For those who don’t know me, my name is Emily Grossenbacher, and I am the Children’s Manager at Lemuria Books in Jackson. Lemuria Books is the only new independent bookstore in the Jackson Metro area and this year we are celebrating our 36th year!

We are also trying to reach out to as many teachers and schools as we possibly can. We understand that it may have been a while since you’ve been in Lemuria, or maybe you’ve never been, but we want to invite you to an open house at Lemuria Books. Come meet the staff at Lemuria and receive information about how you can get great discounts on school orders and how you can be a part of our fantastic author events!

So come on by THIS THURSDAY, September 15th from 4-6. We will be happy to answer any of your questions and help you make promoting literacy a little easier.

When this new novel arrived in the fiction room not too long ago, I was mesmerized by its catchy cover depicting a woman reclining on a chaise lounge dressed in a long period dress circa 1930s, with a handsome well dressed man gazing at her. They are obviously in a garden enjoying cigarettes, some sort of refreshment, and lively conversation, based on the huge seductive smile on her face.  I kept looking at this cover wondering what  Rules of Civility was about, not withstanding the obvious.

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As a debut novelist, the author Amor Towles has scored, as we say! Surprisingly, he is a principal at an investment firm in Manhattan, though, once upon his graduation  from Yale, he went on to receive  his master’s degree in English from Stanford. I liked his credentials immediately once I read this, but I wondered if his current involvement  in the cosmopolitan New York business world had rendered him void of exceptional fictional writing talent. Once I read that his debut novel is currently in the top five picks of the NPR recommended novels, however, I became  interested in reading this period piece for sure.

Set primarily in 1938, only a year before the Great Depression hit, New York City was abuzz with well educated, glamorous, fun loving, and often risque twenty somethings. Life was good, and living was great.

Into that environment the female protagonist Katherine, or “Katie” Kontent (pronounced like the state of well being) enters, but not as a socially privileged girl, for even though her upbringing was in the city, she was not from the Upper East Side, nor a debutante, nor did she want to be. The gaiety of the times surrounded Katie as she lived in a girls’ boarding house and met numerous eligible bachelors with whom she became involved.

One of the enticing features for the reader is the knowledge acquired about the diverse  restaurants and bars, many of which had once banded women, but were now reluctantly letting them enter, much to the dismay of some men. One particular scene, which was very fun, involved a dinner at the 21 Club. Having spent some time in New York several years ago, I was eager to read about some of the same locales which I had frequented and to learn about their customs in the late 1930s.

While most girls of the time period were searching for youthful rich potential husbands, bidding their time with only minor secretarial jobs, Katie’s intelligence and drive took her ultimately to a rising publication akin to a mixture of “The New Yorker” and “Vogue.” Because of her drive and initiative, she was once asked by her boss if she even liked men! Even though Katie could barely make ends meet once she obtained her own small apartment, she continued to work extremely hard for her boss, sometime working until 2 and 3 a.m., with no overtime pay, of course, during this time period.

Katherine’s particular love interest, which waxes and wanes throughout, throws the reader onto an emotional roller coaster throughout the novel. The author’s emotive ability to manipulate the reader’s desires to root for the heroine should not be underestimated, and at times, the reader wants to take Katherine into another room and talk to her about her decisions, some which seem so wrong for her.

The frame story, which initially puts Katherine in the 1960s, with her husband in the Metropolitan Museum of Art looking at 1930s photos, which happen to have a special someone from the past in them, provides a very effective way to tell the story. Of course, the ending of the book reluctantly throws the reader forward once again to the 1960s.  Not all writers can take on the frame story and have it work as well as Amor Towles does in this novel.

One more thing of great interest to me did involve the title: Rules of Civility, the source of which is actually a short pamphlet composed by the young George Washington entitled “Rules of Civility and Decent Behaviour in Company and Conversation.”

Apparently this short publication was the guide book for all young men of manners and aspirations. It so happens that Katherine’s primary love interest studied, memorized, and applied the 110 rules of etiquette and behavior in his every day life to the extent that he seemed (underline “seemed”) to be flawless. To add to the interest of this novel, the 110 rules are added in the Appendix at the end of this work of fiction.

Take a look at one of the last pages in this incredibly enjoyable novel in order to get a feel for this author’s beautiful language:

“It is a bit of a cliche to characterize life as a rambling journey on which we can alter our course at any given time–by the slightest turn of the wheel, the wisdom goes, we influence the chain of events and thus recast our destiny with new cohorts, circumstances, and discoveries. But for the most of us, life is nothing like that. Instead, we have a few brief periods when we are offered a handful of discrete options. Do I take this job or that job? In Chicago or New York? Do I join this circle of friends or that one, and with whom do I go home at the end of the night? And does one make time for children now? Or later? Or later still?

In that sense, life is less like a journey than it is a game of honeymoon bridge. In our twenties, when there is still so much time ahead of us, time that seems ample for a hundred indecisions, for a hundred visions and revisions–we draw a card, and we must decide right then and there whether to keep that card, and discard the next, or discard the first card and keep the second. And before we know it, the deck has been played out and the decisions we have just made will shape our lives for decades to come.”

Those readers who loved the poet T.S. Eliot’s “The Lovesong of J.Alfred Prufrock,” as I did, will well remember the language that Amor Towles referred to in this quote. I loved Rules of Civility already, but when I read the above, well, then, I was hooked on this novel for sure! Give yourself a treat and read this novel, and give it as a gift to someone this Christmas!

Rules of Civility by Amor Towles (The Viking Press, an imprint of Penguin, July 2011)

-Nan

Today Borders is closing its doors one last time in Flowood. We view the closing of Borders as an opportunity to gain new customers and welcome old ones back. The closing of Borders refuels our ongoing initiative to provide the best service to our existing customers.

We know that Lemuria is still not the only place to buy your books. We could say “shop local” to keep your tax dollars and jobs close. These things are no doubt important, but we believe that there are more reasons than that to shop at Lemuria:

We read books. We love to talk about what we read and hear about what our customers are reading.

We take this knowledge and get the best books in our store for our wide range of customers. We analyze our inventory every day–from buying to receiving to shelving. Our entire knowledgeable staff is involved in this process.

We stock a variety of books–from the paperback to the hardback to the signed hardback to the collectible editions.

If we don’t have it, we’ll try everything we know to get you the book you need–in print and out of print.

We get behind a book and its author. We love to “work on” books with the knowledge that we are bringing it to Mississippi. We have signing & reading events and broaden your reading experience. Your book increases in value, literally and figuratively.

We bring the books and/or the author to your school, your local library, or other event location. Lemuria has wheels.

We like to think that Lemuria is a wonderful place to spend your time. At any time of the day, you may find Lemuria full of curious people. People we see every day, people who are passing through on a long road trip from Boston to New Orleans, people who are serious book collectors, people who are looking for a book for someone special, or people who are looking for that book that fits their particular mood or required task.

All of these people have three things in common: they are here with a purpose or destination in mind, they are here looking for content and interaction that is meaningful to them. Reading adds a rich dimension to their lives. That’s why Lemuria is here and everything we do at Lemuria is with this goal in mind. We nurture our community through human relationships that revolve around an understanding of the importance of reading.

A Big Thank You to all of the local organizations, schools, churches, and libraries we have worked with over the past 36 years.

Let’s keep it growing and going!

If we made an error by leaving your group off the list, please feel free to add it to our comments section.

Schools

Jackson Public Schools, Hinds Community College, St. Joseph’s Catholic School, Madison County Public Schools, St. Anthony’s Catholic School, Jackson Academy, Jackson Prep, St. Richard’s Catholic School, First Presbyterian Day School, Mississippi College Law School, Belhaven University, Millsaps College, East Flora Elementary, First Presbyterian Day School, Madison Avenue Elementary, Madison Ridgeland Academy, Madison Station Elementary, Mannsdale Elementary, Pelahatchie Elementary, Power APAC, St. Andrew’s Episcopal Lower School, St. Andrew’s Episcopal Upper School, St. Anthony Catholic School, Jackson Prepatory School, Ridgeland High School

Special Events

Crossroads Film Festival, Freedom Riders 50th Anniversary, Mississippi Social Workers Convention, Jackson Free Press Chick Ball, VIP Grand Events, Mississippi Art Week-Hinds Community College, Millsaps Arts & Lecture Series

Organizations

Mississippi Hearts Against Aids, Jackson Friends of the Animal Shelter, Clinton Junior Civic League, Mary Church Terrell Literary Club, The Elsinore Garden Club, Downtown Rotary Club, French Society, Party Like a Professional, Jackson’s Green Ladies, Southern Farm Bureau Book Club, Madison Bar Association, Raise Your Pints, ACTE Mississippi, Junior League of Jackson, Operation Shoestring, Salvation Army, Mississippi Cattlemen’s Association, Candlelighters of Mississippi, Craftsmen Guild of Mississippi, Bookfriends of the University Press of Mississippi, Wisdom Academy, United Way of the Capital Area, The Gray Center, Fondren Theatre Workshop

Businesses

Julep Restaurant, Cathead Vodka, Broadstreet Bakery, Fischer Galleries, Hal & Mal’s, Parlor Market

Libraries

Pearl Library-Brown Bag Series, Mississippi Library Commission, Flowood Library, Eudora Welty Library & Applause Series, Jackson Friends of the Library, Jackson/Hinds Library System

Churches

St. James Episcopal Church, St. Andrews Cathedral, Daughters of the King-Chapel of the Cross Episcopal Church

Mississippi Arts & Sciences

Mississippi Public Broadcasting, Mississippi Archives & History, Mississippi Children’s Museum, Mississippi Museum of Art, Mississippi Natural Science Museum, University Press of Mississippi, Mississippi Institute of Arts & Letters

Lemuria welcomes back Pulitzer Prize winner Robert Olen Butler Tuesday evening to sign and to read from his new novel, A Small Hotel.

His last visit was in 2009 for the novel Hell, a tongue-in-cheek romp through an underworld which is populated, it seems, by everybody who’s anybody, including Anne Boleyn, Humphrey Bogart, Shakespeare, and Dante’s Beatrice. His two books before that, Severance and Intercourse, were comprised of vignettes examining, respectively, the last thoughts of just-lopped heads, and the fevered thoughts of couples while they, well, couple. In these collections, like in Hell, Butler let his imagination play with the details of well-known lives.

His new book, though, is a departure from these entirely. A Small Hotel is a look back at a marriage from the vantage point of its ending, and its characters are nobody we recognize. It’s the day Michael and Kelly Hays, who met in New Orleans twenty-five years ago when he saved her from some drunk ruffians, are finalizing their divorce, though Kelly doesn’t show up at the courthouse to sign the papers. Instead, armed with bottles of scotch and pills, she drives to New Orleans to the Olivier House, to the same room in the hotel where she and Michael spent their first night together, and to where they have returned many joyful times since. It’s been a place of happy nostalgia for the Hays couple, but for Kelly, on this day, it’s a place of despair.

Through his and hers flashbacks, seamlessly slipped into and out of as the characters go through a single day, Butler reveals the fissures in the couple’s relationship. If this basic plot description sounds quite gloomy, I actually found the novel to be too full of insight into relationships to be depressing. Michael and Kelly for twenty-four years have participated in that most vulnerable of relationships, a marriage, each trusting that their spouse understands implicitly their intentions, feelings, and thoughts, and each has ended up realizing that they’ve been completely misunderstood.

So I take it back that we don’t recognize the characters in A Small Hotel. They remind us of ourselves, of course.

Mr. Butler will sign and read at Lemuria on Tuesday, the 13th of September, beginning at 5 pm. To order a signed copy of A Small Hotel, click here. 

Maybe you know that I take care of our social media at Lemuria. I also take care of a schedule for our blog which enables us to keep blogs posting at a pretty regular rate. Well, as it sometimes happens, two of my coworkers have not blogged in the past couple of days. (I’ll not mention any names.) I am thinking about that fact and checking Twitter at the same time this morning. To my delight, there is a tweet about Boo. And since there are no blogs, I take this as the final signal that I should indulge in Boo pictures this morning.

Do you know Boo? The “world’s cutest dog”? If you don’t already know Boo, about 1,638,000 people think that he is the world’s cutest dog on Facebook, and he has just come out with a new book: Boo: The Life of the World’s Cutest Dog. The tweet about Boo was about his appearance on Good Morning America this morning. This is his first TV appearance. His owner stays purposely behind as she does not want the spotlight and would like to just let Boo have it.

The other funny part about Boo, at least for me, is that John Evans is not that excited about the Boo book. Well, that leads me to another reason why I like Boo. I tell John that Boo is the perfect example of something gone viral on the Internet. We, at Lemuria, dream of the day we could go viral, at least in our community. Maybe if we had a cute dog we could! And he could do our blog instead of us boring old humans! Well, maybe not Murakami and Marquez and Marlantes. I think that would be too heavy for Boo.

So thank you absent Lemuria Bloggers for letting Boo make his debut at Lemuria.

I LOVE BOO! DO YOU?