Fi)
With thousands of apps, great design, and cool features, it is still the industry standard.
Price: $499
How to Buy Ebooks from PSB: Use a web browser to buy from portersquarebooks.com
How to Read: The free Google Reader and IndieBound Reader (coming in December) apps will automatically sync with your purchases, both available at the App Store

Toshiba Thrive (16g/Wi-Fi)
The closest thing to a portable all around work station. Perfect for students, writers, & anyone looking to be productive and entertained on the go.
Price: $379
How to Buy Ebooks from PSB: Use the IndieBound Reader app to buy straight from Porter Square Books, available at the Android App Market
How to Read: The IndieBound Reader app will automatically sync with your purchases, even those made on other computers.

Samsung Galaxy Tab 8.9 (16G/Wi-Fi)
A slick device that packs all the features you want from a tablet into a very bookish size.
Price: $469
How to Buy Ebooks from PSB: Use the IndieReader app to buy straight from Porter Square Books, available at the Android App Market
How to Read: The IndieBound Reader app will automatically sync with your purchases, even those made on other computers.

The IndieBound Reader App for the Android will allow you to make purchases directly from Porter Square Books (or the Indie bookstore of your choice). You can adjust the font, font size, line spacing, margins, and more. It supports bookmarks and annotations, has brightness controls and a "Night Mode." It will also support other ebooks in industry standards like Adobe Digital Editions, ePub, and PDF. The app will be available for Apple products in December.

EREADERS

NOOK Simple Touch/Color (Wi-Fi)
The NOOK is consistently one of the best reviewed ereaders out there. With a little know-how the NOOK Color can be turned into a general tablet. (I use a rooted NOOK Color.)
Price: $99 (Nook Color $199)
How to Buy Ebooks from PSB: Download ebooks from portersquarebooks.com onto you computer.
How to Read: Use the free software Adobe Digital Editions to move the ebook from your computer onto your Nook.

iRiver Story HD (Wi-Fi)
This inexpensive reader has the highest resolution of any e-ink screen on the market and automatically syncs with your Google ebook purchases from portersquarebooks.com
Price: $139.99
How to Buy Ebooks from PSB: Use a web browser to buy from portersquarebooks.com
How to Read: Automatically syncs with your purchases whenever you connect it to the internet

Sony Reader WIFI PRS-T1BC
Sony released the first ereader and they’ve been making quality devices at a reasonable price ever since.
Price: $149.99
How to Buy Ebooks from PSB: Download ebooks from portersquarebooks.com onto your computer.
How to Read: Use the free software Adobe Digital Editions to move the ebook from your computer onto your Sony Reader.

Include a Porter Square Books Gift Card in with the device. Our gift cards are good for ebooks and all other online purchases.

For more information about devices visit the hardware section of our ebooks resource page. Things change quickly in the world of devices. Barnes and Noble has released a new Nook Tablet and though we haven't had a chance to look at it yet, it should work with our ebooks the same way the other Nook devices do. With a big decision like this, it's best to do your research. Wired, Engadget, and CNET, are three sites that consistently review devices like these. (and I scoured all of them for this post)

If you have any questions just ask. If we don't know the answer, we'll find out. Stop in or send an email to josh@portersquarebooks.com

A Very Foodie Holiday

2011-11-16T17:19:00.018-05:00

It’s probably too early to use terms like “golden age,” but we might be living in a golden age for people who like to read about food. Food writing, memoirs, cookbooks that read like works of art, and classics brought back into print. Here is a list of books for the foodie in your life.

The Classics

Escoffier: With maybe the exception of the Larousse Gastronomiqu e, Escoffier’s Le Guide Culinaire is the most important and foundational book of modern French cooking. Whether used as a cookbook or a reference book, it’s on the shelf of all the important chefs.

The Physiology of Taste by Brillat-Savarin: If you’ve watched Iron Chef, you’ve seen at least one quote from this beguiling and philosophical meditation on all things gastronomic. First published in France in 1825, this epicurean masterpiece has never been out of print.

On Food and Cooking by Harold McGee: It might be a stretch to credit On Food and Cooking with the current wave of creative cooking in homes and restaurants, but McGee’s book certainly laid a foundation for interesting thinking about food. By providing a background of science he helped open up the possibilities of cooking.

Food Writing

A Cook’s Tour by Anthony Bourdain: Anthony Bourdain’s most famous book is his memoir Kitchen Confidential and he is now paying the bills hosting No Reservations, what I consider one of the best shows on television. In this collection, written in conjunction with his first TV show, Bourdain explores the cultural resonances of food and travel, demonstrating how both activities can be pathways to a deeper understanding of life.

Blood, Bones and Butter: Gabrielle Hamilton’s memoir was one of the most highly acclaimed works of food writing in the last couple of years. On top of being an unflinching and lyrical work, Hamilton’s book (and life) proudly barges into a restaurant world that is still largely a bit of a boys club.

The Art of Eating: This probably belongs up in the Classics section above, but Brillat-Savarin beat MFK Fisher to it. Regardless, modern American food writing started with MFK Fisher and this is the definitive collection of her writing. Not willing to dive into a 748 page tome, her smaller collections, like How to Cook a Wolf and Consider the Oyster are good places to start.

On The Edge

Thai Street Food: If you want to get a true taste of a place’s culture, eat their street food. This gorgeous book presents the street food of one of the world’s most vibrant and interesting culinary cultures. The pictures make this book as much at home on the coffee table as on the kitchen table.

Mission Street Food: Part graphic novel, part memoir, part cookbook, the story of the Mission Street Food book is about a changing American food culture and a couple of people following their dream to run a restaurant.

A Day at elBulli: The recently closed elBulli was considered by many to be the best restaurant in the world, and its head chef, Ferran Adria, to be one of the world’s most creative minds. Though there are recipes in the book, this isn’t a cookbook, so much as it is an exploration of the process of creation focused around food and eating. A great book for artists and writers whether they read about food or not.

Something You Might Actually Cook From

Family Meal: Every day the staff at elBulli sat down together for a family meal before service. The meals were simple, hearty affairs designed to help power the chefs through their long night, but still spiced with the creativity that made Ferran Adria and elBulli world famous. With elBulli now closed, this book will be the closest we can get to tasting Adria’s genius.

Momofuku Milk Bar: If there’s an American Ferran Adria, it might be David Chang, whose restaurants and cookbooks, and now a quarterly food magazine, infuse food and cooking with the rebellious raucous energy of a punk rock show. This book is recipes from the bakery of the same name run by the equally creative Christina Tosi. Who wouldn’t want to whip up a compost cookie, crack pie, and cereal milk ice cream.

The Good Eats Trilogy (Vols 1, 2, and 3): I make more recipes by Alton Brown than by anyone else. His DIY philosophy combined with his commitment to share the reasons for recipes make his one of the most educational cooking shows out there. These books collect all the recipes and techniques from his long running show.

Come Home for the Holidays

2011-11-09T17:43:00.005-05:00

It’s hard to believe it’s time to start thinking about holiday shopping, but, well it is. As you plan your gift-giving this year, we’d just like to tell you about some of the extra benefits of shopping at locally owned independent stores.

Shopping Local is a Job Creation Program. There is a lot of debate about how to create jobs in America, but an easy way for everyone to participate is to shop local. A bookstore the size of Porter Square Books employs 11.6 full time equivalent employees for every $1 million in sales. Walmart employs 5 people for every $1 million in sales. Amazon employs 1. (Institute for Local Self-Reliance) In terms of revenue and actual job creation, another study found that $1 million in revenue shifted to locally owned business would create 2.14 jobs, as compared with 1.27 jobs at chains and .39 jobs when you include online only retailers. And it doesn’t take much. A study in San Francisco found that if shoppers shifted only 10% of their buying to locally owned businesses, it would create 1,295 jobs.

And Those Jobs Usually Pay Better. Economists Stephan Goetz and David Flemin analyzed 2,953 counties, including both rural and urban places, and found that those with a larger density of small, locally owned businesses experienced greater per capita income growth between 2000 and 2007. The presence of large, non-local businesses, meanwhile, had a negative effect on incomes.

Keeping Us Here Makes Your Home More Valuable. And speaking of stimulus, a report studying 27 neighborhoods in 15 major cities found that home values in neighborhoods with thriving independent businesses outperformed their broader markets by 4 percent per year and 50 percent cumulatively over the past 14 years.

It Helps Us Give Back. A 1991 study (most recent I could find for this specific data) found that small businesses donate twice as much, per employee, to charities as large companies. Other studies have confirmed this general trend. Furthermore, because this is our home, we donate to charities in our community and work with organizations like Breakthrough Cambridge and Youk’s Kids that improve the lives of people living here.

Your Money Stays in Your Community. Because we give here and live here, more of your money stays here when you shop with us. With taxes, profits, wages, and the giving mentioned above, $45 out of every $100 you spend at a locally owned store like us, stays in the community. It funds schools and other public services, it pays the rent, it goes back into other local businesses through our own shopping. Only $13 out of $100 stays here when you shop at a national chain. Even less would stay when shopping at an online only store.

For more information about the effect of shopping local visit Civic Economics, The Institute for Local Self-Reliance, and Cambridge Local First. And a special thanks to Senior Researcher and author of The Big-Box Swindle, Stacy Mitchell for finding some of this data for me.

And on top of all the good economic stuff, you get to give someone a book. To borrow a little business-ese, I don’t think there’s a much bigger return-on-investment.

Books help keep me alive and for that I am forever happy

2011-10-26T17:06:00.003-04:00

As a child, I had a difficult time learning how to read. It wasn’t that I didn’t want to read. In fact, I desperately wanted to be able to do what my mother and father did every day with me—make words on the page come out of their mouths in magical sounds. I would stare at those squiggly black lines on the page trying to make them into words, into something, anything I could make sense of. I wanted to make them mine.

And then suddenly, one day, BAM, I was reading! The black lines were words, glorious words. I ate every one of them right up and haven’t looked back since. I now work at a literacy non-profit spreading the love and pleasure of, you guessed it, reading. The most incredible moments in my work are when a young person finds a book that they can truly and deeply connect with. Many of my students consistently say “I don’t like reading”, or “Reading is boring”. So, when I see a young person re-reading a Mo Willems Pigeon book for the hundredth time and begging their staff to read it to them, I know I’ve succeeded, if just a little, in helping children see that reading can be joyous.

Although I’ve known that I love reading, lately I’ve been even more grateful of the space it occupies in my life. I’ve been going through a bit of a rough patch lately—I’ll spare you the particulars, but let’s just say I’ve been feeling like I’m in a boat floating about in a wild sea with no oar, no sails, and no map. And when in a boat like that, it’s challenging to keep sight of what’s positive and hopeful in life. Instead of seeing the blue sky and taking the time to breathe, I can only see the obnoxious fellow riders on the bus and T, the angry pedestrians, and experience a general feeling of malaise. The other day I was at the gym finishing the book Incredibly Close and Extremely Loud by Jonathan Safron Foer. For unknown reasons, I’ve resisted his books up to this point. I don’t know why, because now I’m a HUGE convert. So, I had loved the book up to this point, but the ending: wow. I had the weirdest experience—I’m on the elliptical, sweating my bum off, physically moving my body , and doing my damnedest not to break out in giant sobs as I try to finish the book. I looked out the window at the breathtakingly blue sky and just thought, Oh man, I am so full of feeling and life and look at that sky and I am alive. And I am alive. Books help keep me alive and for that I am forever happy. If I can continue to find bliss in books and to help other people find bliss, I’ll continue to find meaning in this crazy thing we call life.

Sarah Farbo

Want to see more posts like this? Click here. And we want to hear from you. Send your thoughts on the worth of books to josh@portersquarebooks.com. Click here for more info.

Porter Square Books Featured in Demand

2011-10-26T13:40:00.003-04:00

It’s always gratifying to hear from customers how glad they are that our store is in the neighborhood. We never tire of it! Even more thrilling to be recognized for what we do in print by a veteran management consultant and bestselling business author.

In his new book Demand: Creating What People Love Before They Know They Want It, Adrian Slywotsky includes Porter Square Books among the many companies he profiles recognizing us with those who achieve success by taking “the individual-customer based approach”. “Like Fresh Pond Market, their store has become a platform offering a wide array of products that can be organized and configured around customers’ varying, ever-changing needs.”

Words are my food & I Hope Others Will Join the Feast

2011-10-19T14:20:00.004-04:00

The people who ask me what they should read are often the most cat-killing curious of customers, the men and women (and sometimes children) that want, simply put, to be entertained by something new. To this question I respond: “Well, what do you like?” It’s true that everyone has their favorite authors, just as everyone has their literary enemies. Working in a new and used bookstore, where the smell of ancient bindings is always waiting for a covert sniff, I field a lot of ambiguous questions; and you know what? I love it. Words are my food, and I hope others will join in on the feast.

Books can be harsh and silly, they can heal you and hurt you and echo in your mind like cannon-fire. They are redemptive and fun, and can swim raucously around in your intestines like greasy food. Time-tested literature is worth, to me, more than I can express in such a short space. Reading has changed me in the most significant way, as it has given a gift: the realization that I want to be a writer. No longer do I feel the conflict of your average mid-twenties male, puppy-lost in his career search. Now I have a purpose.

I think everyone should read something for pleasure, and it saddens me that there are individuals who do not. How beautiful is this thing called language, the only connection between the author’s vision and the reader’s imagining? As a novelist friend once told me, stories save lives. Books are so much more than just what you hold in your hand. Books are what you hold inside.

Ian Ross

This is Ian's take on the worth of a books. We'd like to hear yours. Send your stories, thoughts, comments, etc, to josh@portersquarebooks.com or Click Here for more info.

Zone One, Colson Whitehead’s Bucket List, and PSB

2011-10-18T14:45:00.005-04:00

Colson Whitehead’s new novel Zone One is out today. The book is one of the most anticipated novels of the fall and is already garnering plenty of praise. To share a couple of choice quotes, USA Today says: "Highbrow novelist Colson Whitehead plunges into the unstoppable zombie genre in this subtle meditation on loss and love in a post-apocalyptic Manhattan, which has become the city that never dies," and The Daily Beast says "A satirist so playful that you often don't even feel his scalpel, Whitehead toys with the shards of contemporary culture with an infectious glee. Here he upends the tropes of the zombie story in the canyons of lower Manhattan. Horror has rarely been so unsettling, and never so grimly funny." In Zone One, Whitehead turns his particular brilliance on the idea of zombies, zombie apocalypse and New York City. And he’ll be reading with us on Thursday November 3rd. And he had this to say about Porter Square Books:

“I went to college in Cambridge, so whenever I read at Porter Square Books, it’s always an occasion for quiet reflection as I’m reminded of how far I’ve come, and how far I still have to go. For example, after losing my virginity last week, I’m now halfway through my freshman year bucket list. Now to land that gig as a lead dancer in a Debbie Gibson video...”

Want a sneak peek of Zone One? Here is a link to the first 19 pages.

PITCH-A-PALOOZA??

2011-10-18T14:16:00.004-04:00

Here are the particulars about our upcoming Pitchapalooza event November 10 AT 7 PM.

WHAT: Pitchapalooza is American Idol for books (only without Simon). Twenty writers will be selected at random to pitch their book. Each writer gets one minute—and only one minute! In the last month, three writers have gotten publishing deals as a result of participating in Pitchapalooza.

WHO: Arielle Eckstut and David Henry Sterry are co-founders of The Book Doctors, a company dedicated to helping authors get their books published. They are also co-authors of The Essential Guide to Getting Your Book Published: How To Write It, Sell It, and Market It… Successfully (Workman, 2010). Arielle Eckstut has been a literary agent for 18 years at The Levine Greenberg Literary Agency. She is also the author of seven books and the co-founder of the iconic brand, LittleMissMatched. David Henry Sterry is the best-selling author of 12 books, on a wide variety of subject including memoir, sports, YA fiction and reference. They have taught their workshop on how to get published everywhere from Stanford University to Smith College. They have appeared everywhere from The New York Times to NPR’s Morning Edition to USA Today.

HOW: At Pitchapalooza, judges will help you improve your pitch, not tell you how bad it is. Judges critique everything from idea to style to potential in the marketplace and much, much more. Authors come away with concrete advice as well as a greater understanding of the ins and outs of the publishing industry. Whether potential authors pitch themselves, or simply listen to trained professionals critique each presentation, Pitchapalooza is educational and entertaining for one and all. From Miami to Portland, from LA to NYC, and many stops along the way, Pitchapaloozas have consistently drawn standing-room-only crowds, press and blog coverage, and the kind of bookstore buzz reserved for celebrity authors.

Most importantly...

PRIZE: At the end of Pitchapalooza, the judges will pick a winner. The winner receives an introduction to an agent or publisher appropriate for his/her book.

PRICE OF ADMISSION: To sign up to pitch, you must purchase a copy of The Essential Guide To Getting Your Book Published. Anyone who buys a copy of receives a FREE 20 minute consultation, a $100 value. If you don’t want to pitch, the event is FREE.

Here's some of the press on the event:

New York Times article: http://tinyurl.com/3tkp4gl.
Pitchapalooza mini movie: http://tinyurl.com/3jr8zte.
Pitchapalooza on NBC: http://www.thebookdoctors.com/the-book-doctors-pitchapalooza-on-nbc-television

REMEMBER, YOU HAVE TO BE AMONG THE FIRST 20 TO PURCHASE THE BOOK TO GET THE OPPORTUNITY TO PITCH TO THE PANEL AND THE AUDIENCE. DO NOT DELAY!

If you have to hide a book, it must be valuable

2011-10-16T12:23:00.003-04:00

THE WHALES, a picture book by Cynthia Rylant full of beautiful illustrations of whales, naturally, was the first book I was driven to hide. Now, I’m as fond of whales as the next person, and I’m fond of picture books. Fondness can dim though, when a two-year-old asks for a whale book to be read not just once or twice a day, but once or twice an hour. We had stacks of picture books in the house. It didn’t matter. They seemed to be invisible, so I admit it, I hid the chosen book for a few hours each day. For a child of two, out of sight was out of mind, and it meant I got a welcome respite to all whales, all the time.

The day did come when my son didn’t want me to read the book more than a few times. Joy reigned. I read him at least ten other picture books I had waiting. Wonderful, colorful, fabulous stories. I was happy. But for those of you with book-obsessed toddlers, I’m sure you can guess what came next. A different book, this one called OUR NEW KITTEN by Harriet Hanes, became the new must-read all the time. We ended up with three copies of that book. After the first was in tatters, from the necessary practice of turning pages to him carrying it around like a talisman to me hiding it in the hamper and under sofa cushions, I bought two more. One, I cut up, putting each page in a protective sleeve, and then punching holes in the cover and rebinding it with string. The other I put away, because if a book is so well-loved, it must not be forgotten.

My son is long past that age, and now carries around books so that he can sneak in a few pages of reading when he has time. I still buy picture books, especially around the holidays. They are supposedly just a quirk of mine, but I find when I’m reading them, others in the family migrate to sit next to me just to keep me company. No whale books though. I might have to resort to hiding them.

Dee Garretson

Would you like to share a story or answer the question what is a book worth? Click here for more info.

Your Answers to the Question: What is a Book Worth?

2011-10-13T14:41:00.004-04:00

A few weeks ago, I wrote a blog post looking at the value of books, mostly because I wanted to talk abut something other than how much books cost. In some ways, it was a very general look at what books do in our world, but in other ways it was a very personal statement, it was me telling you how valuable books are to me. From conversations in the store, to reading blogs, to following all the bookish goodness on Twitter, I know that I am far from alone. Books are valuable to many people for many different reasons. I’d like to share those reasons with the world.

So send me an answer to the question: What is a book worth? You can talk very generally about books and reading in your life. You can share a story about a particular book that was and is important in your life. You can tell a story about giving that perfect gift, getting that perfect gift, or the one book you always seem to lend out, but never seem to get back. There are many different readers, many different books, and many different ways a book can be valuable, and I’d like to hear about all of them.

So please send your response(s) to josh@portersquarebooks.com. You can write something of blog length (1-3 paragraphs), you can include pictures, if you want to make a video you can upload it to youtube and send me the link. What am I going to do with them? I’ll post everything I get on our blog and spread those answers around on Twitter and Facebook. If there’s a quote we think is particularly pithy or powerful we’ll display it somewhere in the store. And then we’ll see what happens. If there’s a big response, we might try to do something else. If not, then we’ll still have a collection of thoughts, reflections, ideas, and stories about books. That alone, seems worthwhile.

Have Bugs, Will Travel

2011-09-28T21:49:00.005-04:00

A few years ago, I wrote a book about earthworms and I brought worms with me on the book tour. This was easier than you might think; they lived in a little plastic container filled with dirt and seemed very content to ride around in my carry-on. They even made it through airport security without a hitch. (I called the airline before I traveled with them to ask if there was any prohibition against bringing live worms on a plane. After a long pause, the guy said, "Are they, like--man-eating worms?" He thought they would be fine, and they were.)

So the worms were nice. People liked them. I got them out at every event and dropped them into audience members' outstretched hands. Then I'd take the worm back and give them a little hand wipe in a foil packet. It was a nice touch, I thought--a little bit of extra customer service.

Naturally, people assumed I'd bring bugs with me on the Wicked Bugs tour as well. This was not so easy. I tried to imagine myself boarding airplanes with live black widows, bed bugs, and scorpions. I wasn't sure how I'd keep them alive (well, I guess I know how I would have kept the bed bugs alive) and I didn't think bookstore audiences would be so happy to see them.

Instead, I contacted a freelance entomologist whose company, God of Insects, supplies bugs for photo shoots, movies, and television shows. I sent them my species list, and they sent me a box of bugs. Dead bugs.

So far, I've had no trouble getting them through airport security, and there's no need for the little foil-wrapped hand wipes. That alone should be reason enough for you to come out to my event on October 21, but if you need an extra incentive, I promise any number of spine-tingling tales, just in time for Halloween, of bugs gone bad. I hope to see you there.

Just My Type Author Simon Garfield on the Porter Square Books Logo.

2011-09-28T15:41:00.005-04:00

Just My Type is a delightful and inquisitive tour of the rich history and subtle power of type. Simon Garfield looks into the world of fonts, meets the designers behind the typefaces, and takes an in-depth look at the best and worst font through the ages. Here's what Simon had to say about the font in our very own logo:

“It's somehow fitting that this indie emporium in learned collegiate Cambridge should choose such a British institution as Times New Roman for its ID. The typeface has always been associated with knowledge and elucidation, and even though it can be criticised for being a bit old-world, it can't be faulted for its clarity or purpose. Originated by Stanley Morison in the early 1930s, it was intended to provide a crisper way of presenting the London Times, but it was a modernisation rooted in traditional values even then. It has certainly stood the test of time - not a bad symbol for a well-established book store in challenging times.”

The Letters of Ernest Hemingway 1907-1922

2011-09-20T12:08:00.004-04:00

Cambridge University Press released today the first volume of The Letters of Ernest Hemingway covering the years 1907 to 1922. They've made available a short promotional video with Hemingway's son Patrick and the General Editor, Sandra Spaniel, that I think serves as a useful introduction to this important new collection.

What is a Book Worth?

2011-09-14T15:47:00.005-04:00

Some time in college I read Ishmael by Daniel Quinn and everything changed. The way I saw humanity, the world, and how the two go together was completely different. Pretty much the same thing happened when I read A People’s History of the United States. It wasn’t just learning about events and people that weren’t taught in school, but learning that history is a story that changes depending on who is narrating. What do you think those books are worth to me?

What is it worth to parents to see their children finally turn off the TV for a few hours because they simply have to find out what happens to Harry, Hermione, and Ron? What about a really good book club discussion? Looking up at the clock and realizing you’ve been in a different world for three hours? How about a dessert serving of entertaining escapism that picks you up after a terrible week at work? Or that moment when your friend tells you they absolutely loved the book you gave them? That it changed their life? That it saved their life?

I started thinking about this after a brief, exchange on Twitter about the price of ebooks. Someone voiced what I think is a pretty common sentiment; publishers are going to struggle as long as they insist on charging more than $10 for what is essentially a computer file. I responded that you don’t really buy a file when you buy an ebook, in the exact same way that you don’t buy a bunch of paper and some ink when you buy a book. You buy the efforts of an author, editor, and publisher and all the infrastructure it takes to get a book out of an author’s head and into a reader’s hands.

But it occurred to me that I’ve been spending way too much time explaining how much books cost and not nearly enough time talking about much books are worth. What is the value you get for the money you spend? Many people are willing to spend hundreds of dollars on devices they are going to replace in a year or less. Or $25-250 or even more on dinner and drinks with friends. When two hours of movie entertainment costs $10-15 (or more) why should we be taken aback by $15 for an experience that will last at least ten times as long. (That you can give away or sell to someone else if you don’t like. Try giving a movie ticket to a friend of yours who you think is more likely to appreciate the style of the film.) Check out this post at Beyond the Margins by Randy Sue Meyers for a similar discussion, complete with research.

The point is that what a book costs in terms of money and what a book is worth are very different things. I’m not saying everyone should drop everything and spend hundreds of dollars on books or that books and ebooks should be more expensive, but that we should think of the price of the book second. So if you find yourself in a bookstore considering buying a book, remember that rainy Saturday afternoon you spent as a child reading Treasure Island, or your own child jumping around for joy with the latest Harry Potter, or passing along A Grief Observed to a friend who needs it, and then check the price. Whatever it is, you’re holding one of the best bargains around.

On the E-Horizon

2011-09-07T14:08:00.003-04:00

There are some fun things coming up in the world of ebooks and Porter Square Books.

First of all, Random House is running an ebooks sale through September. Twelve titles are specially priced including Lisa See’s Shanghai Girls, and Alice Hoffman’s The Story Sisters. They’ve also specially priced some children’s ebooks for the first time including The Magic Tree House Dinosaurs before Dark and The Penderwicks. Click here for the full list of featured ebooks.

Algonquin Books is offering an ebooks bundle in October. With the purchase of a hardcover copy of Hilary Jordon’s new novel When She Woke, (being released on October 1) you can get a postcard with a URL, promotion code and instructions for downloading the ebook edition. When She Woke is a retelling of The Scarlett Letter, except instead of wearing a big red letter “A” as Hester Prynne does, Hannah Payne is red herself, for the crime of murder. The victim, says the state of Texas, was her unborn child, and Hannah is determined to protect the identity of the father, a public figure with whom she shared a fierce and forbidden love. Inspired by The Scarlet Letter, When She Woke is a dark fable about a stigmatized woman struggling to navigate a dystopian, theocratic America of the not-too-distant future, where convicted felons are no longer imprisoned and rehabilitated, but “chromed” and released back into the population to survive as best they can. This ebooks bundle is perfect for those of you who like to keep your hardcover books in pristine condition but still want to read it. Having cake and eating it too. The promotion lasts until October 31.

The American Booksellers Association is working on a reader app for Android and Apple tablets. The app will integrate with your Google Account and, on Android platforms, will allow you to shop for ebooks from Porter Square Books within the app. It is based on the well-regarded BlueFire Reader app and will update automatically whenever BlueFire does. You can check out BlueFire to get a preview of IndieBound Reader.

Finally, in the even more distant future, Random House is teaming up with Politico to provide real-time, in-depth, insider narratives of the 2012 election, as it unfolds. The series will be written by Mike Allen, Politico's chief White House Correspondent and author of the renowned dailytip-sheet, Playbook, and Evan Thomas, award-winning writer and author. The first installment is scheduled for release on November 28, 2011 and will be a $2.99 ebook. This will be a unique resource for political junkies.

As always, you can get more info about ebooks from our Ebooks Resource Page.

Interview with Dennis Johnson of Melville House

2011-08-31T14:21:00.006-04:00

If you read about the book industry at all, you’ve run into some permutation of the phrase “Everything is changing,” and once you hit that phrase you almost always run into “But nobody knows what’s coming next,” next. Melville House Press might be what’s next. Publishing daring fiction like Tao Lin and Christopher Boucher, creating collections like the Neversink Library and Art of the Novella series, and embracing new reading technology with their Hybrid Books, Melville House displays everything that has made publishing important in the past, with the potential of the future. Below is an interview with publisher Dennis Johnson.

What are Hybridbooks?

It's a project we've developed that takes the concept of the enhanced ebook and imposes it onto print media.

It's very simple — if you buy a book in the HybridBooks series, you will find in its back pages a QR Code that you can scan with your smart phone, and that will take you to a trove of free material related to the book. For example, for our edition of Giacomo Casanova’s The Duel you’ll find an excerpt from Casanova's diary detailing the actual duel he was involved in that inspired the book; an article about the hunt to find the manuscript of the book, which was lost for centuries; paintings and portraits of Casanova and the figures in his world; and lots of stuff about dueling, including a comic essay by Mark Twain on French dueling, lots of paintings of famous duels; photos of historic dueling weapons; and an illustrated account of a famous duel fought from hot air balloons.

These addendums, which we're calling "Illuminations," are hundreds of pages long — in every instance so far, longer than the book they accompany. They're free ebooks, basically, and they're available in every format, for any reading device. You don't need a QR scanner to get them, either. There's a url to follow, or we can just email them to you.

What potential is there for digital technology to change and/or improve the experience of reading?

Well, I think the HybridBook project really speaks to that. I've always ignored traditional introductions and afterwords in the classics I've read in trade editions. I don't like scholarly types telling me what to think and appreciate in a book before I've even read the thing. On the other hand, if I read a classic and like it, I usually want to know more about the book and the writer and what it's about. So I inevitably launch a giant search for information inspired by the book -- just endless, wandering and impromptu research into the author and their times, the background to the story and maybe the location, and endless research into little tidbits from the story -- such as, say, what's a ginger nut, the thing Bartleby is always eating in Bartleby the Scrivener? See, a great story can stay with you that way, with so many different levels of interest and intensity that it ultimately takes you into an expanded sense of its meaning. So that is the experience we emulate with HybridBooks. By putting all that stuff into one package, I think we've improved the core experience of reading Bartleby, or The Duel, or whatever. And yes, the Illuminations for our edition of Bartleby tell you what a ginger nut is.

What are some of the limitations of digital technology in terms of books and reading? What can paper and binding do that screens and apps still can’t?

You know, no one ever thinks of print books as "technology," but of course a book is one of the most absolutely amazing pieces of technology ever invented, right up there with the wheel. In fact, it's a superior technology that actually has lots of advantages over the more modern technology supposedly replacing it. For one thing, it's a technology that never needed a 2.0 — think about it: you can still access the information in the very first book ever printed. It's a Gutenberg Bible and it's still in one piece, the binding still works, the pages are unfrayed and still completely readable ... and it's 500 years old! And you don't need any particular training or skill to do so -- a monkey could access the data loaded into a book ... all that you have to do is open it. Further, a book is the reading technology that's easiest on your eyes, is as portable as any computer or reading device, usually in fact weighs less, never needs a charge, and if you drop it it still works. A book is also 100% recyclable, which is not true of any digital reading device, and certainly will not be during our lifetime. Plus, you can read it in the bathtub, secure in the knowledge that if you drop it in the water you won't 1. be out hundreds of dollars, and 2. electrocute yourself.

Meanwhile the basement of the Library of Congress is littered with old fiches and tapes and cartridges and whatnot that are loaded with art and information that is now unreadable for numerous reasons and is therefore lost forever. Then there's the problem of getting rid of that junk, which poses a significant hazard to the environment.

But I say all that only to emphasis how amazing a print book is, which people just seem to blank out on sometimes. This is why people love books and they won't go away. Of course, neither will ebooks. And they've got a long list of equally obvious advantages — god knows I love being able to read manuscripts on my iPad and not wasting so much paper, and it's great to be able to travel with an entire library like that. And as I've come to appreciate with the Illuminations in our HybridBooks, there is no better way to view color art than on that iPad. From a publisher's perspective, that's awesome — up until now, a little publisher like us couldn't really afford to make books that are heavy in color art. But we can afford to make ebooks that are ....

The point is that it's super-important to note that we shouldn't see digital and print as being competitive. The really big corporations that sell books -- retailers and maybe some publishers, too -- want you to see it that way because they'd love to get rid of their warehouses and skip the packaging and postal expenses and the salaries of the people working those areas for them and sell you something they make a higher margin on -- ebooks.

But the fact is that in many ways print books and digital books are apples and oranges, because we read differently in each format, and I think that's going to mean the development of ebooks that are significantly different qualitatively from print books. Again, our HybridBooks project illustrates the point — the Illuminations are essentially ebooks, but you won't read them from start to finish the way you would the print text they're accompanying. You skip around in them, reading the parts you like first, probably not as deeply nor with as much retention as with the print text, and you would generally emulate the way you read on a computer. That was our thinking in the development of the thing, anyway — that it was a way to put two different kinds of reading together and show how they compliment each other. This is part of our statement of support for the belief in the co-existence of print and digital.

Melville House has created a couple of different collections, the Neversink Library and the Art of the Novella. Why did you decide to create these collections? What do these curated collections offer that wouldn’t be there if you just published all the books individually?

It was mostly just out of personal passion for those kinds of books. I mean, Jesus, The Train is the best book Georges Simenon ever wrote. Why is it out of print? How cool is it to be able to fix that little problem? Answer: It's totally cool! In fact, we practically have a party every time we have an editorial meeting to work on selections for the Neversink. The whole staff comes over to the table with stacks of books they think we should do, and it can get pretty raucous.

As for novellas -- well, that came out of my experience when I was in the writing program at the University of Iowa. It seemed to me that every one of my fellow students had written a novella, but then we would each just put it in a drawer knowing we could never sell it, because it was too long for a lit journal, and too short to be a book. So it was this very pure thing everyone was doing, art for arts sake, more so even than a short story or a poem. And I just fell in love with the form. So when I suddenly found myself with a publishing company, I thought I'd act on that passion and see what happened. It's kind of the same impulse that I followed when I wrote fiction -- you just do it because you're following an artistic impulse. You imagine an audience but don't really think about them. You just do it. As it happened, it worked. But I have to say, it was just instinct. In the early days, lots of people told us it was an idiotic thing to do -- people in the biz, some sales reps at our distributor and a couple of buyers at some very big accounts. There was particular hostility toward the design of the series -- the text-only presentation, the bright colors, the whole thing. They wanted pictures, art, you can imagine. Now, we win design awards and people laud us in particular for those books. But it was not an easy sell. It taught us to follow our instincts, the way we did, Valerie and I, when we were just artists making art.

Along the same lines we started a crime series about a year ago, simply because I thought that for all the crime series out there no one was really getting what crime fiction should be about. They were just running with the idea of books as cheap entertainment -- the bestseller principle. I think of crime fiction as literary and political. To me, noir was born in the work of the sunshine of the California trinity; James M. Cain, Raymond Chandler, and Dashiell Hammett. Their work was smart, beautifully crafted, treated the reader intelligently, and was rooted in the socio-economic politics of the day -- they were born of the depression and the rise of fascism. They weren't just brain-dead whodunits like Agatha Christie. They were uniquely American, but a form that could be applied to any culture. So that's what we look for, and I think that's what makes it our own. And of course, that all fits in nicely with what we're already known for -- works in translation, political writing, great prose, and a kind of activist, you-can-do-something-about-it feel.

As for any advantage to being part of a series -- well, there are lots of advantages. For one thing, all three series are pretty popular, and so good-looking that most booksellers display them as a group. So people recognize them as a brand they come to trust. And that level of design also speaks well for our attention to the texts.

And in a successful series, each book helps the other, while it's also a boost for any given book in the series. This is particularly true in our novella series, which is a public domain series, as there are other versions of some of these titles out there. I also just think people like series publishing. It's a sign of dedication and concentration that speaks to their own dedication as readers. It's a different level of publishing.

How do you choose books for these series?

Complete whimsy. They're just books that we love. Publishing is so hard that you have to feel that way about everything that you publish. That's the way the first series, the novella series, started -- back when the company was just me and Valerie working off the kitchen table -- and that's the way we've tried to keep it.

What responsibilities do publishers have to society?

They have an obligation not only to publish books that support the cause of culture and the promulgation of information important to a democracy, and fearlessly so, but also to support the cause of literacy. I think the emergence of digital media can really help in that fight, so it could be a good moment for that, but I must observe that few publishers, strangely, seem to be involved in the effort. Perhaps it's that publishing is so hard that most publishers already feel like they're running some kind of charity!

Beyond that I also feel a personal obligation to educate people -- writers and translators in particular -- about how publishing works. Most of them have absolutely no sense of publishing being a business -- it's the place where art meets commerce -- and it's to their detriment. They have no idea about how much it costs to make a book, for example, nor what booksellers go through to sell their work. I also feel it's important for readers in general to know about the business in greater depth, so they'd know how badly Amazon is damaging their cultural and free-speech issues, for example, or understand the reasons that digital media is being pushed at them so hard, which has nothing to do with whether it's the best way for them to receive literary information.

What’s the most exciting thing happening, or who are the most exciting writers in America right now?

We've published two books this summer by two of the most radical writers we've ever published -- which is saying something -- and they are to my mind the most exciting writers around. One is David Graeber whose book is called Debt: The First 5,000 Years, and the other is Christopher Boucher, whose book is a novel called How to Keep Your Volkswagen Alive. David is one of the most highly intellectual yet hilarious writers we've ever published, and his book is like an exciting journey into something you thought you understood but will come out thinking entirely differently about. Chris, on the other hand, is a flat-out avant-gardist, but he is to my mind perhaps the most accessible avant-garde writer ever. He's funny and tells a beautiful story about love, and in the end his weirdness becomes a very gripping thing and leads you to enter his story in a depth that's going to feel new and different. There's really nothing like either one of these guys out there anywhere, and you really feel changed at the end of both of these books.

Why did you decide to go into publishing? Was there a particular book that showed you how powerful books could be?

It's a long story that essentially boils down to this: It was an accident. We had no intention of becoming publishers, and had no experience in the business beyond the fact that we were writers. But like most writers, we knew absolutely nothing about how publishing works. But it was 2001, George Bush had just been appointed president, and we were angry and desperate for a way to do something good for the country. Then 9-11 came along, and we were eyewitnesses. As it happened, I had a very hot book blog at the time -- one of the first -- called MobyLives. On Monday, September 10, Yahoo (the Google of its day) had named it the website of the week or month or something, so I suddenly had, the next day, tens of thousands of readers. And as events unfolded, friends in the city who were writers started writing in about their experiences. One, the poet George Murray, had a day job at 7 World Trade Center, and he wrote in about his escape, which was dramatic. Another poet, Elliot Katz, wrote in about watching it all go down from Queens. The playwright named Mike Daisey wrote about escaping downtown over the Brooklyn Bridge under a blizzard of paper.

And I just posted this stuff as a way to tell people what was going on -- the broadcast towers for all TV and radio were on the towers and so for most New Yorkers the internet was the only place to go for news -- and to say, hey, we're holding on. We started getting some attention -- the AP ran a big story about Elliot's poem, for example -- and it just kept growing. It was an utterly remarkable moment when people in New York were struck into the most thoughtful, spiritual state imaginable, wondering how that had happened, where had it come from, what we could do to impart this to others, how to make it never happen again, and in general some very deep philosophical wanderings. And poetry was everywhere! People were posting it on telephone polls and writing it into the letters to the editor section and most famously in the ashes covering lower Manhattan. It was like the average person thought this was a good way to respond.

Meanwhile Bush came to town and crawled up onto the rubble and said let's go to war. It was ridiculous and didn't represent at all what was going on in New York. And there was this moment when Valerie leaned over my shoulder to look at Moby and she said, "The stuff you're posting tells the story of New York right now so much better than what's in the newspapers." And that was the spark. We started looking into collecting material from Moby for what we thought would be some kind of political pamphlet cum poetry chapbook, and it all snowballed into a book called Poetry After 9/11, which sold a remarkable 12,000 copies that first year of release, and here we are ten years later.

What do you think publishing is going to look like in 10, 20, 50 years?

I've not a clue, which is what's so exciting, not to mention terrifying. Valerie and I have just surrounded ourselves with some of the most exciting creative thinkers we've ever known, and our plan is to simply sally forth and see what happens.

What are you reading now?

I'm not really at liberty to disclose that, because I'm reading stuff for the Neversink series that I'd prefer were a surprise to our fans. The most recent thing I've read that didn't relate to our own publishing program was You Are Not a Gadget by Jaron Lanier. What a great book!

Clue #1

2011-08-12T10:02:00.002-04:00

The first clue in our scavenger hunt is: The 2010 Pulitzer Prize Winner for Fiction. Find that book in the store and hidden somewhere around it will be a QR code that will send you to the next clue. Here is a link to more info about the Smart Phone Scavenger Hunt. Please send any thoughts about the hunt to josh@portersquarebooks.com. Have fun.

Smart Phone Scavenger Hunt at PSB

2011-08-07T13:01:00.003-04:00

Got a smart phone of some kind? Love books? Need something to do that’s air conditioned and/or out of the rain? Then play our in-store smart phone scavenger hunt. On Friday August 12 at 10 am we’ll post the first clue to a book on our blog, Facebook, and Twitter. Once you’ve figured out what the book is, using whatever online or in-brain resources you have, find it in the store. (Our website lists the sections our books are in.) There will be a QR code hidden near the book. Scanning the code with your smart phone will bring you to a web page with the next clue for the next book. Find the book, find the code, rinse and repeat. The scavenger hunt will be up until closing time (9pm) on Monday August 15. The first ten people to finish the scavenger hunt will win a $10 Porter Square Books Gift Card (good for in-store on online purchases including ebooks).

To play you’ll need a smart phone of some kind (obviously) with a camera and a QR Code Scanner App. Most of those are free. Here are a couple of links to them if you don’t have one already: iPhone and Android and other smartphones.

Some fine print, in regular-sized print. You can certainly ask our booksellers where a particular book is, but it’s wouldn’t be much fun so say “I have a question,” and then read them the clue. The same thing goes for just stumbling on the final book and/or following someone else. There’s no way we could prove you didn’t do the whole hunt, but the hunt is kind of the point. Feel free to do the hunt in a group, but you’ll only get one gift card.

This is the first time we’ve done anything like this, so we’re not sure how everything will go. If everybody enjoys it, we’ll do it again some time. If it doesn’t go well, well, we tried something new. If you have any questions, comments and/or suggestions please send them to Josh at josh@portersqarebooks.com

Banned Book Week

2011-07-28T12:07:00.002-04:00

Banned Book Week is September 24 - October 1 this year. The American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (ABFFE) is encouraging all readers to get involved. Check out this link, http://bit.ly/pjEDl6, then go for it. Stay tuned here and we will tell you how to get your videos to us and then on to ABFFE for viewing on the web.

So You’ve Lost Your Borders

2011-07-24T16:23:00.004-04:00

Hundreds of Borders locations will be closing over the next week or so. They’ll be liquidating their inventories, laying off their employees, and closing their doors. So what to do if your bookstore is a Borders?

Find an Independent Bookstore Near You: IndieBound.Org is the online presence of the American Booksellers Association. Use its store finder to see if there’s a bookstore near you. Just plug in your zip code and the miles away you’re willing to go and you’ll get a list of stores. Because indie bookstores don’t usually have much money for advertising, there’s a chance there’s a store on the other side of town or the next city over you just haven’t heard of.

Shop Online at a Store in Your State: Unfortunately, if you had a Borders in your area it is likely you didn’t have an indie bookstore. If there is an “It Gets Worse” about the Borders story it is that all of their mistakes caused their failure after they contributed to the demise of hundreds of independent bookstores over the last decades. However, most indie bookstores sell books online, and most will ship books to you as well. If you don’t want to pay for shipping and the closest store is too far away, hundreds of indie bookstores sell Google ebooks through their websites. Google ebooks can be read on many different devices including, computers, laptops, smart phones, and tablets like the iPad. Most ebooks sold at indie bookstores are the same price as at all other ebook stores and you don’t have to buy a specialized device to read them.

Find a new Favorite Store Online: Hundreds of indie stores (including us) are on Twitter and Facebook and run blogs. Look around online for a bit. If you find yourself retweeting, liking posts, or reading a store’s blog fairly often, start shopping with them. They can only tweet, post, and blog if people buy books from them.

Powells and The Strand: Powells, in Portland, OR and The Strand in NYC are two huge independent bookstores that sell new and used books online. Between the two of them, there is a book inventory just about as big as Amazon’s.

Talk to Your Local Chamber of Commerce, City Hall, Small Business Association...: Nothing can replace popping into a bookstore to get out of the rain. Wandering around the stacks just to see what catches your eye. Meeting friends. Getting your picture taken with your favorite author. There are some things that can be done only in a physical bookstore. So talk to the relevant agencies to make getting a bookstore into your community a priority. There are lots of things local government and agencies can do, from streamlining licensing and zoning procedures, to low interest loans and property tax breaks that can help get a town a bookstore. Make a bookstore a community priority. Furthermore, locally owned businesses are great for the local economy. Given that states, counties, and cities will often give big national chains tax breaks, incentives for small local businesses shouldn’t be too much to ask, especially given that the return on investment would be much higher from the local business. Here is more information on the impact of local businesses.

Everyone knows bookstores fill important roles in their communities, one of which is selling books. But the only way bookstores can do all the other important work they do, like providing a safe space for young people to hang out or getting books for local schools or providing a haven of slow moving contemplation in our information deluge society, is because people buy books from them. The closing of Borders is tragic, but if people respond by shopping at indie bookstores, there will be more indie bookstores. If you make the effort to shop indie two towns over, it will greatly increase the chances of getting an indie store in your town.

For further reading and to see how other independents around the country are doing, check out this link. http://to.pbs.org/oEtXed.

Two Great Reads for This Summer

2011-07-13T18:42:00.006-04:00

Since I’ve been out of school, I stopped buying into the whole “Summer Reading” idea. There are books you read to relax, books you read for entertainment, books you read to stretch your intellect... and it’s the use and not the season that determines what book I pick up. That said, the idea of “Summer Reading,” provides a great opportunity for book people to tell the world about the best books out there, and so here are two great books that have come out this summer that make great reading whenever you get to them.

The re is No Year by Blake Butler. Told in vignettes and short chapters and using the space of the words on the page to help communicate the story, this is a drifting, imaginative, innovative novel, that often moves with the fluidity of poetry. The characters (if they can be called that) are father, mother, son, and, eventually girl, and the plot, if this book can be said to have one, follows the family’s interactions with the distorted and shifting geography and topography of their new house. The prose is exquisite. This is one of those rare books you can pick up, flip to a page, read for a few minutes, and then set down again to have a sip from your cold beverage and contemplate the view of the world from your porch. This book reminds me of Lydia Davis, Mark Z. Danielewski, and Jesse Ball (more on him in a bit) and sometimes even David Markson and Donald Barthelme. Butler has published two other books Scorch Atlas and Ever and edits HTMLGIANT, Lamination Colony, and No Colony. If you’re interested here is a full review of There Is No Year from my personal blog.

The C urfew by Jesse Ball. I teared up at the end of this book, even though I knew exactly how it was going to end. Part touching story about a father and a daughter navigating an indifferent world, part exploration of resistance to a totalitarian state, part homage to music, puppetry, art, and imagination, this is a stunning mix of emotions and intelligence and innovation and tradition. “The movement” is the most interesting idea I’ve come across recently about radical activism. Furthermore, Ball’s prose is almost folktale or legend-like. There is a timelessness to his style, so that even though his books exist in a time and place, you feel like they’ve always been there and will always be about the human future. Furthermore, this timelessness makes Ball's work accessible to a whole range of ages, so his work is also good for intellectually inclined teens. Jess Ball is the author of two other novels Samedi the Deafness and The Way Through Doors. Fans of his work will be thrilled to know that a collection of his other work has been released called The Village on Horseback. Along with two books of poetry and other prose, it collects the otherwise hard to find Parables and Lies and his Plimpton Prize winning novella The Early Deaths of Lubeck, Brennan, Harp & Carr. He is an assistant professor at the School of the Art Institute of Chicago where he teaches classes on lying, lucid dreaming, and general practice. Here is an interview we conducted with him.

Buying In

2011-07-06T16:51:00.002-04:00

Who would suffer if we lost our favorite independent bookstores, and especially if we lost Porter Square Books? Not just the staff. Not just the little kids who come to story time. And not even just readers. In some ways, the biggest losers would be local writers.

Here's my story. A year ago, Yale University Press published Spider Silk: Evolution and 400 Million Years of Spinning, Waiting, Snagging, and Mating, which I wrote with my co-author, arachnologist Catherine L. Craig. This is my first book. I'm hardly a big-name author or celebrity. (Have you heard of me? Thought not.) Yale pushed hard to get us reviews in all the popular newspapers and magazines any writer would like to get reviews in. No dice. In the U. S., trying to sell a book by non-celebrities about spiders, evolution, genetics, and proteins--even though there's some bizarre spider sex featured--is tough. And without reviews, reporters and radio programs aren't interested. Publications in England lapped the book up. The Times: "a fascinating and readable account of one of the great, overlooked mysteries of life." The Sunday Telegraph: "full of amusing facts and observations." BBC Wildlife Magazine: "This supremely absorbing book examines one of nature's most extraordinary creations." See, it's not like we were trying to peddle dreck. But U.S. newspapers and magazines have drastically cut back on the column inches they devote to book reviewing over the last decade, some newspapers discarding their separate book review sections altogether. We were just one of tens of thousands of books vying for their attention, and given that very few science books for nonscientists get reviewed anyway (start keeping track; you'll be surprised given that we're supposedly such a technological society), we reconciled ourselves to being essentially invisible, just like lots of other worthy books.

So when I went to ask Ellen Jarrett at PSB whether she would consider giving us a reading spot, I wasn't exactly expecting her to say yes. What was in it for PSB? We had great blurbs, but there weren't any reviews, or interviews, or articles they could cite to generate buzz. But I knew PSB had a history of promoting local authors and also of co-sponsoring events with the Boston Chapter of the National Writers Union, which I've been a member of for about 25 years. I left a book and a flyer with Ellen and went home.

Ellen said yes. I felt like a high school senior hearing I'd just gotten into my first-choice college--the same mix of elation and nervousness. I'd never done a reading before. But we rustled up as many friends for the audience as we could, and it was absolutely exhilarating.

That was our first big break after publication. The PSB reading gave us credibility when I approached other venues less interested in the "local" issue, even though we still weren't getting any stateside reviews. And things began to build slowly from there.

Just recently, nearly a year later, PSB's support of us no-name authors has been vindicated. The Boston Authors Club named Spider Silk a Highly Recommended Book. ForeWord Reviews gave the book its Silver Award in the Nature Category of its Book of the Year Awards. And just last week we found out that we're longlisted for the Royal Society Winton Prize for Science Books, maybe the premier book award for science books written for nonscientists. But Ellen had no idea any of that would happen. She just knew the book looked interesting and, most important, I was a local writer.

Writing is a tough business. Most of us make very little money from our writing. By giving us reading spots, PSB helps us make a few immediate sales and lay the groundwork for future sales. Readings also help us network with other writers: I talked to Dominique Browning at her PSB reading after she wondered whether it was true that hummingbirds knit spider silk into their nests (it is), and she very nicely mentioned Spider Silk in her widely read blog. Plus, of course, hanging out in Cafe Zing before or after browsing often results in serendipitous conversations with other writers.

PSB does all this for writers, but it's not a charity. It's a business. We penurious writers can get books cheaper from Amazon. I'm glad to sell a copy of Spider Silk anywhere from any outlet, but Amazon doesn't care about me or the local writing community. Because my co-author and I are of a certain age, most of our friends remember when Cambridge was a mecca for book buyers and have mourned the loss of bookstore after bookstore. So they bought Spider Silk from PSB at my reading, even though they could have gotten it cheaper from Amazon. We didn't even have to ask them to do this--they know from experience what eventually happens when you don't buy books locally.

So, fellow local writers, when we go to a reading at PSB, we should buy something, even if it's not the book being featured. No one begrudges buying a ticket when we go to the movies, but for some reason we think spending an hour and a half at a bookstore listening to something we'll never hear anywhere else should be free. We should buy the books we want to own at PSB. And we should tell our local readers why they should buy our book at PSB, even if it costs more. Almost any book you can get from Amazon, including ebooks, you can get from PSB: if it's not on the shelves today, you can order it. I'm sure most of us follow these rules already, but in tough times, for writers AND bookstores, they seem worth repeating.

The future reading you save may be your own.

Our New Website

2011-06-30T14:15:00.002-04:00

So you might have noticed our website looks a little different. We decided to change it up to give a cleaner look, make it easier to navigate, and give a little more web space to the most important things in our lives; books. Here’s what’s new.

You can now get to staff picks, our ebooks page, the children’s section, all the other store information, and pretty much everything else from the drop down menus above our snazzy new banner. Right below our banner are three book lists; our staff picks, the IndieBound bestseller list, and our featured ebooks. Our next event is displayed right on the home page, so it’s easy to see what’s happening at the store and the next five events are listed on the left with a link at the bottom to the full calender. You can still sign up for our monthly email newsletter and order gift cards from the homepage.

The homepage also features our Twitter and Facebook feeds and still has the IndieNext List; a list of the 20 best books of the month as selected by independent booksellers around the country.

The biggest difference is that the account login has moved. Now, there is a “Login” link right above the search field on the right side of the page. Just click on that link and you can login or create an account. Then you’ll be taken directly to your account, which makes things a little more convenient if you’re logging in to access your ebooks. You can return to the homepage, use the search field at the top of the page, or navigate the site with the drop down menus.

Let us know what you think of our new online digs. Leave a comment here or send an email to josh@portersquarebooks.com and thank you for all of your support.

Best Read City in America

2011-06-14T17:47:00.005-04:00

We’ve always known that Cambridge is a great book city. So in some ways, when Amazon released its list of best-read cities in America, it was nice to see our home at the top. We were sure Cambridge loves books, now we had some data to back it up. But the rankings are based on per capita Amazon sales, meaning that Cambridge buys more books, per capita from Amazon than any other city. Even though Cambridge has great bookstores, Cantabridgians are choosing convenience over culture and price over personality. Knowing how much Cambridge buys from Amazon it’s no wonder the city went from dozens of bookstores to a dwindling handful.

Of course, there are some books that can only be bought online, and in this economy it’s hard to chastise anyone for saving some money. But shopping exclusively at Amazon has consequences beyond a dwindling bookstore culture. Some major studies have shown shopping at locally owned businesses has a much more positive impact on the local economy than shopping at a nationally owned chain. One study concluded that for every $100 spent, a locally owned store will recirculate about $45 in the local economy, whereas a nationally owned chain will only recirculate roughly $13. And a little change in your spending can do a lot of good. Another study found that shifting 10% of your spending to local retailers could create 1600 jobs and generate $137 million in new activity. So if you buy all of your books from Amazon now, simply buying every tenth book from one of the local independents will do wonders for Cambridge.

Furthermore, Amazon does not remit Massachusetts sales tax. Not only does the state lose revenue, Amazon gets a 6.25% discount advantage over physical retailers. And they are fighting hard to preserve this advantage, lobbying to prevent legislation that would require them to remit sales tax and sometimes firing their affiliates in states where such legislation is passed.

Of course, I could talk about the quality of service that you get at independent bookstores, but, most people already seem to know about that. 23% of book-buyers prefer to buy books from indie bookstores and yet indie bookstores account for only 5-10% of book purchases. We call this gap between the percentage of books bought in indie bookstores and the percentage of people who “prefer” to shop in them, the “mindshare gap.” So, I could go through the list of things we do that Amazon can’t, and I certainly can’t miss an opportunity to say that Porter Square Books sells ebooks, quite often for the exact same price as Amazon, but it seems like the point has already been made.

Cambridge is a fantastic city to have a book store in. When Porter Square Books opened almost 7 years ago, we were overwhelmed by the support our community showed. Furthermore, selling books in Cambridge isn’t just an issue of scanning barcodes, we get to have fun intelligent conversations with well-read people about the books we love. Most days, working at Porter Square Books feels less like a job and more like being a member of dozens of rolling book clubs. So to everyone who is already making our job so much fun, thank you for your support. And for those of you great readers who only shop at Amazon, stop in once in awhile. You might like what you find.

Kids Summer Reading Lists

2011-06-13T12:53:00.010-04:00

Our kids books experts have put together some great summer reading lists. Stop by the store, check out the display and grab a list. We have lists for three age ranges, K-2nd Grade, 3rd-5th grade and 6th-8th grade. Check out some of the highlights below.

K-2

Bear's Water Picnic, by John Yeoman, Illu. Quentin Blake (Andersen Press) Five forest friends embark on the perfect summer outing, but those noisy frogs won't stop their awrk-awrking. Will the animals find a way to go with the current?

The Big Fat Cow That Goes Kapow!, by Andy Griffiths, Illu. Terry Denton (Feiwel & Friends)
A laugh-out-loud collection of ten, short, easy-to-read stories. Includes characters like “lumpy-head Fred” and “Mike who rides a bike with a very big spike!” ()

3-5

Anna Hibiscus, by Atinuke (Kane Miller)
Anna lives in Africa with her dad’s side of the family. Her mom has told Anna of the snow of her own childhood, and now Anna wants to see it.

Justin Case: School, Drool and Other Daily Disasters, by Rachel Vail, Illu. Matthew Cordell (Feiwel & Friends)
Nothing’s going right for Justin. It’s the beginning of third grade, he has the wrong teacher and he’s lost his favorite stuffed animal. This funny, illustrated diary will appeal to the Wimpy Kid crowd.

6-8

Mockingbird, by Kathryn Erskine (Penguin)
CaitlinAnnSmith has Asperger’s syndrome, and sees the world in black and white. When tragedy strikes her family, however, she is the one who sees the clear path to healing and closure.

Claudette Colvin, by Phillip Hoose (Square Fish)
One year before Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat on that Montgomery bus, 16-year-old Claudette Colvin did the same, but with very different results. Here is her story.

Interview with Two-Dollar Radio

2011-06-08T14:00:00.008-04:00

Two Dollar Radio is a boutique publisher who functions on a no-wasted bullets policy. You won’t find jokebooks or bathroom readers camouflaged in their lists. In the work they publish, they value ambition above all, and believe that none of their books crimp to convention when it comes to storytelling or voice. Ideally, that contributes to a liberating reading experience. Their primary interest lies with what they would characterize as bold literary fiction: subversive, original, and highly creative.

The name has its origins in a San Diego bar, when the bartender/publisher was ignoring a belligerent old man who blurted out, “Don’t mind me, I make more noise than a two-dollar radio.”

Below is an interview with Eric Obenauf, Publisher and Editor in Chief.

Why did you decide to get into publishing?

I studied dramatic writing in college, but the more I learned about the film industry the less I wanted anything to do with it. I got into fiction writing because I believed it was pure – an art produced by one person and in turn consumed by one person – that could provide this incredible personal connection that you feel in the grip of your favorite authors. My wife and I took a road trip to Big Sur and picked up a copy of Andre Schiffrin’s The Business of Books at the Henry Miller Memorial Library, which burst my bubble about the publishing industry. I was definitely inspired enough to act.

What are some of the challenges specific to being a small publisher?

It’s probably most difficult to deal with the long-lead sales seasons that are dictated by the large publishers. As a small press, it’s hard to fork over an advance for a book that won’t earn money for another two years.

In a recent Boston Review article a number of publishers, small and large, talked about the pressure Amazon puts on them. What has your experience with Amazon been like?

Ummm... We don’t have any direct interaction with Amazon as that all takes place through our distributor, but you still feel the squeeze. It’s also knowing how they conduct themselves as a business, as well as the impact they have on our society that is especially disturbing. In the recent past it seemed as though we may have been entering a new age of corporate responsibility, which has proven to be a stupidly optimistic pipe-dream. Clearly change won’t happen thanks to any sort of responsible accounting enacted on our behalf by our state or federal governments (although, big ups to California!), so we try to let people know – visitors to our website, friends, family, acquaintances – about what goes on. As an outfit that sports its idealism on its sleeve, I’m genuinely embarrassed by our interaction with Amazon.

How about some of the advantages to being a small publisher?

Oh man, I love everything about the position we’re in, it makes me giddy. It’s easier to establish credibility with readers and reviewers as a small press because you have a carefully curated list, especially starting out as it’s organized by just one editor. I had this conversation with Gavin Grant of Small Beer at BEA, where at a small press you’re never publishing anything that you would classify as good – it has to be great. And hopefully that passion for your work translates and is evident to readers and booksellers.

There are a lot of restrictions to being a small press, but then that forces you to get creative with your problem solving, which can be really thrilling. A good example of that is Featherproof, who publishes three or so books a year, but they’re super-creative and have things like Storygami, their mini-books, and I’ve heard a really stunning app. That’s how you stand out with little-to-no budget.

There’s also an incredibly strong support group in the indie publishing community. First and foremost, support from indie bookstores, which provides the very backbone of our existence as most of our sales go through them. In starting out, a number of individuals, such as Johnny Temple, Richard Nash, and Pat Walsh, as well as the truly kind people at Consortium (our distributor), have given us invaluable advice.

What’s the most exciting thing about the work that you do? What keeps you getting up and going to the office?

Most days I work from home, so I can’t really avoid it. In all seriousness, it’s immensely gratifying work, especially now that we’re solvent. You can probably sense my enthusiasm from some of my other responses, but I never want to do anything else. Eliza and I tattooed our logo on our wrists, so it’s very much embedded in who we are. And now, one of our authors, Joshua Mohr, tattooed the radio on his arm, as did Emily Pullen, who started working with us. The other night we were walking down our street and my daughter was riding her bike, when out of nowhere she turns to us and says, ‘when I grow up I want to work on Two Dollar Radio,’ and it choked me up.

Did you feel a sense of validation when Grace Krilanovich, author of The Orange Eats Creeps, was named to the 5 under 35, list? What was your reaction to that?

It has been really satisfying to witness such a bold and brave artistic statement being rewarded, and not just by the fringe but by the mainstream. It was all Grace. She wrote the most courageous book that I’ve read in years. Most first novels that are submitted to us read like they’ve been workshopped to death, where they’re formulaic and conventional. It was evident that Grace held herself to her own very high creative standards. Eliza and I spent many summer nights sitting on our front porch talking about the book, peeling back the layers. It has that pull for readers, that you want to talk about it, debate it, tell your friends to read it, and it became apparent early on, even before the book came out that it had a special glow about it.

Steve Erickson’s intro still gives me goosebumps. I think to have a writer of Steve’s stature flattering Grace and her writing in the way that he did definitely piqued interest. There were some places like HTML Giant that started singing its praises very early on that helped it to gather steam. But the ‘5 Under 35’ thing, it wasn’t a committee decision, but one very esteemed writer, Scott Spencer, singling the book out. I’m sure he didn’t make the most obvious choice. And I’m fairly certain he received a cocked eyebrow or two when he proposed going to bat for a book that mentioned slutty teenage hobo vampire junkies in the synopsis. Which is a testament to the power of Grace’s writing.

I like to imagine that in a lot of ways it’s what readers nowadays are seeking. I know I am. I was asked recently by a reporter what the appeal of an artist like Rudy Wurlitzer has for our generation, so this has been on my mind a lot. I don’t think it’s generational in any way but emblematic of where we are as a culture. Rudy and Grace, I believe to be singular. As artists, as writers, they have remained true to their own voice and vision, while also not caving to the commercial demands of the economy. There’s a purity and authenticity to the approach that feels absolutely vital. It’s what we’re lacking with our medication, sleek gadgets, and everything-on-demand. There’s a swagger to it that feels too rare in our lemonade-stand culture of literature. What’s really inspiring to me both as a publisher and a reader is witnessing a new crop of young writers, some of whom I’ve had the good fortune to publish, and others like Joshua Cohen and Blake Butler, who appear beholden solely to themselves. They never compromised their voice in order to be published or to succeed, which marks them in my mind as the torchbearers who will impart a renewed sense of value upon our future literary world.

What does it mean for a book to be “subversive, original, and highly creative?”

Ideally that’s identifiable in some or all of our books.

What are a publisher’s responsibilities to the world of readers?

As someone with a platform in the arts, however limited, I believe you have a responsibility to contribute something to our culture. Which may sound self-righteous, but whatevs. This was actually a big point of Schiffrin’s book, where he talked about corporate publishing becoming homogenized, with five publishers essentially dominating eighty percent of book sales in the country, which is dangerous for any self-proclaimed democracy in addition to being exceptionally boring. It appears to be cyclical, so I’m actually indebted to the corporate takeover which has enabled this incredibly vibrant and fertile time that we’re living in now. It has enabled our very existence and that of countless other indie presses. It’s a new golden age.

Hopefully we’re providing a service for readers that they wouldn’t find elsewhere; that’s our goal and we know it’s not for everybody. Our families, for instance, have gotten pretty good at feigning interest. But the last thing the world needs is a small press releasing books about a boy’s relationship with his dog.

What are you reading now?

We just returned from Book Expo America in New York, so I have a stack that I picked up in stores and at the show that I’m excited about and am reading simultaneously: Bohemian Girl by Terese Svoboda, Nightwood by Djuna Barnes, and The Ask by Sam Lipsyte.

Mobile Optimized and Gift Card for eBooks

2011-05-18T13:07:00.003-04:00

Last week Portersquarebooks.com became mobile optimized. This means our website is a lot easier to use on your smartphone. You’ll be able to search for and buy books and ebooks much easier, get a listing of our events, and login to your account to read Google ebooks you’ve already purchased. You can also change back to the regular website if you want to read staff picks, check our childrens section, or explore other parts of our website.

You can also now purchase ebooks with a gift card. Gift cards can be ordered online and over the phone as well as in the store. The American Booksellers Association (they handle the e-commerce part of our website) has been working tirelessly on developing this capacity. It works the same way paying for a regular book with a gift card does. If the amount ends up more than the value of a gift card, you’ll be prompted to enter credit card information. This means you can, finally, share your support for Porter Square Books (and many other indie bookstores around the country) with your friends and family with ereaders.

Environmentally Conscious E-reading

2011-05-03T09:46:00.003-04:00

As with the pricing of ebooks, the environmental impact of ebooks and ereading is a lot more complicated than it first appeared. Like many others, I first thought of all those trees that wouldn’t be cut down and all that gas that wouldn’t be used shipping books from publisher to store (and sometimes back again). But as Ted Genoways, in his illuminating essay in the Virginia Quarterly Review argued, there’s a lot more going on environmentally with digital reading devices than just saving trees. Genoways is worth quoting at length:

“But the New York Times recently calculated that the environmental impact of a single e-reader—factoring in the use of minerals, water, and fossil fuels along the manufacturing process—is roughly the same as fifty books. At first that sounds encouraging; after all, even the smallest personal library contains fifty volumes. But the real problems come in lifespan. At present, the average e-reader is used less than two years before it is replaced. That means that the nearly ten million e-readers expected to be in use by next year would have to supplant the sales of 250 million new books—not used or rare editions, 250 million new books—each year just to come out footprint-neutral. Considering the fact that the Association of American Publishers estimates that the combined sales of all books in America (adult books, children’s books, textbooks, and religious works) amounted to fewer than 25 million copies last year, we have already increased the environmental impact of reading by tenfold. Moreover, it takes almost exactly fifty times as much fossil fuel production to power an iPad for the hours it takes to read a book as it would take to read the same book on paper by electric light.”

Here is the full quote from the New York Times article he mentions:

“So, how many volumes do you need to read on your e-reader to break even?
With respect to fossil fuels, water use and mineral consumption, the impact of one e-reader payback equals roughly 40 to 50 books. When it comes to global warming, though, it’s 100 books; with human health consequences, it’s somewhere in between.”

Does this mean we should abandon ereading in order to protect the environment? No, it just means, that, like everything else, if we want to diminish our negative impact on the environment, we need to be conscientious. So if you want to read ebooks, here are some strategies to improve your impact on the environment.

If You’ve Got an Ereader Use it Until It Breaks: Perhaps the biggest source of impact of electronic devices is that we constantly replace them, no matter what condition the old device is in. The numbers quoted above suggest you replace (not just read) at least 100 books with ebooks if you want to be certain to just break even, in terms of negative environmental impact, but really, in terms of global warming we probably want to try for a little more than breaking even. How long that takes depends on how many books you buy, but I imagine for most people, the new device will be out long before they’ve reached the 100 books mark. So don’t buy a new device until your old one breaks. If your old device breaks every year or two, stop buying from that company.

Buy a Used Device: Last year’s model will still read this year’s books and old readers are probably pretty cheap. They might not have all the features of the newest model, but they’ll get the job done.

Buy One Multifunctional Device: With various apps, including Google Ebooks, any tablet can also be an ereader. Furthermore, the new tablet PCs or “convertible tablets” or “netvertibles” can be your computer, iPad, and Nook, all in one device. The fewer devices you buy, the less of a negative environmental you impact you’ll have. And in that vein...

Read Ebooks on a Device You Already Have: If you’ve got an iPad or other tablet, just get the Google Ebooks app, or some other ereader app and away you go. Google ebooks can also be read on any computer, so if you’re already carrying around a laptop or spending a lot of time on your desktop you might as well read ebooks on the computers you have. You could also download Adobe Digital Editions, an ereading software that works with tons of different ebooks providers, including the Google ebooks sold at Porter Square Books.

As with pretty much everything else in our global economy, the ecological impact of ereading isn’t simple. But if you are conscientious about the device you buy and how you use it, ebooks can be an eco-friendly way to read books and support your locally owned independent bookstore.

An Invisible Rope

2011-04-27T10:48:00.005-04:00

Although it has been a few years since he passed away and many years since he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature, I have yet to see a full-scale biography in English of the Polish poet Czeslaw Milosz. In the meantime Cynthia Haven has recently edited a collection of portraits and reminiscences by a wide range of individuals who had a close association with Milosz just published by the Swallow Press, an imprint of Ohio University Press, titled An Invisible Rope.

Organized largely chronologically, An Invisible Rope provides glimpses of the man and his work from his student days in Wilno, through his early lonely days of exile, to his final return to Poland to live in Krakow for the last few years of his life. I would hesitate to recommend this to anyone who does not at least have some exposure to both Milosz's prose such as The Captive Mind or Native Realm, as well any of his numerous books of poetry, as the biographical detail in this book is necessarily incomplete. Nonetheless, it is wonderful to have these remembrances of this complicated man by those who knew him best including the translators he worked with most often.

Poems that Could Be in Your Pocket

2011-04-25T19:46:00.005-04:00

For our National Poetry Month display, Jennifer asked all of the staff what their favorite poems are. Then she printed them out and folded them into pocket sized packets for anyone to take. What she got was a collection of poems that would make a diverse and interesting anthology. Below is a list of poems that could very well be in your pocket.

excerpt from When We with Sappho by Kenneth Rexroth (Dale)

The Pobble Who Has No Toes by Edward Lea r (Susannah)

canvas and mirror by Evie Shockley (Jennifer)

I’m Nobody! Who are you? (260) by Emily Dickinson (Megan)

The Dry Spell by Kevin Young (Jennifer)

Tide Pickers by Rosanna Warren (Jennifer)

Crossing the Bar by Lord Alfred Tennyson (Megan)

I Found a Silver Dollar by Dennis Lee (Megan)

New Year’s Day by Mark Haddon (Anne)

Forgetfulness by Billy Collins (Carol)

Counter-world by Todd Romanowski (Jennifer)

Today by Billy Collins (Carol)

Love After Love by Derek Walcott (Anne)

XI by Wendell Berry (Anne)

The Suitor by Jane Kenyon (Robin)

ancestors by Harvey Ellis (Anne)

May by Mary Oliver (Jory)

The Song of Wandering Aengus by W.B. Yeats (Todd)

Half-Light by Cesar Vallejo (Josh)

Jabberwocky by Lewis Caroll (Gary)

The Raven by Edgar Allan Poe (Gary)

America by Walt Whitman (Josh)

in Just by e.e. cummings (Josh)

The Peace of Wild Things by Wendell Berry (Robert)

Here, Bullet by Brian Turner (Josh)

A Blessing by James Wright (Robert)

Jennifer also added some poems from Common Threads, a program of MassPoetry.

Samurai Song by Robert Pinsky
Occupation by Suji Kwock Kim
The Lost Pilot by James Tate
Vita Nova by Louise Glück
Love Song: I and Thou by Alan Dugan
New England Ode by Kevin Young
In the Waiting Room by Elizabeth Bishop

The Awful Momentum

2011-04-20T16:04:00.005-04:00

For many of us history buffs, a favorite general account of the lead-in to World War I is Barbara Tuchman's The Guns of August. With histories, succeeding generations build on their predecessors, bringing fresh views and sometimes even fresh materials, and we now have have Miranda Carter's George, Nicholas & Wilhelm as a new narrative satisfying as Guns.

A catastrophe of heredity, placement, Fate: Of the three cousins on the thrones of the great European empires, two were way over their heads and the third was fatally bombastic and close to insane. Focusing on the three principles enriches the larger story even as the reader familiar with the awful historical momentum mutters, "No nooo!" Here is the archaic imperial life, the disastrous misapprehensions and total incomprehension of consequences, the whole elegant bloody mess in all its glory. A superb work.

At the other end of the density spectrum, for a serviceable thumbnail history of the whole conflict, World War One by Norman Stone is good for an overview.

Gary Cowan
(Josh also wrote about George, Nicholas & Wilhelm on his own blog. You can check it out here.)

Creative Bookshelves

2011-04-13T12:22:00.001-04:00

In case you needed another reason not to buy an e-reader....

ABFEE v. Coakley

2011-04-12T14:07:00.006-04:00

Last year Porter Square Books was proud to join a suit with the Harvard Bookstore, the Photographic Resource Center, the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (ABFEE), the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund, the ACLU and others to block the enforcement of a law that would have imposed severe restrictions on internet content by making providers of constitutionally protected materials criminally liable if such material was deemed harmful to minors. It was our view that the law was overly broad and likely violated the First Amendment and Judge Rya Zobel agreed by issuing a preliminary injunction late last year.

We received word today that Gov. Patrick signed into law an amendment to that original legislation that addresses these First Amendment issues while still allowing the state to protect children from predators using the internet.

We'd likely to thank ABFEE, the Media Coalition, our fellow plaintiffs, and all the attorneys who worked so hard on our behalf and Gov. Patrick and the legislators who adopted the needed changes to the law.

Flash Mob Freeze

2011-04-12T13:30:00.004-04:00

Thanks to WWLP.com for sharing this video of a flash mob freeze in the Holyoke Mall where "about 75 people stopped everything they were doing to read a book" in support of National Library Week.

Digital Advantages

2011-04-04T18:49:00.004-04:00

I don’t see ebooks replacing physical books any time soon, but there are some types of books and some particular books that I think really utilize the particular advantages of digital books.

Books in a Series. There is nothing worse than getting to the end of a book in an absolutely addicting series, like George R. R. Martin’s A Song of Fire and Ice, and not having the next one handy. It’s one thing if you finish Storm of Swords, on a Saturday afternoon and you have a chance to get to a book store to pick up A Feast for Crows, but another thing entirely if it’s 11 pm and you’re already home. The ebook can be purchased any time of the day, any day of the year. Furthermore, if you’re going on a trip you can load up your device with several books in the series and not have to worry about running out of a series on the plane ride home.

Big, Hard Books. Having a book on a digital device can also provide convenient access to the Internet, which if you’re tackling Moby-Dick, Ulysses, or some other big, hard book, can be really handy. Looking up terms, finding criticism, and accessing cliff notes online can greatly deepen (or just help you complete) a first reading. Also, the ability to annotate with links to useful websites or your own thoughts about the work can make re-reading even more rewarding.

Classics You Somehow Missed in School. Because many old classics are in the public domain, you can almost always find them in inexpensive digital formats, so you catch up on Heart of Darkness, Silas Marner, or The House of Mirth. You can also explore less famous works by classic authors like The Old Curiosity Shop by Dickens, A Tramp Abroad by Mark Twain, Northanger Abbey by Jane Austen, Hadji Murad by Tolstoy...

Books and ebooks are different technologies and have different ideal uses. You can’t look at an ebook on your shelf, pick it up and flip through it randomly just to see what catches your eye, and you can’t wrap it as a present. You also can’t link a passage in a book to an online video, cut and paste a quote directly into a paper, essay or review, or infinitely annotate. Given that they have these different uses, I believe books and e-books should co-exist for years to come.

Diagram Prize

2011-03-30T13:11:00.004-04:00

As reported in today's Shelf Awareness, this year's Diagram Prize winner for the oddest book title of the year has just been announced. The winner is Managing a Dental Practice the Genghis Khan Way by Michael Young. Other short-listed titles this year included The 8th International Friction Stir Welding Symposium Proceedings, What Colour is Your Dog?, The Italian's One-Night Love-Child, Myth of the Social Volcano, and The Generosity of the Dead.

"Previous winners include Crocheting Adventures with Hyperbolic Planes, Living with Crazy Buttocks, Greek Rural Postman and Their Cancellation Numbers, How to Avoid Huge Ships, and Highlights in the History of Concrete."

Brother Blue and Ruth Hill Award March 2011

2011-03-22T14:42:00.004-04:00

Our very own Robert Smyth was awarded the Brother Blue & Ruth Hill Award by the League for the Advancement of New England Storytelling (LANES) - Celebrating story. Creating Community. The award is given annually in recognition of extraordinary commitment and dedication to the storytelling community which Robert has given for some 30 years.

Robert helped to launch the start of Storytellers in Concert the oldest adult storytelling series in the country in 1979. He was there supporting the first Sharing the Fire in 1981. He was there for the first Three Apples Festival in 1984.

It was in Robert's living room that LANES was formed in 1988. He went on to publish the first 5 Museletters, to be on the board for many years, and to give untold number of volunteer hours and donations in free copying and computer skills, to publish conference brochures, and the NE Directory of Storytellers for 20 years.

He was a huge supporter of Blue and Ruth’s storytelling series. He was the driving force behind the book paying tribute to Brother Blue in which people from all around the world contributed stories. He was a huge support to Ruth and Blue during Blue’s illness and continues to support Ruth on a weekly basis.

We just wanted you to know about another person working diligently behind the scenes on something for which he has a great deal of passion.

Mysterious Istanbul (or is that Constantinople?)

2011-03-15T13:01:00.004-04:00

Mysterious Istanbul (or is that Constantinople?)

Istanbul has always had a fascination for me with exotic harems, spices, silks, and sultans.

Childhood fantasies populated my thoughts until I reached Dorothy Dunnett and her Lymond Chronicles. Her brilliant writing brought my fantasies sharply into focus.

Pawn in Frankincense is the 4^th installment in the series and is set in the Istanbul court of Sulieman the Magnificent. Ottoman empire but very Byzantine atmosphere.

While not a mystery in the classic sense, Lymond himself is mysterious enough.

Dunnett inspired me to put Istanbul on my list of must-visit places.

I’m really excited about the beginning of the new HBO series based on the Dunnett books. (I hope they get to Istanbul soon).

A mystery series set in modern Istanbul written by Barbara Nadel features Inspector Ikmen. Reminiscent of Donna Leon’s Venetian series with Commissaire Guido Brunetti, it has a strong sense of place and a sympathetic protagonist. The first book is Belshazzar’s Daughter published now by Felony and Mayhem.

After my first trip to Istanbul, the series provides little memory jolts (like the underground cisterns, the Blue Mosque) and stimulates thoughts of a return visit.

Another Istanbul mystery series is the Inspector Yashim series written by Jason Goodwin and is set at the end of the Ottoman empire. The first Inspector Yashim mystery, The Janissary Tree, is set in 1836 and features the eunuch, cook and sleuth looking into a series of grisly murders designed to halt sweeping political changes by the current sultan.

Jason’s first book, Lords of the Horizon, exposes his historian’s roots. Lords of the Horizon is a history of the Ottoman empire from the 13^th to the 20^th century.

The last novel I'll mention is set in Constantinople during the struggles between the Western (Roman) church and the Eastern (Orthodox) church. The Sheen on the Silk is written by Anne Perry (of much mystery fame) and gives us another perspective on the times of this ancient city. Not a total mystery but compelling nonetheless.

The Sheen on the Silk sent me off to look at Byzantine history. Lost to the West by Lars Brownworth reads like a novel and is endlessly fascinating.

This is only a sampling of the many opportunities to learn about Istanbul/Constantinople while being wonderfully entertained. When a city has been a major center of culture for 16 centuries, there is much to explore!

Craft News from PSB

2011-03-10T12:21:00.003-05:00

Greetings,

Upcoming Events for Crafters in the Boston area.

March 12th and 13th

Fiber Camp

For those of you who are interested in Fiber Camp, here is the url

http://fibercampboston.pbworks.com/w/page/5055892/FrontPage

It really sounds like a good time and I understand they still have some spaces. (Maybe I can go next year!)

Even in the face of Fiber Camp, we will have Knit One on Sunday.

March 20^th - Lucy (Mind’s Eye Yarns) is one of the sponsoring shops for the Red Line Yarn Crawl again this year. This was fun last year – great yarns, events at all stores and meeting up with friends along the way! Check with Lucy at www.mindseyeyarns.com/ or call her at 617 354-7253 for details.

April 20^th – Gore Place Sheep Shearing Festival http://www.goreplace.org/sheepshearing.htm

Wonderful diverse fun!

A few of the new books in this month.

Knitting Plus by Lisa Shroyer - great details for altering knitting patterns to fit. Interweave $24.95

Spud and Chloe at the Farm by Susan B. Anderson – I’ve got to make the sheep! Workman $13.95

A Knitting Wrapsody by Kristin Omdahl – scarves, shawls, skirts – o’ my. Interweave $24.95

130 Mini Quilt Blocks by Susan Briscoe - patchwork quilt blocks - St. Martin's $22.99

Knit One Schedule:

Second Sunday of each month from 1:00 PM until (whenever you finish that row) 3:00PM

All handcrafters are welcome.

March 13

April 10

May 8 (I may be at Maryland Sheep and … whee!)

June 12

July10

August 14

September 11

October 9

November13

December 11

Stay well everyone and enjoy whatever you’re doing!

Jane

Jonathan Coe

2011-03-10T10:52:00.003-05:00

As promised, Jonathan Coe turned up at the bookstore yesterday to sign copies of his new one, The Terrible Privacy of Maxwell Sim. In my opinion, this kind of encounter is an experience one can only have working at an independent bookstore. When we each got done being extremely appreciative of what the other does (oh yeah, he loved the bookstore), he mentioned that he had never been to Boston before and was looking forward to exploring it a little on the T. He has never met compatriot Ian Rankin, but is a huge fan and wished he could stick around another week and meet him here on the 16th! He bought a copy of Wesley Stace's latest in paperback for his travels and was on his way.

Why a Bookstore?

2011-03-09T19:34:00.005-05:00

On most Wednesdays, we host a story hour where a very talented story teller reads books and entertains kids for as long as their attention spans last. Our children's section has a big comfy teddy bear, a stuffed dog, samples of picture books and pop-up books, and toys for kids to play with. We also run a young reviewers program called Fresh Ink, that gives kids a chance to read advanced reader copies of books (which they can keep) and have their reviews published on our website and on a blog. On December 8th, 2010, we hosted an event, with Whole Foods for the poetry anthology, Poets for Haiti, with the proceeds from all sales going to Partners in Health, capping off a year filled with events big and small. We also now run a blog, Facebook page, and Twitter account sharing reviews, recommendations, author interviews, and news from the book world, along with our website with links to bestsellers, IndieNext List selections, Featured Titles, staff picks, our event listings and more. Our in-store displays are like the “Also Bought” feature except instead of some mysterious algorithm spitting out book titles, we have intelligent, passionate readers choosing and arranging the books around important and fun themes. And we love talking about books in all forms, whether through 140 characters a pop or long conversations in the store. And we can do all this because people buy books.

As the world of book buying changes at an increasing rate, people are beginning to ask why bother with a bookstore, especially when most of the time the book you buy is going to cost you more at a bookstore? If I can buy a book for $9.99 from my computer at home why go anywhere else? Well, you buy more than a book when you buy one from a bookstore. You get to pop in after dinner and wander around the stacks for a while or flip through a magazine while drinking coffee; you get a landmark to help you organize meet ups with your friends; a safe place to bring your kids; somewhere to go when you just need to get out of the house; you get a place to meet with your book club; to have a heart-to-heart with an old friend; and a perfect setting for a first date ("So...did you like Freedom?" "No." "Ok, then....") Buying books from us keeps our rent paid, our lights on, and our doors open. And if you don’t feel like going out, you can do the whole shop-from-the-comfort-of-your-own-home thing with us too, for books and ebooks, from our website. Every metal folding chair we put out for events was paid for by a book purchase. Every conversation you have with a bookseller (about a book or otherwise) was paid for by a book purchase, as was every stuffed animal in the kids section, every blog post you enjoyed reading, every author picture you looked at on our Facebook page, and every gift we wrapped for free over the holidays.

Does this mean you should feel compelled to buy a book every time you just happen to stop in to warm up or use the bathroom on your walk home from the train? Of course not. We just ask that when you’re thinking about buying a book from Walmart, Amazon, or some other heavily discounted venue, you think of everything else you get when you buy a book from a bookstore and compare prices as you must, of course, do. Sure the Amazon book is cheap, but it won’t come with a conversation about how Hollywood filmmakers never really capture the essence of Pride and Prejudice, or a free flip through a copy of US Weekly, or a tip on the next big experimental short story writer in translation, or, well, anything else.

But let’s face it, sometimes all that other stuff you get from us isn’t as important as the cost. Sometimes you need a book and would like to have coffee money for the week left over after you buy it. There’s nothing wrong with that. You should have options when buying books and some of them happen to be deep-discount joints. Just remember us with your holiday or birthday money or when you get your tax refund, or during that few day (or week) high after you’ve gotten a raise or a new job.

It might be best to sum this up with an old truism. Sure, their books are cheaper than ours, but, as with just about everything else in the world with a price on it, you get what you pay for.

Ian Rankin comes to PSB March 16

2011-03-07T09:10:00.002-05:00

So a bunch of us were dancing around shouting "Ian Rankin! Ian Rankin!" and looking forward to how cool it'll be to have him in the store. Then somebody said "You're all pretty animated about a crime guy who gets pretty dark sometimes." "But he's probably the best crime writer in the UK!" we insisted. And the retort was, "Well just what makes someone that?" So we all calmed down and got to wondering about the dude. Here are some questions we sent off to him, preliminary to his visit, of course.

Q:Is there a particular book in your childhood that turned you on to the possibility of being a writer? Is there any particular author you'd credit as an inspiration?

A: Not childhood exactly, but as a teenager I read Anthony Burgess's A Clockwork Orange and realised not all literature needed to be about angsty Russians and men in monocles. A bit later I fell in love with Muriel Spark's The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, which led me to R L Stevenson's Jekyll and Hyde... and from Hyde to crime fiction.

Q:Your depiction of police procedures and the inner workings and/or politics of intelligence seem awfully well informed. Is this due to diligent research and the gleaning of tasty rumor, or do you perhaps have a cousin who's a cop?

A: I have a few friends/contacts within various Scottish police departments, and also know a few journalists and other useful people. I have also worked in a variety of large, bureaucratic organisations, and am guessing the police aren't any different: office politics is office politics, right?

Q:Are you familiar with our local guy Dennis Lehane?

A: I know Lehane, of course! Last time I did an event in Boston, I think he was there to introduce me to the audience. I wrote the introduction to one of the UK editions of 'Shutter Island'. We've known one another since we were hungry young writers. He's about as cool as a cat can get without the refrigerator-light going off.

The introduction and questions for Mr. Rankin were composed by Gary Cowan, PSB bookseller and Rankin fan.

Ebooks Education Session

2011-03-02T19:11:00.005-05:00

Last Tuesday Porter Square Books held an ebooks education session. The session featured a general overview of ebooks at Porter Square Books, presentations about three ereading devices; the Nook, the Sony Reader, and the iPad, and a lively discussion that touched on pricing, technology, and other ebooks issues. Along with the presenters and other PSB staff on hand, one local publisher stopped by and shared a publisher’s perspective on ebooks, and a representative from Google ebooks was here answering questions about Google’s plans and getting feedback from the audience. For those of you who couldn’t make it, below is a blog post version of the overview, complete with links to more information. We've also updated our ebooks prices. Click here to learn more. And if you have any questions about ebooks and Porter Square Books, feel free to send an email to Josh at josh@portersquarebooks.com.

Ebooks at Porter Square Books

Buying ebooks from us supports us the same way buying regular books does
Our ebooks can be read on virtually any device, except the Kindle, including a regular computer
With Google ebooks and ebooks provided by Ingram Digital we offer hundreds of thousands of titles and that number is growing
Ebooks are available 24/7, 365, from the comfort of your home and just about anywhere else and are a great way to support your local bookstore even as you travel

Buying an Ebook from Porter Square Books

Buying an ebook from us is pretty much the same as buying anything else off the Internet, except that instead of getting something shipped to you, you download a file, or, with a Google ebook, you can read it right in your browser. Click here for a complete walkthrough of purchasing an ebook through our website.

The Price of Ebooks

There are two methods of pricing ebooks; traditional and agency. In traditional pricing the publisher sets the list price and then we pay a percentage of that list price to the publisher whenever someone downloads the ebook. Here is a traditionally priced ebook.

Hardcover: $34.95

Google Ebook List Price: $28.00

Retailer Pays: $14.56

Our Price: $21.00

Amazon Kindle: $9.79

In this case, Amazon loses about $4.77 every time someone buys The Autobiography of Mark Twain for the Kindle.

In agency pricing, the publisher sets the selling price and the retailer receives a commission, acting, in essence, as an "agent" for the publisher. Here is an agency model book.

Amazon: $12.99

Google: $12.99

Sony: $12.99

Barnes and Noble: $12.99

Porter Square Books: $12.99

Seven publishers now use the agency model: Hachette, HarperCollins, Macmillan, Penguin, Simon & Schuster, Wile, and Random House. These are seven major publishers and together account for a substantial portion (if not the majority) of ebooks publishing. This means that very often our ebooks will be the same price as Amazon's.

Still in the Works

The world of ebooks is constantly changing and Porter Square Books and the American Booksellers Association are doing our best to keep up with it. Here are some aspects of ebooks we are working to improve.

Using Gift Cards to buy ebooks
Not all books are available as ebooks or in all ebook formats so, before you buy, make sure you've selected the right format
Penguin ebooks available on our website
Integrated check-out so you can buy ebooks and regular books online at the same time
Highlighting and annotating Google ebooks in their otherwise very convenient, browser based reading function

For more information please visit our ebooks resources page.

Egyptian fiction for adults and children

2011-02-22T23:46:00.005-05:00

I have found myself thinking about great Egyptian fiction in the last few weeks, as the protesters in Cairo filled the news and swept over my thoughts. Below are a handful of books that delve into modern Egypt and allow for the complexity of all that has happened surrounding the end of Hosni Mubarak's presidency.

A few titles I've loved:

The Map of Love, by Ahdaf Soueif (Anchor Books, 2000)

This parallel love story spans England, the U.S. and Egypt, and numerous generations. The novel begins with Isabel and the Egyptian-American conductor she's fallen in love with in 1977 New York, while also following Isabel as she retraces the love affair between her great-grandmother, Anna, and the Egyptian nationalist she loved a hundred years prior. This book is intense, full of politics, yet also seductive and beautiful.

The Yacoubian Building by Alaa Al-Aswany (Harper Perennial, 2006)

In an apartment building in central Cairo stands the Yacoubian Building, full of different Egyptians simultaneously going about their lives. Al-Aswany attempts to chronicle many of the buildings' tenants in this intense fictional web that displays contemporary Egyptian society.

Midaq Alley, by Naguib Mahfouz. (Anchor Books, first published in 1966 in English)

Mahfouz is the most widely translated and sold Egyptian author internationally, and he won the Nobel Prize for Literature after this title was published in 1966. At the center of his books are Egyptian politics, and this book takes place in 1940s Cairo, as Egypt struggles to become a "modern" nation. This novel follows the lives of a rich and complicated cast of characters. Also try Mahfouz's Cairo Trilogy, which begins with "Palace Walk".

I Loved You For Your Voice, by Selim Nassib (translated from French, Europa Editions, 2006)

Nassib is actually a Lebanese author, but this book is fitting because it's a fictional account of the legendary Egyptian singer, Umm Kulthum, a massive cultural icon of the 20th century, and a fierce Egyptian nationalist. The novel is told from the perspective of Ahmed Rami, the poet who wrote many of the lyrics for Umm Kulthum's songs, and who is desperately in love with her in this novel.

And for children:

The Illustrator's Notebook, by Mohieddin Ellabad (Groundwood Books, 2006)

Ellabad is a cartoonist and illustrator in Cairo by profession, yet this is his childhood memoir (of sorts). The book is a collage of his childhood growing up in Egypt, all beautifully pieced together and commented upon. One side of the page has the original Arabic text, and on the opposite page is the English translation.

Goha, the Wise Fool, by Denys Davies-Johnson & illustrated by Hag Hamdy & Hany (Philomel, 2005)

This collection of "Goha" tales (known elsewhere in the Arab World as "Joha") is hilarious and witty. As always, Goha gets himself in and out of trouble in ways that will make the whole family laugh out loud. The illustrations are done by two well-known Egyptian artists who stitched the panels together in this traditional form of Egyptian quilting, called khiyamiyas.

Iain (M.) Banks

2011-02-19T20:05:00.003-05:00

The author of both mainstream and science fiction novels (the latter distinguished by the use of the adoptive initial "M"), Scottish-born Iain Banks is a writer of power and imagination -- wicked, brilliant, deep imagination.

From his first infamous novel, The Wasp Factory -- the gruesome and humorous 1st person story of a 16-year-old psychopath -- to his quantum-thriller Transition Banks bends genres and breaks boundaries. He is best known, however, for his novels of the deep-future, ultra-technological utopia known as the Culture. Liberal to the point of anarchy; home to billions of humans, aliens, and hyper-intelligent AIs, all technologically empowered beyond the dreams of avarice; the Culture is a kind of anti-Star Trek meddling in the affairs of lesser societies for their own good. That Banks can repeatedly tell exciting, suspenseful stories of such powerful characters is a continuing testament to his own power. He has quickly become my favorite living SF author and I urge you to visit the Culture for yourself, it is truly a wonder-land.

The Culture novels (though presented here in published & chronological order) are self-contained books that may be read in any order:

Consider Phlebas (1987)

The Player of Games (1988)

Use of Weapons (1990)

Excession (1996)

Inversions (1998)

Look to Windward (2000)

Matter (2008)

Surface Detail (2010)

A New Translation Please

2011-02-16T16:55:00.003-05:00

Over the last few years a number of classic European novels have gotten new translations, some to widespread acclaim and excitement; War and Peace, Doctor Zhivago, The Death of Ivan Illyich and Other Stories, Madame Bovary, and The Tin Drum to name a few. This got me thinking, what book would I really like to see newly translated?

The Death of Virgil by Hermann Broch. The Death of Virgil is a story about the last day or so in the life of the great Roman poet Virgil (think Tinkers, only instead of off-their-rocker woodsmen, the man dying hung out with Caesar Augustus) as he grapples with his unfinished Aeneid while thinking about the nature of poetry, power, and love. Occasionally his thoughts break out of structured prose and into verse. The book opens with Virgil being carried from a ship on a litter through the back streets of the port city to the hut where he will be staying and it ends when he dies.

I’ve written about how brilliant this book is before but there were many times when I was reading that I could feel the prose straining against its own translation. I’m not entirely sure how to describe the sensation, but I could tell that Broch said more in German than was translated into English.

In the end, Broch turned from the novel to philosophical writings, but before he did he produced two of the great novels of the twentieth century. A new translation of The Death of Virgil (and maybe one for the Sleepwalkers too, since I’m pondering this) might go a long way in generating the kind of attention that Broch deserves.

Jonathan Coe

2011-02-15T15:13:00.004-05:00

Fans of Jonathan Coe may be a diminutive group, but I count myself among them. I started my infatuation with The Rotter's Club and continued with The Closed Circle (both available as Google ebooks by the way) and have now picked up his latest, The Terrible Privacy of Maxwell Sim, which will be released in March. He will be making his first trip to the US in March and plans a stop at Porter Square Books to sign copies of the book. To get you started on the path to "knowing" Jonathan Coe, I am pasting a copy of an interview with him below. Enjoy and pick up a copy of a Coe novel next time you are in.

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A conversation with Jonathan Coe, author of The Terrible Privacy of Maxwell Sim

Q: Like your well-known novels The Rotter’s Club and The House of Sleep, The Terrible Privacy of Maxwell Sim is a dark comedy but it also tackles new territory, examining the very modern position of being technologically connected and yet socially bereft. How did this book begin for you? Did it feel like a new direction or a return?

A: In many ways it felt like a return. I had built up a reputation for writing 'social satire' - a label I have never felt comfortable with - and The Rain Before it Falls was in some ways an attempt to break free from that: a more interior, more melancholy, more psychologically-focused book. With Terrible Privacy I went back to writing about the contemporary world, and back to the seriocomic vein of my most well known books. Only the subject matter (loneliness in the age of advanced communications technology) is new. My regular readers will, I'm sure, recognize the tone and intentions of the book as distinctively mine.

Q: Our hero, Maxwell Sim, has some trouble navigating the tech world: he e-mails his estranged wife under a false identity, can’t seem to distract his daughter from her Blackberry and tech-alienation reaches a point of absurd hilarity when Max develops feelings for Emma, the voice of his car’s GPS system. It’s very funny but ominous. How do you feel about the role of technology in society?

A: The book really evolved out of some everyday observations: just things I saw happening around me in cafes and restaurants and other public spaces every day. One of the most common sights you see in restaurants these days is a couple who have gone out for a meal together but are sitting sending text messages to other people on their mobile phones, rather than talking to each other. I suppose I became slightly obsessed with this situation and started to wonder what it told us about
our relationships at the current time. The obvious conclusion was that our most important or consuming relationships are no longer necessarily with the people with whom we're sharing the same physical space. But this is interesting, because the one thing you can say about someone sitting opposite you at a table (or lying in bed) is that they are real. Whereas a relationship with someone by text - or email, or Facebook, or whatever - will on some level be a virtual relationship, however
well you think you know that person. They're not there while you talking to them, so you have to imagine them. The question the book tries to raise is whether our closest relationships these days should be with 'real' people or with virtual or imaginary ones. So it also becomes a book about reading, about literature, and about how we all construct our identities through storytelling.

Q: Do you consider yourself tech-savvy? How involved are you in the worlds of Facebook,Twitter and all the rest?

A: I joined Facebook in order to research the novel, and I'm still on it, but I don't use it much. Twitter is a step too far for me, though. I don't need reasons to sit at my computer or gaze at my iPhone any more than I do already.

Q: In TERRIBLE PRIVACY, Maxwell Sim is on a kind of odyssey, physically driving a Prius full of toothbrushes to the remote Shetland Islands as part of a new job, but also facing private demons along the way: his father’s secret past, his own childhood and his broken family. Through all the twists and turns of the journey, did you know exactly what was going to happen next or were there any surprises for you, as there certainly are for the reader?

A: I tend to be pretty controlling as a novelist. In real life I'm rather a passive person, not very good at getting my own way, so I probably try to compensate for that in my writing. The novel is my kingdom and I'm the absolute monarch. Occasionally, I know, this can be a problem for some of my readers - people who don't like my books find them over determined and too full of coincidence. But I do increasingly leave room to surprise myself too. A lot of important events in TERRIBLE PRIVACY were improvisations: the whole business of Max inventing a virtual female
identity for himself, for instance, so that he could go online and get closer to his ex-wife. And also the 'controversial' final chapter of the book (which of course I won't give away here) was something that only occurred to me as a possibility about halfway through. And it wasn't until the very end that I actually plucked up the courage to write it, and realized how closely it tied in with the book's central themes.

Q: Privacy and its sadder cousin, loneliness, are obviously a big part of this book. Can you talk a bit about the “terrible privacy” of the title?

A: The phrase comes from a review written by James Wood in the early 1990s. James and I were colleagues on the books pages of the Guardian newspaper in London at the time. Since then, of course, he's gone stateside and become very well known over here. Anyway, in those days I used to read his pieces pretty closely, and was struck by how his prose could often seem more resonant and lyrical than that of the author he was reviewing. He was a great phrasemaker, even then, and it was in the context of writing about Toni Morrison that he used the words 'terrible privacy',
which have haunted me ever since. (I myself first used the phrase in my novel The Closed Circle, as part of a poem purportedly written by the hero, Benjamin Trotter.) Over the last few months, as my novel has been published in most of the major European countries, I've come to realize that 'privacy' is a peculiarly British concept: my translators have found it impossible to render it in Italian, Dutch, German or French. We British certainly value our privacy, but what James's phrase always reminds me is that being self-contained, keeping the rest of the world at a
safe distance for purposes of self-preservation, can mean that you are only a coin flip away from a dreadful, paralyzing isolation. And this is the hinterland that Maxwell Sim is traveling through in the novel.

Q: One of the stories within the book is the real-life adventure of Donald Crowhurst, an amateur drawn into a boat race-around-the-world. It’s an unbelievable story - how did you first become interested in Crowhurst? Did you know then that it would be a past of Maxwell Sim’s tale?

A: The story of Donald Crowhurst is becoming more and more well-known in the UK. Nicholas Tomalin and Ron Hall's book about him has, of course, become a classic, and that was my first introduction to this fascinating and tragic figure. I was given the book shortly after I'd started writing my novel, and immediately I knew that it would become a key component. (Another instance, I suppose, where I allowed something to surprise me, and an important new element entered the book even after it was up and running.) Taking advantage of the primitive/nonexistent technology of his day, Crowhurst famously entered a race in 1969 to become the first yachtsman to sail around the world non-stop and single-handed, and - realizing that he was not
up to the task - decided to fake his voyage instead, by tacking out into the mid-Atlantic, hiding there for several months, and devising a 'phantom' journey by writing fictional logbooks. Ultimately he could not handle the loneliness of his situation or the scale of his own deception,and committed suicide. I found several aspects of this story to be resonant: it seemed to illustrate very graphically how much communications technology had changed in the last forty years,
making such a deception impossible today, and also I realized that Crowhurst and Max's father have a good deal in common - both have decided to present untruthful versions of themselves to the world, with tragic consequences. Most of all, though, I think that so many writers, visual artists and filmmakers have been drawn to Crowhurst's story over the years because in this figure - condemned to months and months of isolation and 'terrible privacy', which he filled by devising
fictions about himself and his voyage - they recognize something of themselves. He has become a powerful archetype of the artist.

Q: A very diverse cast of characters pops in and out of Max’s life throughout Terrible Privacy, many of them poignant and also very funny. Poppy, for example, is a junior adultery facilitator. She helps her clients with technological evidence to prove to their partners that they have been working, instead of philandering. Do you have a favorite character? Was there one particularly fun to write?

A: Poppy was a good deal of fun to write. She arose out of watching a man one night at Singapore airport (on my way home from Australia) wandering around with a recording device. I started to ask myself why anyone would want to make ambient recordings of airports and came up with the idea of a cheating husband playing these recordings in the background while talking to his wife on the phone, to make her think he was in a different part of the world altogether. But actually my favorite character is Miss Erith, the old woman who lives by herself in a high-rise
apartment in Lichfield, and whom Max encounters about halfway through his journey. She is someone who grew up in a world completely alien to Max - spending her childhood on the network of working canals which still linked British towns in the 1930s - and she represents the last living memory of this vanished era. Through her I allowed myself to voice nostalgia for a preindustrial England based on a notion of local community which is all but irretrievable in the era of globalization. Such nostalgia is usually the preserve of the patriotic right, so I wanted to lay
hold of it and reclaim it for a different (perhaps more progressive) way of political thinking.

Q: Are there any writing habits that you rely on as you sit down to your first draft?
A: Eating biscuits. The results are there for all to see in my waistline.

Boskone 2011

2011-02-07T20:12:00.003-05:00

Boskone is the annual convention of the New England Science Fiction Association, held this year February 18-20 at the Westin Waterfront hotel. It is 3 days of science fiction and fantasy books, movies, arts, and songs.

This year's guest of honor is Charles Stross, the author of the Lovecraftian spy novels of the Laundry series, as well as the genre-busting Merchant Prince series, and such hard-hitting SF novels as Wireless and Halting State.

Also in attendance will be Charlaine Harris, the author of the wildly popular Sookie Stackhouse books.

Whether or not you're able to attend the con, now is a great time to catch up with these two authors of serious fun and fancy.

New SciFi / Fantasy

2011-02-07T19:12:00.003-05:00

With a new year comes new SciFi / Fantasy novels.

Midnight Riot by Ben Aaronovitch -- A fun and light urban fantasy set in London, this novel is the first in a series (book #2 comes out in March) about a likable young cop whose only talent seems to be talking to ghosts.

The Heroes by Joe Abercrombie -- Set in the same world as the Abercrombie's "First Law" trilogy, this novel tells the story of a bloody three-day battle that will determine the fate of nations. Blood and grit, passion and sin, these are the hallmarks of Abercrombie's writing. As the tag-line says: "Three men. One Battle. No heroes."

Leviathans of Jupiter by Ben Bova -- The latest in Bova's "Grand Tour" of the solar system, Leviathans of Jupiter takes his human colonists to Jupiter to investigate the leviathans -- colossal creatures of unknown intelligence. It's more intelligent space adventure from a giant of the genre.

The Sentinel Mage by Emily Gee -- This first volumne in the "Cursed Kingdoms" trilogy is well-written, fast-paced fantasy adventure. Assassins, creeping curses, and shape-shifting mages make this a fast, fun read.

The Sworn by Gail Z. Martin -- Another first in a new series (The Fallen Kings Cycle) this novel is set in the author's earlier "Chronicles of the Necromancer". In lands ravaged by civil war, a new threat stirs. The dead are lying in their burrows and when they rise even their sworn protectors may not be enough to stop them.

Death's Sweet Embrace by Tracey O'Hara --Book two in a series of shape-shifting urban fantasy follows a new protagonist as she tries to solve a series of brutal murders.

Flip this Zombie by Jesse Petersen -- In Married with Zombies Sara and David's marriage was saved by the zombie apocalypse. In this sequel, the happy couple decides to put their new found skills to good use by opening a zombie extermination business. Horrific hilarity ensues. And stay tuned for Eat Slay Love in June.

Bloodshot by Cherie Priest -- A vampire thief, secret government documents, biological experiments, drag-queens, and Men-in-Black -- what could go wrong?

A Kevin Young Primer

2011-01-30T12:38:00.004-05:00

On February 7, Kevin Young, one of America’s great living poets will be reading at Porter Square Books. This is an event not to be missed for fans of poetry and of contemporary American literature in general. Kevin Young’s style mixes a roots blues sensibility, with the intensity of gospel music, and a broad artistic imagination to produce unique and powerful works of poetry. Young’s collections are usually organized around particular themes giving them an almost novelistic coherence. If you’re not familiar with Kevin here’s a quick primer on his work.

To Repel Ghosts: The Remix, is a poetic reimagining of the life of graffiti artist Jean-Michel Basquiat as a concept album. Art, class, race, drugs, painting, and poetry all converge in a powerful exploration of what it means to create.

Jelly Roll was a staff pick here a few years ago. Drawing on the the legacy of the great blues pioneer Jelly Roll Morton, Young invents a shimmying, comic, low-down, and high-hearted language. Discovering Jelly Roll is like passing a random bar with live music and turning in, on a whim and loving it, shaking your head and saying, “Hell, yeah.”

In Black Maria, Young bends another conventional form of expression into a totally new kind of work. Black Maria is a gritty noir movie as poetry collection. A twisting tale of suspicion, passion, mystery, and the city, Young channels the world of detective movies, picking up its lingo and dark glamour in five “reels” of poetry–the adventures of a “soft-boiled” private eye, known as A.K.A. Jones, and an ingenue turned femme fatale, Delilah Redbone. We follow Jones and Delilah through a maze of aliases and ambushes, sex and suspicions, fast talk and hard luck, in Shadowtown where noir characters abound. The Killer, The Gunsel, The Hack, The Director, The Champ, and The Snitch are among the local luminaries and beautiful losers who mingle with Jones and his elusive lady as they stalk one another through the scenes of the poet’s dazzling “treatment.”

For the Confederate Dead, a twist on Robert Lowell’s famous poem For the Union Dead, won the 2007 Quill Award in Poetry. In this passionate collection, Kevin Young takes up a range of African American griefs and passages. For the Confederate Dead finds Young, more than ever before, in a poetic space that is at once public and personal. In the marvelous "Guernica," Young's account of a journey through Spain blends with the news of an American lynching, prompting him to ask, "Precious South, / must I save you, / or myself?" In this surprising book, the poet manages to do a bit of both, embracing the contradictions of our "Confederate" legacy and the troubled nation where that legacy still lingers.

Begun as a reflection on family and memory, Dear Darkness became a book of elegies after the sudden death of the poet's father, a violent event that silenced Young with grief until he turned to rhapsodizing about the food that has sustained him and his Louisiana family for decades. Flavorful, yet filled with sadness, these stunningly original odes—to gumbo, hot sauce, crawfish, and even homemade wine—travel adeptly between slow-cooked tradition and a new direction, between everyday living and transcendent sorrow.

In The Art of Losing, Young has introduced and selected 150 devastatingly beautiful poems that embrace the pain and heartbreak of mourning. The Art of Losing is the ideal gift for a loved one in a time of need and for use by ministers, rabbis, and palliative care workers who tend to those who are experiencing loss.

His newest book is Ardency, and tells the story of the Africans who mutinied onboard the slave ship Amistad. Written over twenty years, this poetic epic—part libretto, part captivity epistle—makes the past present, and even its sorrows sing.

Kevin Young reads with us on February 7, at 7pm.

Featured SF/F Author: Orson Scott Card

2011-01-14T12:35:00.004-05:00

Orson Scott Card is best know as the author of Ender's Game, which along with its sequel Speaker for the Dead won both the Nebula Award and the Hugo Award. He went on to write 10 Ender novels, one short story collection, and there is at least one more novel forthcoming. The chronology of the novels are a bit complicated. As a public service I'll list the chronology (and pub. date) of the novels here:

* Ender's Game (1985), Ender's Shadow (1999), and A War of Gifts (2007) all take place at the same time and should probably be read in this order.

* Ender in Exile (2008)

* Shadow of the Hegemon (2001)

* Shadow Puppets (2002)

* Shadow of the Giant (2005)

* Speaker for the Dead (1986)

* Xenocide (1991)

* Children of the Mind (1996)

? Shadows in Flight (forthcoming)

Card's other award-winning series is The Tales of Alvin Maker, an alternate history of the American frontier heavily influenced by American myths and folklore. Unlike the Ender books the Maker novels are chronological published. They are: Seventh Son, Red Prophet, Prentice Alvin, Alvin Journeyman, Heartfire, The Crystal City, and Master Alvin (forthcoming).

A prolific author, Card has written many other books and short stories including The Homecoming Saga, the Hidden Empire books (as author and editor), The Women of Genesis, and many others.

His newest books Pathfinder and The Lost Gate both concern young men who, like Ender, must master their unique gifts. They are cross-over young adult novels.

On a sadder note, Orson Scott Card suffered a mild stroke on January 1st, 2011. He is now recovering at home.

New Audio Week of 1/10/11

2011-01-13T11:11:00.002-05:00

A bumper crop this week. Enjoy!

Poser: My Life in Twenty-three Yoga Poses Claire Dederer
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9780374236441

The Knife of Never Letting Go: Chaos Walking: Book One Patrick Ness
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9780763645762

Will Grayson, Will Grayson John Green, David Levithan
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9780525421580

Inner Circle Brad Meltzer
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9780446577892

Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother Amy Chua
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9781594202841

Clara and Mr. Tiffany Susan Vreeland
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9781400068166

The Squeaky Wheel: Complaining the Right Way.... Guy Winch
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9780802717986

Conversations with Myself Nelson Mandela
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9780374128951

This I Believe Jay Allison
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9780374128951

Our Kind of Traitor John le Carre
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9780670022243

Wise Blood Flanner O'Connor
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9780374530631

Nudge: Improving Decisions.... Richard H. Thaler
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9780143115267

A Visit from the Goon Squad Jennifer Egan
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9780307592835

Parisians: An Adventure History of Paris Graham Robb
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9780393067248

The Long Walk Slavomir Rawicz
http://www.portersquarebooks.com/book/9781599219752

Darwyn Cooke’s Parker

2011-01-12T14:00:00.007-05:00

Richard Stark’s Parker is one of American crime writing’s iconic characters. However you choose to assess the character, his stories are a lot of fun to read. It is always a challenge to adapt a popular character or story into another medium, especially when you adapt a book into, well, anything else. There is no easier way to make a lot of enemies than badly adapt a beloved (though that’s probably not the right term for Parker) story.

Darwyn Cooke adapted the first Parker novel The Hunter last year and absolutely nailed it. The style of art looks like an edgier version of Eisner’s The Spirit, or perhaps a more sophisticated version of Dick Tracy, using the expected style of past noir comics without relying or parodying them. The faded coloring makes you feel like you’re watching The Big Sleep, or some other classic noir without being completely in black and white. Perhaps the greatest success in the adaptation are the wordless panels that perfectly evoke Richard Stark’s blisteringly fast-paced prose. No matter what is happening in those frames, they vibrate with narrative energy.

Now Cooke’s Parker is back with The Outfit, an adaptation of the third novel by Richard Stark. Cooke decided to skip The Man with the Getaway Face, because he wanted to get to some of the other stories. If Cooke continues the series the way he started, we may one day talk about his Parker, with the other great crime comics series, like Ed Brubaker’s Criminal, Brian Azzarello’s 100 Bullets, and Frank Miller’s Sin City.