Handselling Among Friends: Booksellers Share Favorites Over Breakfast

Booksellers and editors met over breakfast to discuss reading selections and forthcoming titles.

ABA President Russ Lawrence of Chapter One Bookstore in Hamilton, Montana, welcomed an audience of 400 booksellers and 40 editors to the "What Are You Reading?" Breakfast, where, he observed, they were all "doing what we would be doing otherwise--getting together and talking about books." The breakfast, he said, provides an opportunity for "one of the most important things we do [at BEA]--networking and discussing what we're looking forward to selling and what we're loving."

Booksellers heartily agreed that swapping titles and book chat with industry colleagues was a convention high point. Everyone was as eager to report on their latest read as they were to fill their coffee cups.

Nancy Rutland of Bookworks in Albuquerque, New Mexico, was very enthusiastic about Khaled Hosseini's A Thousand Splendid Suns. "I liked it better than The Kite Runner," she disclosed to her tablemates, who nodded in agreement. Mary McHale of Fox Tale Books in New Durham, New Hampshire, talked about the Thursday Night series by Swindon, England, author Jasper Fforde. She described the literary satires as "Jane Eyre meets Monty Python," and passed his upcoming First Among Sequels (Penguin) around the table.

Also mentioned was Ian McEwan's new work, On Chesil Beach (Nan Talese/Doubleday). Dee Robinson of Village Books in Bellingham, Washington, was so stirred by the language in the five-part tale of a couple that takes place solely on their wedding night in 1963, that "my husband and I read sentences out loud to each other."

Booksellers discussed the common topic of the weather, but with a distinctive literary twist. "I couldn't bear to read The Road (Cormac McCarthy, Vintage) during our difficult New Hampshire weather; too depressing," said McHale. "And now with summer coming, I'd like to read some funny, happy things."

Robinson warned that The Inheritance of Loss (Atlantic Monthly), Kiran Desai's award-winning novel, leaves you "dripping with the humidity of India." The outstanding book is perhaps best read in a cool, dry season, all agreed.

Traci Giganti of Brunswick, Maryland, co-owner of Book Crossing, said that she was looking forward to the upcoming debut presentation of "Expanding Your Bookstore: Why, When, and How," to be presented by ABA CEO Avin Mark Domnitz. "[It's] perfect timing for us," Giganti said, referring to upcoming plans to double the square footage of the two-year-old, 800-square-foot general bookstore.

McHale spoke generally of the available materials from ABA--including the Book Sense Picks lists, Bookselling This Week, and the Winter Institute. "[Attendance at ABA functions and membership] is so worth the money," she said. Fox Tales, which opened in September 2006, has used many of ABA's resources to get started, according to McHale. "We're always finding out about new things. At the Winter Institute in Portland, I learned enough about magazines to decide not to carry them--it saved me all kinds of money and trouble." --Nomi Schwartz