Don't be offended if you see me washing my hands after waiting on you this holiday season.  There's some serious stuff going around out there, and I can't afford to get sick.

 

This has been a tough year.  As always, December is our most important month.  Last year we got clobbered by the ice storm and a whole lot of snow.  This year it looks like the flu might be our nemesis.  So I'm taking lots of Vitamin C and encouraging staff members to take care of themselves.  And you too!

If you can't make it into the store due to sickness, or any other reason (like a broken bridge!), don't forget that when you buy books here on our website, the shipping is on us.  Just click on the button on the lower right of your screen that says "Buy Books Online".

If you aren't quarantined, we'd love to see you for holiday shopping.  We love to make recommendations, and we gift wrap for free.  We also like it when you bring us cookies.

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One more reason, besides her awesome books, to adore Ms. Kingsolver is this quote:

“Obviously, authors don’t own our physical books, just the words inside, so we have no control over how they’re sold,” Ms. Kingsolver said. “But we can ask our readers to consider how much they value their local bookstores. If this price war is another way of using volume discounts to put independent booksellers out of business, then every thoughtful reader is going to lose in the long run.”

She said this because her new book, The Lacuna, is being offered online at $10 as part of an ongoing price war between Amazon and Walmart.  We like her outlook, and we look forward to hosting her at The Music Hall on the very day her book comes out, Nov. 3rd.  The show is sold out, but you can still reserve a signed first edition, even if you aren't lucky enough to be at the show.  Just shoot us an email and we'll hold one aside for you. 

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Hey, there's a boy in a balloon lost in media land! There's a new memoir from a Alaskan media-hound and possible presidential candidate, and there's a price war between Amazon.com and Walmart.com over books.  

That's right, books! I didn't think books got enough attention (or market share) for people to fight over these days. Hopefully it wont last long, but right now both of these behemoths are selling the biggest releases of the fall at a loss just to spite one another. It's ridiculous. Am I worried? Not really (I find the weather a much more frightening prospect when it comes to killing Christmas sales).

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Okay, here's where I offend somebody, but people who obsess over rare books make me crazy.  At SecondRun, our used bookstore, we sell paperbacks for $5 and hardcovers for $7-- good reading copies.  People turning in books are always upset that we don't want to pay them extra for rare first editions, but that's a very specialized industry that has mostly gone online.  We have the used bookstore because we want people to read more books, not to sell artifacts.

That said, I do love to have signed copies of books by my favorite authors.  First Printings if possible.  Its a little dweebish, but it's my way own little way of honoring them.  I have As She Climbed Across the Table by Jonathan Lethem, and I have The Corrections by Jonathan Franzen, and I have Anagrams by Lorrie Moore.  And yes, I have a signed first printing of The DaVinci Code which I did not sell even when prices got quite high.

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I just lived through three days with no glasses!  I dropeed them in Lake Pawtuckaway while cavorting with little kids.  What a headache-- both literally and figuratively.  I can see well enough to get around the house and do basic tasks, but my eyes were tired and red and everything was blurry;  reading was definitely out.   What's summer without reading?!  The whole incident made me recognize how lucky we are to be able to read and appreciate life through the written word.  When I got my new glasses yesterday I was so happy I wanted to throw a baby up in the air! read more

We want Portsmouth to read smarter this summer!

 

Hey!  We challenge you to elevate your reading this summer.  We'll help you find engrossing, entertaining beach reads that are still literate, educational, and maybe even challenging.  We're calling it Summer Smarter Than Others, and we want you to join us.  Personally, I'm planning to read a bunch of Graham Greene that I've been meaning to get to, and at least one book by Henry James (it's true, I've never read him).

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Thank You! We just turned Seven Years Old!

Thank you, thank you!  There is no RiverRun without you.  We should be experienced enough by now to feel like old hands, but the publishing world keeps shifting under our feet.  No matter how well we do our job, there are parts of this industry over which we have no control.  For some reason, they wont listen to me when I tell them how to run their businesses.

Kindle, Borders, and Beyond

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This is a good time of year to pick up a book about a far away land.  Or, a nice big think novel that you can really get lost in (and use for kindling if the electricity goes out again).  One of my favorites from last year that fits in both  categories is called Sacred Games by Vikram Chandra.  It's about 900 pages, and is all about modern day India.  Almost all of the Indian novels I'd read to date were set sometime in the past, often around 1947 when the country became independent (Midnight's Children is a phenomenal example of this).  Sacred Games takes place now, and it is a crazy swirl of religion, crime, pop music, history, terrorism, and romance.  The plots are meandering and only twine together far into the novel, but that's half the fun.

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 Help the Seacoast Local (H)EAT Campaign raise $50,000 this winter for home heating and food assistance.  

 

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