Never thought the day would come...

When I started this blog I never expected anyone to read it besides friends. Despite that, I chose to write anonymously to avoid being google searched by bored coworkers or future employers because why cause problems if you don't have to. As the blog caught on, I began to feel stifled by the anonymity. It felt weird to approach people with questions when I didn't feel comfortable giving them my full name*. How could I ask people to share information with me when I couldn't return the favor?

Late last year (I believe it was) I began to seriously consider outing myself. I felt that I content-wise I had something to be really proud of--something that didn't show the company in a bad light--and I could use this forum as a springboard to something more (writing articles, etc). Really, what harm could it do, right? It wasn't like the company had a blogging policy.

Or at least it didn't until that week.

One that I had to sign off on.

One that indicated--like most company legalese these days--that my online activity could affect my job security.

And so back under the bed went any and all plans I had to out myself. So long idea. Nice knowing you.

Since I didn't know when I would be leaving the company (the general idea being soon, followed by the even more vague idea that it would be to do something else book related), I really had no idea when I could be me. Despite the fact that my writing bears a striking resemblance to my natural speech patterns (both friends and family have exclaimed upon reading an entry or three, "That sounds just like you!"), writing this blog sometimes makes me feel like I'm dealing with a split personality. I have to remember the correct way to sign emails. There are were people I couldn't talk to about the amazing things I learned through this blog.

As a person who considers herself to be a bit on the TMI side, not talking about author interviews and the discussions we've had killed me. But I liked my job, I loved the people I worked with and I adored most of my customers, so I kept things status quo.

Then we all got laid-off, and I figured finally, FINALLY I could just say, "Hey y'all, my name is... Thanks for reading," but then I realized there was a waiting period for severance and such. There was more legalese, there was more time waiting, and it all jammed up against my desire to out myself and really get on with this.

This waiting was almost worse than working and blogging because at least when I was working I could lay my hands on a new book to talk about or experience some story to share with y'all. Suddenly without the job I was in traction. I wanted to contact people, try to get out there and really talk about the book business without feeling like I needed to narrow my focus, but I had to wait until my ties were officially severed. God forbid that I come this far only to experience an "off with her head and her money" moment!

So I stayed mum, got a little depressed as I felt directionless, got over being depressed and applied for Publishing school (I should know by April 15th if I got in, but my packet arrived whole and happy), did the temp agency thing and ran around Seattle drinking too much.

Okay, so Seattle really has nothing to do with the whole blogging/bookselling/blog-cycle thing, but since I looked at books there, I'm including it.

I'm also including this, the point of this whole post really:

I got my severance check today.

My last tie with the company is gone. I have no more excuses to hold me back from trying everything that I've been dreaming about since this blog caught on. I no longer have to sign my emails with Jade or filter myself**. I can be all the me I can be.

As soon as this check is cashed...

A girl has to pay rent, you know.

So consider Monday my coming out day. We can play the name game and everything. I'm still not going to slam the company I used to work for (or even reveal the exact location of the store), but I will answer any other questions you might have.

If you have any at all.

If not, I figure that we'll get back to what this blog was about in the beginning: books, bookselling, and the publishing world that bring about both.

See you Monday!***

*For those of you I've traded emails with, Jade is my middle name.
**And yes, despite all the weird bra/boob stories I have been filtering myself.
***Not that I won't post until then, but it will probably be trivial stuff or ruminations on books...so, you know, the usual is-she-or-isn't-she-off-her-meds stuff.

Destination Bookstores: Hitting the Mystery Spot

With competition from the internet and different big box retailers covering the same products, creating a destination store is a big deal in the retail world. How do you get people to go out of their way to come to your store when they can easily (comparatively speaking) find the same product somewhere else? What experience can you offer them that will have a greater appeal than Amazon or Walmart?

Often this leads to bookstores expanding there focus; instead of just books, they carry books and coffee. They add in a line or three of semi-book-related objects (book lights, book marks, or book covers), and several things that have nothing to do with books (chocolates, box kits, lotions, etc). Books, while still a big part of the focus, are no longer the total focus as the owners juggle ideas to hit the jackpot combination that will draw people in.

While I would love a bookstore with a good wine and cheese serving café hooked on (a glass of wine, a plate of cheese and a good book? Yum!), these extras are not what I focus on when I walk into a store. My focus, upon entering a new bookstore, goes like this:

1. Window displays: do they draw me into the store?

2. Display tables and Wall bays: Are they up to date or stale? Do they contain titles unique to the store/area? Are they clean looking (note: something can be shopped, but still clean looking)? Is the overall composition pleasing to the eye (something I’m oddly OCD about)?

3. How s the store arranged?

4. Sections: At a glance can I tell the store’s focus? Are the sections representative of the clientele? Do any sections clearly have no one to take care of them? (e.g. Are they a lot smaller than other sections despite country demand for titles? Are they flopping looking?)

5. Do they have staff recommends? How are they indicated? Am I being forced to decipher someone’s illegible handwriting?

6. Do they carry Bargain or used books?

It’s only after all of this that I begin to notice the other things like:

1. What are the booksellers up to? Was I acknowledged when I walked by? (Note: I’m saying acknowledged, eye contact and a smile will do.)

2. Magazines: do they have them? Are the necessary? Is the selection representative of the clientele?

3. What other things is this store selling?

Now the order of these lists will change slightly depending on when or how I come across different sections or events. If I’m ignored by a bookseller as I walk in who’s chosen instead to talk about non-business related things to her coworker to the point where another customer has to make a noise to get some attention to be rung up? Yeah, I’m going to take note right away. In the Elliot Bay Book Company, we made the mistake of walking in the used books side of the business and that really messed up my thought process as the collectables are all spined, in glass cabinets or up above one’s head. Had we entered through the other side, I would have immediately seen all the display shelves with their recommendations cards, and my first impression would have been completely different.

Since I realize that I’m not the best person to talk about bookstore first impression with (as I enter them still thinking like a retailer and not necessarily a customer), I made my friends go along on my Seattle book adventures (partially because I wanted to hear their thoughts and partially because there was no way I would have been able to get around the city by myself). After our bookstore visits I would ask their opinions on what they did like, didn’t like, and what struck them about their experience. Our surprising consensus after visiting Elliot Bay, the University Bookstore and the Seattle Mystery Bookshop was that Seattle Mystery was our favorite.

At maybe a quarter of the size of Elliot Bay (and an eighth of the University Bookstore if you count the text book sections), the Seattle Mystery Bookshop was the smallest of the stores we visited. As the name would imply, they sold only mystery/thrillers with no add ons. Beyond a few store t-shirts/coffee cups and some mystery related magazines, the store was all novels all the time; specialized to the extreme of carrying only one genre.

The complete opposite of the idea many stores embrace to create a destination experience.

The stock did not feel limiting however. The sub-genres ran the gambit of historical to paranormal and the publishers from large down to self-published. My beloved SoHo Crime imprint was everywhere (their books, with the similar layout for all the covers, look so good when placed face up together. Again, it’s the OCD), but so where many other publishers that I always wanted to order in. The display tables mixed their presentation by placing hard covers, paperbacks and trades all together in a pleasing way that drew the eye. Staff Picks stickers helped differentiate the titles without forcing me to decipher handwriting, and white strips of paper folded around the outside of the book indicated when the author had been in (or would be) to sign that particular title.

Seattle Mystery took a very small space and maximized its potential. They let the book covers and displays speak for themselves with just enough signage to indicate the breakout (Northwest Authors, Culinary Mysteries, Small Publishers of Note, etc). The overall presentation was a store that embraced what it was—a mystery bookstore—and didn’t feel the need to improve upon the product, because it was that product that you came for.

Despite the fact that my friends and I are not mystery buffs (occasional mystery readers, yes, but its not something we seek out), we all left the store after purchasing at least one book. For my Seattle friend, the Mystery bookstore became a store she would return to when she was looking for a good read despite the fact she has no need to go down to Pioneer Square, and my other friend and I agreed that we would both return the next time we were in Seattle.

Does that make it a destination bookstore? I think so.

What do you look for/at when you enter a bookstore? What makes a bookstore a destination for you?

Back!

Consider this spot a placeholder for later today when I will profess my undying love for the Seattle Mystery Bookshop.

Until then, I leave you with this picture of a box of books for soldiers and what appears to be my bone-y monkey feet.



Perhaps I should have cropped this...

The What's This...In My Pants edition

So not too long ago, I ripped a hole in my pants. A big one as you can from the picture below. It started out small, a little tearing sound, a little fabric parting along the side of the pocket (the horizontal rip in this picture). Then I sat down and it ripped a little more.


"Well, this sucks," I thought, seeing as how I was in the middle of Elephant's deli about to eat a sandwich. "But at least I'm wearing a long coat."

A discreet bum check assured me that the hole was not so big that I could not finish eating and do my errands before returning home where I would patch the tear and call it good. No big deal.

Then I stood up, and the pants ripped some more.

Still no big, right? I just needed to buy some more patches.

And then I stepped off the curb and the pants ripped all the way to the base of the pocket. Hell.
What you can't tell from the above picture is that those pants have a thirty-six inch inseam. They're long. The pockets are long. The rip is almost six inches, and the fabric was so weak it didn't seem worth the bother to try and repair them.

So what do you do with a pair of ripped pants? Turn them into an ode to Maureen Johnson and the Green brother's "in your pants" game, of course.

Behold:


Thar be an Abundance of Katherines in my pants.

Whatever shall I tell my parents about this life-style choice?

I’m done! (The going to Seattle edition)

The application is done, and overnighted, and man, I’m having a great day. Behold:

I got an interview with a Temp agency out of the way, so that I’ll have some source of income until I find out if I get into the Institute or not.

I got together with my old costumer and she gave me this beautiful black lace dress that I wore for Arsenic and Old Lace, which means I know have a kick-ass Halloween costume for this October.

I came home to find a lovely copy of The Call of the Weird by Louis Theroux (as provided by the lovely De Capo Press) leaning against my door.

And…and…And! I now get to spend the rest of the week in Seattle, visiting an old college friend, reading my autographed copy of Midnight Brunch (you treat me so well, Marta), and exploring the city’s bookstores. Which is where y’all come in. Anyone know great bookstores I should visit in town? I welcome any recommendations.

Realize, of course, this bookstore-ing will be sandwiched between barhopping and girlie-wow-I-haven’t-seen-you-forever-ness.

All I have to do is some laundry, some packing, some bill paying and make one important trip to the post office to finally send that box of books off to Afghanistan.

Oh, and hopefully post some fun book related pictures that I took today.

So, yeah, hit me with your Seattle knowledge and have a great week if I don’t get back to you.

Thanks for all the feedback on my essay. My writing, I've been told, is very representative of how I sound.

Need your feedback...

Here is yet another (for me anyway, y'all haven't seen any of the others) version of my personal statement for my application. I would love it if I could get some feedback on any glaring errors or weirdness you see.

Thanks.

****

There used to be a bookstore next to the market my mother would shop at when I was little. It was all narrow aisles and fully-stocked shelves, and always dim and cool no matter the weather outside. If we were well-behaved during our grocery shopping expedition, my mother always promised that my brother and I could each have a book—a promise that led to collections of the Serendipity Books by Stephen Cosgrove, Nancy Drew, the Hardy Boys and others.

He signed there once, Stephen Cosgrove; a very sweet man whose book, The Muffin Muncher, I blame for my continuing fascination with dragons and muffins (delicious looking or not). My mother has a picture of my brother and me, proudly standing on either side of Mr. Cosgrove with our tall stack of books nearly obscuring his face. He signed them all, taking the time to talk to us about his Serendipitous world.

Looking back, I realize it wasn’t much of a signing. The store only saw a small trickle of customers during the day, few of whom had rabid Cosgrove fans at home. It was the kind of event I often hear authors online complaining about—not enough advertising or sell-through to justify the time spent—but for my brother and I it was perfection. Here was an author, a star! One who took the time to talk to a little girl and boy like they were the most important readers in the world. To this day the memory of that time with Stephen Cosgrove epitomizes the why: why I read, why I love books, and why I love the people who produce the books I love.

It was from that store’s manager that I got my first job as a part-time bookseller. She taught me the necessity of expediting stock to the floor immediately, store presentation and how to engage the customer with my love of books to up-sell their purchase. From there I transferred to the store I would later help manage. I learned that it was not enough to just supply the books that were in demand, but that a good bookseller also had to anticipate which books would be big thanks to media attention, and those that would only succeed if given enough bookseller support and word of mouth buzz. My manager taught me that the passion that left me dreading the turn of the last page could be channeled to convert others into followers of the authorial cult.

In 2005 I started a blog under the anonymous title Bookseller Chick where I could relate silly customer questions (“I’m looking for a book. It’s blue. Do you have it?”) and new author finds. It was meant to act as amusement for my friends and an out for me—as I could never remember who I told what story to—but nothing more. Then a strange thing happened, others started reading my blog; anywhere from 150 to 250 unique visitors a day that I had never met. I discovered whole communities of readers, writers, librarians and booksellers on the internet hungry to trade information. In my off-time I blogged book recommendations at the request of perfect strangers, tried to decipher why some covers would grab a book browser’s attention while others faded from sight, and walked authors through their interactions with booksellers. I started to study the process that led to the finished title arriving in my store and realized that maybe I could contribute as well.

It is because of my love of books fostered as a child, my bookseller’s passion for spreading the word about new finds, and this wonderful online book community that I’ve had the honor to be part of that I’m applying to the Denver Publishing Institute. I want to take what I’ve learned from working at the end of the book production line and build upon it from the other side of the creation process. Discovering how to best maximize my potential—whether it be in teaching authors how to connect with booksellers and readers, focusing on marketing on and offline or something else entirely—is my goal for the future, one that I believe this Institute will help me achieve.

Reader blogs...

I'm sitting here wondering what makes a good reader blog. Well, not true. I'm sitting here on hold with my old university trying to get a hold of a notarized transcript (shoot me), and I'm taking this muzak-filled opportunity to contemplate reader blogs, the good, the bad and the ugly. Now obviously we've pounded the subject into the ground when it comes to blogs needing interesting voice and content to be popular, but what about when the content is in part dictated by the books reviewed?

We can argue day and night about what constitutes a proper review, but for the moment we'll just settle for any blog or website dedicated (for the most part) to the reader's thoughts on books s/he has read. What makes an interesting, returnable (as in you return to it) reader blog?

Does the rating system matter?

Does it all depend on what is being reviewed (e.g. you would accept one style from a SciFi blog, but not from a lit blog)?

There's a whole list of review blogs in the sidebar that I need to update, but I want to hear your thoughts on what makes a good reader blog and how to build a better one.

I'll consider to gather my thoughts while I wait to talk to a real person.

For those of you not interested in this subject, go check out Sarah Weinman's thoughts on "Genre Wars from a different angle" and share your thoughts.

In which two topics become one…sort of

I have a two page personal statement that I have to write for my Denver Publishing School application. Two pages on why I think I should be in the program and what brought me to this point. Two pages to cover a lifetime of experiences and joys found in reading, bookselling and this blog.

Crap. Verbose people don’t do page limits very well. And verbose book lovers?

Yeah, not so much with the limitations. Not when every discussion adds something more to my mental catalogue of thoughts about books.

Take the different discussions going on surrounding the inclusivity and exclusivity of book blogger communities. In response to one of the comments she received on her original column, Monica Edinger replied, “What may seem totally inclusive to one of us may seem dauntingly exclusive to another.” She applies this to life as a whole and it certainly is representative. How many times have I heard on this blog that readers have felt uncomfortable approaching booksellers to ask for recommendations for fear of mockery or idiocy or that authors break out into the sweats at the idea of walking into a store and asking to autograph their books? Plenty. This fear exists because we all want to be liked or accepted, although more rests on this connection for an author than for a reader. Something that I’ve tried to do with this blog is alleviate that fear, or at least put it into terms that are relatable in the grand hierarchy of things that should affect your self-worth.

Does that make the fear go away? Hell no. In some cases it may help (hey, they’re just as afraid of me as I am of them), and in others it exacerbates. Just because I know that I hate public speaking and I need to obsessively practice whatever I’m going to say to stave off the cold sweats does not mean that I’m still won’t be dreading every moment up at a podium. There are many variables that will add or detract from my experience on stage just like there are many that will affect every time you walk into a bookstore. Did you get a bookseller with knowledge of your section or books? Was the store well organized and run? Did the person helping you have to deal with the customer from hell earlier that day? Did someone just run over grandma with a reindeer? Or hey, do they even have your books? Did they have a nasty reaction a publicist? Did your publisher call during a lunch rush and so all pre-arrival warnings were drowned out by the ca-ching of the cash register?

All it takes is one disconnect in the chain and the whole experience falls apart. And since the chain is long, though it is the person at the very top who dropped the ball, it is the person at the very bottom (and dealing directly with you) that has to deal with getting hit with the flack.

In a perfect world (especially a perfect book world) everyone would be comfortable, well-off (oh, c’mon, you know a little financial cushion would make you feel better), and well informed: the bookseller would know exactly where your book is and why it is/isn’t available, the customer would know exactly what they were looking for and feel comfortable discussing their likes and dislikes, and the author could just walk in off the street into any bookstore and find and sign their stock. Wine and signings would flow freely, and thoughtful consideration would be granted to all.

It’s not a perfect world, but talking about what makes it imperfect and what we can do about it helps. I want to part of the publishing world in some way because I see this disconnect between publishers and booksellers. I see it between authors and booksellers.

And I see it between readers and the rest of the publishing community at large.

We all want to be part of the community, and we all have different point of views to bring to it. Whether we feel comfortable voicing those opinions remains to be seen. And maybe you don’t necessarily have to. This is a wide open world and thanks to the flattening affect of the internet you have a chance to find a champion, someone who says what you might not be comfortable expressing yourself.

Of course, you might have to work up the courage to talk to them, but with a like-minded individual it might be a little easier.

What I’m saying is, I want to be that person in publishing. I want to carve out my little space showing people how to speak up, speak out, and get what they want. I want to make it easier for authors to reach booksellers and readers, and for booksellers to reach authors and the rest of the world.

HTC said to just take my bookstore post and edit it to conform to the personal statement guidelines set forth by the publishing school, but it seems more an obituary than a starting point for something new. I know where I’ve been and what I’ve done, but how that fits in my future remains to be seen.

Whatever I write will have to be done soon, and only represent a narrow section of what y’all have taught me about needs to be done. I hope it helps with the acceptance process.

Either way, know that you had a lot to do with the result.

Popularity Contest, Community Building or Something Else Entirely...

There's some great discussion going on in the KidLit blogger realm (thanks Fuse#8 for the link) that can be applied to all of blogger-dom. Monica Edinger of Educating Alice puts forth the argument that widgets like "Are you an A-List Celebrity Blogger" and blogger activities like Poetry Friday and (I'm adding this one) Thursday Thirteen help to create an environment of "exclusion and inclusion that I deal with daily in my fourth grade classroom." We try to teach kids to not create cliques and depend on popularity, but all the while we're jockeying for web exposure and placement thus creating a "do as we say, not as we do" situation. The discussion of this argument and counterarguments carries through the comments (be sure to read them), and also onto MotherReader's Blog.

MotherReader, who recently wrote an article for Edge of the Forest about becoming a B-List Blogger, points out that even as we point out the unfairness of this inclusion/exclusion system we shouldn't raise people to believe that everyone will accept them automatically and sometimes we have to work for it. Friendships--online and off--like success don't come right away and require a lot of effort for the most part. Now whether that effort requires the child/blogger/person to change something intrinsic to themselves is another matter entirely.

I have my own thoughts on this phenomena and how it plays out through books, bloggers and life, but I need to go help buy a baby shower gift. I'll mull them over until I get back. I would love to hear your thoughts on the subject, or see what you contribute at these other sites.

No longer printing despite demand...

It was with great sadness that I realized today that POD-DY Mouth is moving on and will no longer be running her website (you can find her official post here). If not for the anonymous P.M. I would have never discovered Will Clarke and the many other fabulous authors who decided to strike out on their through print on demand. Her insight into the POD world--and the accompanying round-up of articles related to it--was unequaled (in my opinion) by any other site on the net.

That said I completely understand why now would be the time to quit, and I'm glad that she stuck around this long.

So long, POD-DY Mouth, and thanks for all the books.

Book and Blogger Stuff: the Meds Edition

Stuff:

1. There’s a new issue of The Edge of the Forest out with an article by Mother Reader on how to “Be a B-List Blogger.”

2. Brotherhood 2.0 is teaching you how to be a Nerd Fighter! All you have to do is compose the theme song for your personal Nerd Fighter type.

3. Is anyone else having problems with New Blogger? Not only am I getting more spam, but…yeah: comments, spam, loading weirdness, and I’m really not lovin’ the fact that Word to Blogger program doesn’t work anymore. Anyone else having these problems/complaints?

4. The Pacific Northwest Bookseller’s Association Spring show is this weekend, in case y’all are in town and interested.

More Stuff:

So I’ve been sitting here thinking about numbers, specifically sales numbers of books vs. viewer numbers for TV shows. Why is it that Grey’s Anatomy can routinely pull in twenty-five million viewers, but very few books will ever experience those kinds of numbers? What is it about television that has made it a more appealing medium than the written word?

Now, let me make it clear that I don’t expect a single title (that is not Harry Potter) to have the same mass appeal of G.A. You can’t expect that many people to turn to one novel when they have thousands upon thousands a year to pick from when compared to less than the hundred shows on at any hour. Add to that that television feeds into our short attention spans, allowing us to limit our time devoted to any one thing. With a smaller selection to choose from it makes sense that shows can command larger audiences. Even shows considered to be failing (250,000 viewers or less) command a larger audience than most print runs.

But this reduced selection driving higher numbers can be seen in the book world as well, take the success of Ishmael Beah’s A Long Way Gone, for example. As the book club pick of the Starbucks company, A Long Way Gone benefits from not having any direct competition within the Starbucks stores. As the only title present in a store otherwise devoted to coffee and coffee products, the title has a chance to attract both regular readers and those who might never step into a bookstore on their own. This larger audience brings in more sales not only via Starbucks, but by the people who see the book at Starbucks and choose to pick it up at a more traditional outlet. My store had many people who chose to buy the former Starbucks’ title (Mitch Albom’s For One More Day) from us because of our discount card. How do I know this? Well, they’d come right out and tell us.

Is this happening with Beah’s book? I can only assume so when 9,000 copies were sold during the first week in bookstores alone (17,000 were attributed to “other”—read: Starbucks, etc—outlets), which is amazing (at least in my mind) for a debut nonfiction title on heavy subject matter.

So is Starbucks acting like ABC with A Long Way Gone taking the place of Grey’s Anatomy? Is that even possible?

I’ll let those of you not suffering the loopiness of allergy meds figure it out. Let me know your thoughts.

Your (Unreadable) Secret

While I was reading the Guardian Unlimited article, "The great unread: DBC Pierre, Harry Potter...oh yes, and David Blunkett," and I was immediately reminded of a story the boss told me about our old mall manager. One day he walks in and asks for the newest, hottest business title.

No prob, we had it. Yay, goooo booksellers!

As the boss rang him up, she did the usual patter--very popular book, written up in the NY Times, yadda yadda--only to have him tell her point blank, "Really, that's good to know, but I don't plan on reading it."

Say wha--huh?

Turns out he was just buying it to impress someone by leaving it out on the table. To look smart by proximity.

No wonder this Guardian article makes total sense to me, but I don't think that's the only reason people don't read certain titles they bought. There are also those novels that you start but don't finish right away, or those ones you buy for that long off possible snow storm.

But please take the article as your journalistic absolution and share with us the books you just could not bring yourself to read. At least not yet.

Here are my offerings:

Lads by Dave Itzkoff (started but did not finish)
Fallen by T. Jefferson Parker (started but did not finish)
Joker by Ranulfo (haven't started, but plan to at some point)
Anna Karenina by Tolstoy (maybe someday)

Relying on the Unreliable

I'm deep in allergy hell right now, and for some reason this got me thinking about unreliable narrators (probably due to how unreliable my brain becomes on allergy meds), specifically the good, the bad and the ugly. I happen to really enjoy a narrators who lie (to me and to themselves) in movies (Usual Suspects), TV (Black Donnellys), and books (Catcher in the Rye), and I'm always on the look out for suggestions.

So bring it on: Who's the best and worst of the unreliable narrators out there? What makes them work? When do they cross the line?

Some Loser-ific Tales of High School Horrors

I want this book. I do. I don’t remember doing anything particularly embarrassing in high school, but that may have more to do with some sanity-saving mental blocks than reality.When I Was a Loser: True Stories of (Barely) Surviving High School, edited (and contributed to) by John McNally. Writers (and bloggers) Maud Newton, Tod Goldberg, Owen King, Julianna Baggott, Will Clarke and others provide tales representative of the defining high school moments that we all experienced in some way (even if they happened to the brother of a cousin of a friend of that one girl who works at the Dairy Freeze that met Joey Ramone that one time, maybe).

There’s a reason that very few of us look back on high school as a golden time in our lives.

Hey, which reminds me of a high school horror—I knew I could think of one eventually—although on the scale of some of these tales it probably doesn’t rate very high. Back when I used to do high school theatre, I played one of the main doctors in Brian Clark’s Whose Life is it Anyway. (An excellent play that you should all read because it really makes you think about the different sides of the assisted suicide debate. Also, with a character that is restricted to only being able to move his head, it’s a great study in human as object.) It was decided that my figure was too slender to look mature enough for the role, so the director and the costumers decided to gift me with a set of D-cup breasts. Just for the record, 32 inch rib cages and D-cups should never meet, and girls who develop this naturally have my sympathy. The additional cuppage—besides giving me back problems—changed the flow of all my costumes and made me look fuller figured. Oh, and they also made me stink to high heaven of bird seed.

“Why bird seed?” you may ask. Or you may not, but I’ll tell you anyway; bird seed when placed in little cloth baggies, it turns out, has a comparable weight and movement to real flesh. And every time they shift and move they release a little puff of bird seed dust. I felt so bad for the guy playing the quadriplegic lead because a scene in the play called for my character to lean over him and accidentally put my boobs in his face. This meant not only did have to breathe bird seed dust, but if I’d ever tripped, I would have smothered him.

While the boobs themselves were pretty embarrassing for these facts alone, I didn’t really see the far reaching ramifications that appearing on stage suddenly chesty would have—i.e. people feel the need to see what was real and what was Memorex. Since we put on a pretty good show, offered a matinee for students (which meant they got to get out of classes and therefore guaranteed a full attendance), and a couple of ethics classes required the show for a discussion, my bird seed boobs were noticed by a lot of people. And since bird seed does such an excellent job of mimicking flesh a lot of those people (read: the male half) were a bit confused when they saw me in the hallways later sporting a much-more-appropriate-to-my-size rack.

What I’m saying is my chest got stared at in the hall. A lot. Waaaaaay to make a girl self-conscious.

Still I probably wouldn’t have noticed these looks at all (I was pretty oblivious) if it hadn’t been for the lovely little conversation I had with a recently graduated alum on preview night. After we finished changing out of our costumes, it was tradition to go back into the Cafagymatorium to see our parents and anyone else who’d stuck around. The alum was waiting as we walked out, and after congratulating us all on a job well done, he pulled me aside.

“So I wanted to tell you something,” he said.

Great. I was sure I was going to get some sort of critique on my performance. Some note on how my timing was clearly off on that one monologue in comparison to the cue music.

“I brought a friend with me, and when you walked out on stage he was all, ‘Wow, look at the rack on that one.’”

Oh. Hell. “So, what did you say?”

“Unless something has changed in the last year, those aren’t hers.”

And at that moment, hyper-consciousness to much decreased everyday “rack” was born.

Oh, high school. I don’t miss you at all. And it's good to know that others feel that way as well.

So now that I’ve spilled my guts—or in this case, my bird seed—spill yours. Remember something embarrassing about high school or just some social aspect that you don’t miss? Tell the world. Free yourself from the good, the bad and the ugly. Let others commiserate with your pain, these people did.

Maybe I can rustle up some sort of a prize for the story that makes me laugh/cry/nod my head the most.

For You SciFi/Fantasy/Horror Writers...

Yog's Notebook is currently seeking submissions in the SciFi, Fantasy and Horror categories for their 'zine. They don't pay a lot of money and really this is just a chance to get your name out there. Who knows, this could be your chance at building a grassroots fan base. In five years both you and Yog might be famous...if only because people will puzzle over the meaning of Yog.*

If you're interested in submission guidelines, go forth and click this link.

*And, yes, I do know the origin of Yog.

Oh, and a little something for you female comic lovers as well, check out girl-wonder.org "a collection of sites dedicated to females in mainstream comics. Our goals are to foster an attentive, empowered audience community and to encourage respect and high-quality character depiction within the industry."

I'm now off to visit the little bro and emerge myself Pabst land. Pray for my liver.

Since I seem to be on a You Tube roll...

Since this video has been out for over a month (and already received 1.5 million hits) I'm sure some of you have seen it, but it loosely (don't ask me how) ties into our Writer as Blogger, Blogger as Writer discussion. The discussion itself continues to get some interesting answers both here and other places around the internet, so please, continue to add your thoughts.

Meanwhile, here's Web 2.0...The Machine is Us/ing us. I wish my professors had created things like this when I was in college.

Pulp Fiction as Typography...

A friend of mine showed me this and since it has to do with words I thought I would pass it on.

Warning: This is not work safe, and yes, you do need the sound on.

Here you go: Pulp Fiction as Typography.

Oh, The Places You Will Go, Girls

I had several bookish friends growing up (Big surprise, I know), it was never just me sitting alone in a corner reading—not unless I wanted it to be. When we weren’t outside playing or composing soap operas with our dolls and My Little Ponies, we’d be draped across one another like puppies on the floor or on my bed; have staged a takeover of a table in the library, propping our elbows up on our backpacks to achieve the most comfortable reading position; or be smashed together in the bus seats, tuning out the world with words. When we were done with this book or that, we’d trade, discuss or recommend something else. Series titles, stand alone, historical, fantasy, science fiction, contemporary: it didn’t matter. We read widely and eclectically. We read because we could. Because in books you can be anyone—anything—and not have to worry about limitations.

I wish that my teachers had done more with that, shown us what opportunities were out there by telling us where to try and submit writing and teaching us the finer arts of book discussion at a younger age. Not that they were bad by any means, in fact, comparatively speaking I got a better education than my brother did despite there only being four years between us. My teachers did what they could, but with each successive year trying to make up for the failings of the last they were fighting an uphill battle as curriculum requirements, teaching styles and classroom sizes changed. While I was lucky in that I came into grade school knowing how to read—all the children from my co-op kindergarten did—I never would have become the reader I am today without the help of Miss Cleo.

Cleo volunteered for our grade school, and in my mind I always see her as this very grandmotherly woman. I have no idea if she’d had children come up through our school, or if she was a retired teacher looking for something to do, but she believed in education and the power of reading. Looking back on those years, I can’t think of a time that she wasn’t in the classroom, reading to us or with us in individual or small group sessions. She helped us build our vocabularies and ran through our flash cards. She gave us the one on one attention that we needed as we struggled over how to sound out the big words and divine their meaning through context. She loved reading, teaching, and most importantly us, which came through in every action and word. There were no “can’ts” with Miss Cleo, just “coulds” and “woulds” because all we had to do was try hard enough.

I wonder if she knew how many lives she helped and changed. I like to think she did. The volunteer award for the district was created in her honor and to this day bears her name. Because if you’re going to win that award, you’d better measure up to the standards Miss Cleo set.

I think that readergirlz, a website dedicated to celebrating Young Adult books and strong female characters and encouraging discussion with other teenage girls, would be a site that Miss Cleo would be proud to recommend. Justina Chen Headley, Dia Calhoun, Janet Lee Carey, and Lorie Ann Grover have a created a website for teen girls to “encourage teen girls to read and reach out with community service projects related to each featured novel. As well, readergirlz will host MySpace discussions with each book's author, include author interviews, and provide book party ideas, including playlists, menus, and decorations.” Each month will also have a topic—this month’s being Tolerance—and girls are encouraged to visit the links provided to learn more about what they can do to help improve their own social and physical environment.

Reading is not a solitary activity, it never has been. As soon as your laughter at a phrase or joke causes someone to ask what’s so funny or you open your mouth to tell your sister/brother/mother/father/friend about this plot or that, you’ve left the solitary act of reading words on a page behind. This need to discuss, to share creates a group activity, and is why we’ve seen the proliferation of reader blogs and sites. It’s why the entire country can go gah-gah over a book whose plot and writing—while not complex—made people feel smart and gave them something in common to talk about on the train or in the office. Reading, we’re discovering once again, is fun.

And, gosh darn it, people like it!

And they like to talk about it, finding different perspectives and thoughts. They like that they don’t necessarily have to be an expert in theory or be able to tell the difference between a Post-Modern piece and a Romantic one. They like that they can learn information while not feeling like it’s being jammed down their throats in an academic setting.

I have high hopes for readergirlz. I want to see this work and allow young women to connect across racial, religious and borderlines and celebrate their love of reading. I want to see them grow the idea and expand by offering girls links to where they can try submitting their own writing, providing a little how-to on creating your own ‘zine, and highlighting girls who personify the readergirlz ideal when these authors meet them during tours.

So on this most Suessical day, I think it’s only right to look forward to the places these woman will go and the girls they’ll take with them. I’m sure that the spirit of Miss Cleo will be along for the ride.

Blog ‘em, Dano: Calling All Bloggers!

Three months and ten days ago, Sara Walker emailed me to tell me about the Book Lust Wiki, a companion community to Nancy Pearl’s website Book Lust.

“How cool is that?” I thought, and then promptly went on with my day. I may have told y’all about it, burying its link between newspaper articles and links to other blog entries discussing the gossip of the day, or I may not. To tell you the truth, I don’t remember. But as I was working on whittling down my email box today, I once again came across Sara’s email. “Perhaps I should check this out.”

This time I actually did—hey, that’s what my newly rediscovered follow-through is for—and wow, did I have a good time. For example, I created a Bookseller Blog page (as it was sorely needed) and added myself, the Written Nerd, Bookdwarf and Little Willow (all of whom may want to edit their information), but I know that I’m missing many, many people. Unfortunately I don’t have the time or the energy to add all of my sidebar links to the appropriate places, nor do I think of myself as the official authority on all these categories, which is where you come in.

Booksellers, go add yourself using the Easy Edit key.

Librarians, spread your wisdom and talented organizational skills to the world by linking yourself and others (there’s another designation for straight library websites), so that all may know your shushing power.

Readers, add blogs that I have no clue about, and your own to immortalize your authority on all things paginated.

The rest of you (because I’m sure I’ve missed some niche), go find out what category you/someone else belong(s) in (look at the scrolling side bar on the left hand side of the page)—or, should your designation be lacking, create one by following the instructions on this page—and add another link to increase your/someone else’s Technorati numbers and love.

(‘Cause it is all about the book love, baby. Oooh, it makes my pages flutter.)

The Book Lust Wiki needs your help to build its links, and it is your job—nay, your duty as a book lover—to provide the information that you have collected through your various blog hopping to make this the best Book Blog Wiki it can possibly be! Come, better yourself and others through the wisdom of crowds! James Surowiecki, Dan Tapscott and Anthony Williams would be so proud of you.



Be warned: the procrastination that lies there in is seductive, but as it is a good cause, I can honestly say that it is better for you than playing Solitaire or Snood (evil, evil, time-squandering game!).