How long have you worked at Lemuria?

Since October of 2008, so for 4 years. I started as a senior in college. I was basically living here.

When did you start really collecting books? Is it a collection, or more of a hoard?

I used to have a hoard. For a long time, I really just wanted books. I recently organized my books, so now I only have one copy of things.

 Is there a book you wish that you had bought, but didn’t?

I didn’t buy The Help. I have a signed Advanced Reader Copy, but I never bought a hardcover. Isn’t that bad? I work here. There is no excuse.

 What do you look for in a good book?

I live in two different worlds. I live in the kid world and I live in the adult world. In adult books, I look for good writing. In kid books, I look for a good plot. Good writing isn’t enough. I’ve read plenty of kids books with good writing, but there isn’t a plot.

It’s harder to write a good kids book. There is a reason when you ask people what their favorite book is, they often tell you a book they read when they were a kid.

 How long have you been reading?

I was seriously reading in 2^nd and 3^rd grade. I remember going through the whole Animorphs series and the Baby Sitters Club. I was in the club. When I moved here in 5^th grade, I didn’t have any friends so I just read on the playground. I was that kid. Shiloh, Where the Red Fern Grows; all those sad books.

 How do you organize your books?

I have a bookcase in my room for my current favorites. I have a bookcase for ARCs I want to read. I have bookcases for young adult, for nonfiction, two for fiction, one for southern fiction that flows into another case and finishes with children’s picture books. Then I use books in everything I decorate. I still have too many books, so I just stack them places.

 Is there a system to how you choose what to read next?

There’s always something I want to read next. I usually read whatever I’m thinking of  when I finish a book. If the book I’m reading isn’t really catching me, I’ll pick something else up. For 3 years I only read young adult books, but I’m trying hard to get back into the real world.

 What book have you liked most that came out this year?

Song of Achilles, Madeleine Miller

What are you reading right now?

Why We Broke Up by Daniel Handler, Maira Coleman

Roald Dahl’s Book of Ghost Stories

 When do you read?

That’s a tricky question.  I fall asleep reading, so I have to read during the day. I fall asleep when it gets dark.

 Are you a one-at-a-time reader, or are you reading many books at once?

I read more than one. I was reading 10 books recently, but I’m trying to whittle it back down to 3. I can’t read more than 1 young adult book at a time; they all have to be different kinds of books.

 What do you look for in a good bookstore?

To be honest, I have a hard time finding a bookstore that meets what Lemuria is. Lemuria is the best a bookstore could be. When I travel and go to different bookstores, I am always disappointed. A bookstore shouldn’t just be new releases; if I only cared about new books, I wouldn’t go in a bookstore—those are the easy ones to find. A bookstore should be a collection of all of the people who work there. It’s a piece of art in how it’s culled. That kind of bookstore is going away. A good bookstore doesn’t feel like a retail store.

How long have you worked at Lemuria?

6 years.

 What Was The Best Lemuria Event?

Chuck Palahniuk, duh.

 When did you start really collecting books?

I didn’t really start reading until my junior or senior year in high school. For fun, that is; I could read before that.  I don’t know if I had a favorite book in high school—Geek Love, maybe. I took it with me to Germany between my sophomore and junior year. That, and a book about Jean Benet Ramsey. Everyone thought I was weird as shit for taking those two books with me, but that pretty much describes my reading taste to this day. Geek Love was the first book that made me love books.

 What do you look for in a good book?

Goodness. Does that count?

 Who is your favorite book character?

Ignatius from Confederacy of Dunces.

 You named your dog after him, right?

No actually, after I read that book, I named everything Ignatius. I had a goldfish named Ignatius. My grandmother heard me talking about my goldfish, and she asked me about that name. I told her it was from a book I really liked, and she said, “That was my father’s name”.  Isn’t that weird?

 So your dog is named after your great-grandfather?

Yes, and the Ignatius in Confederacy. If I ever have a child, I’m sure he will be named Ignatius. He’ll probably have a complex, because he’ll actually be named after my dog.

What book do you think is the best-kept secret?

Geek Love. Oh god, this is just going to be about Geek Love. Valley of the Dolls, Confederacy of Dunces—there are never enough people who have read that book.

 If you could meet any author, dead or alive, who would it be?

I’ve already met him, and I’ve hugged him (Chuck Palahnuik). I’m not a writer, so I don’t really have that desire to meet and pick brains.

 If any book could be real?

(Geek Love) no! Don’t write that. Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs.

 What meal would you want to fall from the sky?

Probably pancakes.

With syrup?

and butter

 What book could you not get enough of as a kid?

Goosebumps, and Archie comics. I have hundreds of Archie Comics still. If I could find my Goosebumps, I probably would have a hundred of them. I really loved the create your own story books, too.

 Have you read R.L. Stein’s new book, or are you going to?

Probably not, I don’t want to ruin it.

 Is there a system to how you choose what to read next?

I don’t really have a consistent pattern. But sometimes I’ve had enough fiction, and I want to read true crime. Or enough true crime, I want to read fiction. It kind of depends on the mood I’m in after I finish a book; I don’t really have it planned out.

 When do you read?

Before bed. Sadly that’s the only time

 Are you a one-at-a-time book reader, or are you reading many books at once?

Just one. I have much too much A.D.D. for that. If I try to read more than one book at a time, I’ll get the two books confused, plus whatever TV show I’m

watching, plus any conversations I’ve had. I’ve tried fiction and non-fiction, but no. Can’t make it work.

 How do you organize your books?

Most of all of my coffee table/ picture books are in one spot. I have 4 sets of bookcases with 3 shelves each that have a lot of books I’ve read. And one of those shelves, I have chronologically all the books I’ve read this year. I have a long wall of books in my bedroom that I intend to read in the near future, even though it is like a hundred books. In my study/living room I have all of my crafting books and books that have the most value to me, whether that’s monetary or sentimental.

 What are you reading right now?

Crying of Lot 49 by Thomas Pynchon in honor of our dear Simon.

 What do you look for in a good bookstore? What are your bookstore pet peeves?

I don’t go to bookstores. I work too much, I don’t go anywhere. If I go to a bookstore on a vacation, I just look around, and think: I’ve got all of this already.

I like to see what they do different. Not necessarily bad or good, just how their store is laid out or how they do customer service.

Top 5 favorite books in your library right now (in no particular order):

1. A Father’s Story, Lionel Dahmer

2. Geek Love, Katherine Dunn

3. Confederacy of Dunces, John Kennedy Toole

4. Jitterbug Perfume, Tom Robbins

5. Choke, Chuck Palahniuk

My Bookstore: Writers Celebrate Their Favorite Places to Browse, Read and Shop edited by Ronald Rice and Booksellers across America, Introduction by Richard Russo, Black Dog & Leventhal Publishers, November 2012.

In “My Bookstore” our greatest authors write about the pleasure, guidance, and support that their favorite bookstores and booksellers have given them over the years. The relationship between a writer and his or her local store and staff can last for years or even decades. Often it’s the author’s local store that supported him during the early days of his career, that continues to introduce and hand-sell her work to new readers, and that serves as the anchor for the community in which he lives and works.

“My Bookstore” collects the essays, stories, odes, and words of gratitude and praise for stores across the country in over 70 pieces written by our most beloved authors. It’s a joyful, nationwide celebration of our bricks-and-mortar stores and a clarion call to readers everywhere at a time when the value and importance of these stores should be shouted from the rooftops.

Perfectly charming line drawings by Leif Parsons illustrate each storefront and other distinguishing features of the shops. A portion of the proceeds from the book will be donated by the publisher to the American Book Association (ABA) Winter Institute. An additional portion of the proceeds will go to the American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression (ABFFE).

Lemuria is included in My Bookstore with an essay by Barry Moser. Here is an excerpt from the essay:

Two years later ABA was in San Francisco and Johnny and I ran into each other again, this time on the marble staircase of one of the city’s municipal buildings . . . We talked for a while and during the conversation I told him, over the loud jazz, that I had just finished reading a book written by a neighbor of his, and that I felt it was one of the most influential books I’d ever read.

“What book is that?” he asked.

“Eudora Welty’s One Writer’s Beginnings,” I replied.

“Oh. Oh.” Johnny said excitedly. “She’s a big fan of your work!”

I looked behind me to see who he was talking to, certain that he surely must have been talking to somebody other than me. But he was, in fact, talking to me. I said, “What? You kidding me?”

“No.” he said. “She loves your Huckleberry Finn. I’m going to have to get you two together. Do a project or something.”

A year or so later I flew down to Jackson, Mississippi. True to his word, he introduced us. It was a sunny afternoon and Miss Welty welcomed us into her home with the graciousness you might imagine. We stayed a good part of the afternoon, enough time to put away a good bit of some bourbon whiskey I brought Miss Welty as a present. It was also enough time for us to lay down some preliminary plans for a collaboration: the Pennyroyal Press edition of The Robber Bridegroom, which we published in 1987.

From then on Lemuria was always on the itinerary when I went on the road to promote a new book—that is, until my publishers stopped spending the money to send me on tour. But until that happened I always had Lemuria scheduled—and scheduled last. In case you don’t know, Johnny Evans has a soft spot for good bourbon whiskey, as do I. In fact, I am fairly sure that we might just enjoy it a tad too much, and that’s why I always want to end my travels in Jackson so that all I’ll have to do in my hurt state is to go home. Nobody wants to promote a book while nursing a two-day hangover.

Join us Friday, November 16th at 5:00 for a book signing, reading and toast for My Bookstore: Writers Celebrate Their Favorite Places to Browse, Read and Shop with Barry Moser.

Sometimes the hardest part about reading, is deciding what to read next. But don’t worry, we have books for that too.

Thomas Foster’s Twenty-Five Books that Shaped America is a great starting place if you are trying to reread (or read for the first time) the American Classics your high school English teacher raved about. Each of the twenty-five books has its own chapter, arranged in chronological order, beginning with The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin and continuing through My Antonia and To Kill a Mockingbird. Each chapter gives a summary of the book, as well as insight into the author. If you want to read yourself through American history, this book is a great guidebook.

Book Lust To Go  is a great way to find books for any and all traveling you may do. Compiled alphabetically by place name, as well as the type of trip, Nancy Pearl makes suggestions on what to read where. So if you don’t know what to read on that Caribbean cruise your mother-in-law booked for the whole family, there’s a chapter for that (See: Cavorting through the Caribbean). My favorite part? The suggestions are both fiction and nonfiction.

If you want a long list of good books that you probably haven’t heard of, but wish you had, Read this Next is perfect. Read this Next  is intended as a go-to guide for book clubs–included under each book suggestion is a question guide. The books are arranged by subject, so it is easy to browse. Sandra Newman and Hoard Mittlemark are not book snobs; their suggestions span all genres, from science-fiction to mystery to biography.

Happy Reading!

How long have you worked at Lemuria?

3 months, almost.

Do you have a book collection or a hoard?

Maybe both. I think I collect books more than I hoard them, though. I hoard them for awhile, and then I do a de-weeding. I weed out my garden.

What do you do with your weeds?

I usually take them to an orphanage.

 Are you serious?

No, I give them away as gifts. I re-gift them. I give people dirty, used books.

How long have you been reading?

Six years. I started reading my freshmen year in college. I could read, but I didn’t read books. Ask me what my first book was I read.

What was the first book you read?

Plato’s Republic. It’s what got me into reading. I never liked reading until I read that. What I like in any book are the ideas behind it. More so than the art, I guess. I don’t have to agree with the ideas, as long as they make you think.

What’s best is when something is really artful and it has a lot of things going. I may not like it if I don’t agree with the ideas, but I will appreciate it. More so than a book that says nothing.

 How do you organize your books, or do you organize them at all?

 They are organized, but not in any recognizable pattern. They are organized by how hot they are, side-by-side. How sexy they look together. The ones that are going to make each other sexier, I put those 2 together.

Can you give an example?

My signed first edition of Barry Hannah’s Bats out of Hell would look really hot beside that new A.M. Homes book, May We Be Forgiven. They are all mylared. And the spine on the A.M. Homes is nice and white and clean, but it really sets off that Bats out of Hell. The A.M. Homes wouldn’t look very good by itself, it would be a too sterile, too clinical.  But

 when it’s beside that Barry Hannah, it’s a fine book. It looks good.

That would be the middle part of the sandwich. I’d probably put Either Or by Kierkegaard. all you need to know is that it is green and black and it will look real good. The metaphorical bread. Oh yeah, that’s hot. A purely aesthetic bookcase.

You and Grandfather built your bookcase?

 Yes, I was five.

What did you put on it before you read books?

I had animal books that I looked at. I looked at animals.

 Any animals you liked in particular?

Yes, I like goats a lot. Bats and cats. I had a whole bunch of goat, bat, and cat books.

Is there a system to how you choose what to read next/the order you read books in?

No. I do have 2 books I read annually. Every year in December I read Moby Dick, and every year in October I read Frankenstein. Those are two of my favorite books. I try to read Samuel Beckett fairly often. I also try to read a Walker Percy novel once a year. So there is a sort of system: a chaotic system.

I try to have a non-fiction book , a novel, a science-fiction or fantasy novel, a philosophy book, and a collection of short stories going at once. I try to read that every month. It doesn’t always work, though.

What book have you liked most that came out this year?

The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers.

 What are you reading right now?

Among Others, Jo Walton and Less Than Nothing, Slavoj Zizek

When do you read?

I start reading at 12 at night. 12 to 3 I read. And then I wake up at 5 and read from 5 to 7 and then I take a nap and then I go to work. It doesn’t work all the time.

What do you look for in a good bookstore?

Porn bathrooms. No, I’m joking, though Lemuria has one. Don’t put that in there, that’s confidential. I want some Miss Jodi playing over the speaker system. I love some Miss Jodi.

What is your bookselling theory?

You have to disarm them. You can do anything. My tactic is acting like an idiot, and then like I don’t know anything, but then I spring a book on them. They are so taken aback, they have to pay for it right then. They’re pulling out their credit card and throwing me money.

Top 5 favorite books in your library right now:

1.  Moby Dick, Melville

 2. Lancelot, Walker Percy

 3. Name of the Wind, Patrick Ruthfuss

 4. The Unnamable, Samuel Beckett

 5.Yellow Birds, Kevin Powers