matt on books

Jonathan Coe is coming to Vevey

2012-02-08T15:45:00.001+01:00

Jonathan Coe at the '4+1 traduire' Festival

You might be wondering why I am getting very excited about Jonathan Coe's visit to Switzerland. (He is here as part of the "4+1 traduire" festival in Vevey.)

He is the bestselling author of nine novels, including The Closed Circle, The Rain Before It Falls, and most recently The Terrible Privacy of Maxwell Sim.

Personally I liked Maxwell Sim and reviewed it on WRS. The narrator in the title writes in the style of a new and unpolished author. I was thinking, 'I am not sure if I can take another 300 pages of this', when he turns to the reader and says, 'Do you think you can read another 300 pages of this?'. My instinct was to answer 'No' but the story had hooked me and I didn't give up.

Later in the book other characters share the narrative - there are memorable exchanges on web forums and in letters - and either Maxwell Sim's style improves or Coe's style comes through as the book is certainly well written. The story concerns Sim's ill-fated journey to Scotland as a toothbrush salesman, and explores isolation in the age of Facebook.

Jonathan Coe also plays with literary convention. Without wishing to give it away, the last chapter of Maxwell Sim asks the question, 'Why do you feel emotion for characters you know are fiction?' In The Rain Before It Falls the book's narrator is a character who is describing photographs. Many people might groan when they read words like 'literary convention' but these books are funny and grounded without being trivial.

If you are interested to come to the event in Vevey it's on Friday, March 9th. The programme is here. I understand from the event organisers that Johnathan Coe will be signing books afterwards. Otherwise why not pass by your local independent bookshop and pick up a copy of one of his books.

1Q84

2012-02-06T15:58:00.001+01:00

1Q84 - Haruki Murakami

Do you know the feeling of looking forward to a particular meal so much that the moment you sit down to eat it you no longer feel hungry? That's how I felt about 1Q84 the new book by Haruki Murakami.

Murakami is one of the authors whose new books I always read. The wait was particularly tortuous as this book was published in German earlier in the year and only came out in English in November 2011. I saved it for Christmas and read the first chapter on the plane.
'This is brilliant', I thought, then I couldn't bring myself to read another word.

Only in January did I sit down and read it.

Murakami fans will be familiar with certain elements. There is a girl with magic ears, an entire scene devoted to the making of food, a slight dislocation of reality. In this case the heroine gets stuck in a traffic jam and her cab driver advises her to use the emergency stairs off the expressway. He warns her that by doing so she will be leaving the world as she knows it in 1984 behind.

In another part of Tokyo a writer and his editor are discussing the entries for a writing competition, in particular the story Air Chrysalis by an unknown high-school student called Fuka-Eri. They like the story but feel that it needs more work to win the prestigious prize it has been entered for. They decide to ask Fuka-Eri's permission to improve the text.

From this beginning I was thrown into the world of 1Q84. This is not a small undertaking. It is three books in one, or 1000 pages. Because the world is so compelling it is difficult to come up for air. You want to read and read, sprint through it, despite its length. The detail is well imagined that you do get lost, you are there with the characters, seeing the same things and weighing the same options.

In an important way the book didn't meet my expectations. In his previous novels Murakami has always drawn the most sexy women. Not classically inviting, prehaps, but with some indescribable allure. 1Q84 does deliver sex, probably too much of it, but without Murakami's trademark mastery of the language of attraction.

Otherwise, the story is sublime. Wildly imaginative and well told. Definitely worth the 3-4 weeks it took me to read.

It is also a beautiful book. The hardcover export version (pictured) has a semi-transparent cover with a see-through title.Inside, the page numbering which shifts positions on the page margins and is sometimes written in mirror writing. There are other small features that are worth the effort to look for.

In the bookshop I often recommend Murakami but I always suggest the easier titles first. First time readers might consider opting for Norweigen Wood or A Wild Sheep Chase.

The Perfect Book Blurb

2012-02-03T15:34:00.001+01:00

The perfect book blurb has to contain the words, '[this book] has that Certain Something which makes you want to crawl through thirty miles of dense tropical jungle and bite somebody in the neck.' I think we're only going to stock books whose jackets read like this.

This is from a real book jacket published in 1906.

Book Making, Book Keeping

2012-01-23T20:54:00.000+01:00

A friend of mine dropped by the shop today. I mentioned that I have a job interview tomorrow. He asked me what the job was for and I said that it was for the job I used to do before opening the bookshop.

I explained to him what that it was a marketing management position and outlined the pros and cons for accepting it, particularly in regards to the bookshop.
He thought about this for a while and then said:
'I see. So it's for the status and because people listen to what you have to say.'
'That's right' I agreed.

Then I realised that he was referring to the marketing job and I was thinking about the benefits of being a bookseller.

Prehaps office life has changed in the last four years. Or maybe I have.

A Book About Fonts

2012-01-23T16:17:00.001+01:00

A book designer I know is soliciting opinions on the capital Q of various fonts. She says that this letter is seldom used so type designers often use it to showcase the font's philosophy.

I chose the Q pictured which comes from the Bauhaus typeface. I have to say that I find it pretty ugly. We can think of the Zen circle drawn freehand with a calligraphy brush. All that spontaneous energy poured into the creation of something not quite perfect, prehaps in black against a dramatic red background. This Q opposes this spirit. It is technology as it swings away from human experience.

I have been thinking about typeface alot since I read Just My Type: A Book About Fonts by Simon Garfiled. It's really a book of stories about individual fonts. It starts with comic sans, the typeface reasonable people love to loathe, which came into being to make MS Help more human; it narrates the story of Helvetica, the Swiss typeface invented 60 years ago which has since become the corporate face of The Gap, Hoover and gave birth to, or was ripped off by, Arial; it describes the creation of Metropolitan, the font used on the Paris Metro, and many more.

Whether we have articulated it or not, we all have an opinion on font. While this books does occassionally stray into geekery, I found it interesting to see how my own opinions on a font compared to the aims guiding its creation. The book could possibly be improved by a little humour, but it is a beautiful book to read with elegant typesetting and lots of font samples.

If you are interested in this book then please get it from your nearest independent bookseller. US residents can find a list here.

Incidentally, the Books Books Books logo is set in bold Helvetica to show the Swiss origins of the shop and as a reminder to adopt an adventurous vision.

Books Books Books

2012-01-17T21:30:00.000+01:00

Many people think that owning an independent bookshop involves sipping cappuccinos and making literary small talk to a crowd of less fortunate readers. Surprisingly, that's not true. Mostly it involves shoveling books from one side of the shop to the other. What keeps you going is the idea that if you can just shovel fast enough then you might eventually get paid for it.

I wouldn’t say owning a bookshop is badly paid, as that would assume you actually earn something. I didn’t eat lunch for the first year I opened my shop. The only money I spent was on a Sunday morning when I bought my kids pain au chocolat from the local bakery. I lost 10 kgs while they developed an addiction to calorific pastries.

So why torture yourself? Part of that answer for me, and I suspect for other booksellers too, lies in the wonder of walking into a bookshop. When I was a young lad my mother used to take me and my brother to Hammick’s bookshop in Farnham. It seemed incredible to me that I could walk into this shop and take any book from the shelf and sit down and read it. I still remember the large ladybird cushion where we would spend hours reading Hal and Roger adventures or the latest in the Fighting Fantasy series.

I loved the smell in that shop. I loved the little cardboard slips with the stock information typed on them. I loved the wooden counter where we reluctantly relinquished our books in order to allow the woman to sell them to us. The shop was constantly busy and I remember being conscious that there were many more shelves outside the children’s' area - shelves that I couldn’t yet reach the top of – full of boring books of the kind adults liked to read.
‘You’ll read them one day,’ my mother assured me.I didn't believe her.

Of course, Farnham Hammick’s is long gone. There is a Waterstones in the Lion and Lamb courtyard, a WH Smith’s on West Street and the out of town supermarkets with their cut-price hardbacks. Not many towns boast a bookshop, particularly a bookshop where the owner, or some quixotic assistant, has hand-picked every title with a certain audience, even a certain customer, in mind. Where the chairs and tables are unique to that establishment and not replicated throughout the country, or even the planet.

Before I opened my shop, I read two excellent publications from the British Bookseller’s Association and its American counterpart. These were quite old editions of their ‘How To Run A Bookshop’ manuals. I remember reading in one of them about this new thing called ‘The Inter Webs’. The author cautiously opined that it might eventually have a small impact on the retail book trade. There was something so tragically wrongheaded about this prediction that I found myself laughing. Yes, the cruise missile did hit the house, but miraculously we picked the best china out of the rubble and were able to enjoy a cup of tea.

But before we get misty-eyed, it is worth saying that this is not a lament, it’s a hurrah. Hurrah for the people who love books so much that they still continue to sell them, despite the competition and the dash for digital. It takes a certain kind of reader, too, who can find the time to visit a shop and browse through the titles on display knowing all the time that it might be possible to buy the same titles cheaper online.

I see the bookseller and the reader as a couple enjoying a last waltz as the band plays on and the ship slips beneath the waves. On the horizon the moon rises and its beams pick out lifeboats being hastily rowed away by discount book purchasers. Forget them. I am interested in knowing what brings the couple here, why they can't let go and what hope the future holds. I am interested in the magic of books and the shops that sell them.

The Joy of Books

2012-01-14T11:11:00.001+01:00

You would have to be pretty insane to try this. But if I can find half-a-dozen volunteers I am ready to give it a go.

WRS | Speed Read: Funny reads to chase away post-holiday blues

2012-01-14T10:34:00.002+01:00

WRS | Speed Read: Funny reads to chase away post-holiday blues

Here are a few picks from my Speed Read slot on Radio World Switzerland.

Major Pettigrew Gives Me Hope

2012-01-14T10:04:00.005+01:00

2011 was a pretty grim year for booksellers. Look at the headlines. 'One million Kindles are sold each week, says Amazon' Hurray for them. I spent Christmas listening to my family extolling the virtues of Kindle, while watching my own retail sales dwindle.

But there are still somethings bookshops do so much better than online retailers. I was reminded of this on Thursday when Helen Simonson, the author of Major Pettigrew's Last Stand, skyped into the bookshop.

Don't be sad if you don't know who Helen is. I'll give you a brief synopsis. She is a New York Times bestselling author and has been reviewed by such luminaries as Alexander McCall Smith and Elizabeth Strout. Her book is my favourite work of fiction I read in 2011, and this is from someone who doesn't read much romantic comedy.

Major Pettigrew is an retired widower who lives in Edgecombe, a conservative town on the south coast of England. He falls in love with Mrs Ali the local shopkeeper of Pakistani origin. The book is the narrative of their growing love and a very funny look at the problems of inheritance and family. What I love about this book is the way Helen is able to peel away the layers of character until the whole person is revealed.

She kindly spent an hour answering questions from one of our bookgroups and I think everyone left the shop buzzing. (Thank you Helen).

It is this kind of book I love to champion. A book which will bring its readers pleasure and, if it's not too strong a word, joy. And it's this kind of event which makes it easier to put up with callers asking, 'Do you sell the Amazon Kindle?'

I urge you to buy this book from your nearest bookshop, and to contact Helen if you have a bookgroup that wants to read the book.

WRS | Speed Read: Jesus and other gurus

2010-04-20T10:15:00.001+02:00

Top picks on Radio World Switzerland from the Guru. matt on books:

WRS | Speed Read: Jesus and other gurus

2010-04-09T17:16:00.002+02:00

Sleeping man,
On my sofa,
Do I wake him?
Do I leave him?
Do I take a heavy book,
Draw back,
And cleave him?

Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi

2010-04-08T14:55:00.004+02:00

Maybe you know what it is like. You are going away for a few days and pack a selection of books that you feel will match your holiday mood. Arriving at your destination, you pick a book almost at random from someone else's bookcase and totally fall for it. Such is my relationship with 'Jeff in Venice, Death in Varanasi'.

I can't help thinking that in Geoff Dyer I have at last found the authentic voice for people who grew up in England in the late 80's and early 90's. Douglas Coupland got closest with his books, starting with Generation X. However, I am slightly too young to be truly a part of this era and his books are set in North America.

'Jeff in Venice' evokes for me many memories of being young and monied in London. As a result I have, somewhat rashly, ordered all his other books for the shop. I can't wait to get, 'Yoga For People Who Can't Be Bothered To Do It'. I think in my position you'd do the same.

Country Driving : A Chinese Road Trip

2010-03-27T14:13:00.005+01:00

Getting a new book from a favourite author sends a tingle down my spine. It is almost like renewing a conversation with an friend you haven't seen in a while. You know in advance more or less what you are going to talk about, but you are excited to break new ground and catch up on the last year or so.

These were my feeling when the new book by Peter Hessler 'Country Driving : A Chinese Road Trip ' arrived in the latest shipment.

Hessler's first book, River Town, won the Kiriyama Award for writing about Asia. In it he recounts the two years he spent as a volunteer English teacher on the River Yangtze. What I admired most about the book was the elegance of the writing. Hessler knows exactly where to insert himself into the picture to bring his characters and stories to life. He writes with insight, sensitivity and killer wit.

You might have the impression that I enjoyed it.

In this new book Hessler recounts his seven years of travels around the country by car. It is divided into three parts. (At least I assume it is three. I still have about 50 pages left.) In the first part he drives along parts of the Great Wall and narrates the history of the monument and the lives of the people who live beside it. Next he offers insights into the life of the rural community which he retreated to for his writing. The final segment he views Chinese economic growth through the lives of two entrepeneurs, and their migrant workforce, who establish a factory in an economic development zone.

This book effortlessly lifted me from of the day-to-day and had me reading until the early hours of the morning.

Speech to the Geneva Writer's Group

2010-03-27T14:10:00.003+01:00

An excerpt from a speech I made recently to the GWG:

It seems strange as a bookseller to be speaking to a room of writers. We sit at opposite ends of a long and complicated supply chain. I am wondering what I can say to you, other than 'We have enough books now. Please stop writing.'

I thought I would begin by answering the most common question that people ask me, 'Why did you open a bookshop?' When I hear this question I often read the sub-text as, 'With all the bookshops closing around the world, why did you begin the quixotic adventure when it is sure to end in bankruptcy, public humiliation and possibly madness?' (As writers I am sure you are often asked the same thing.)

My answer, and I suspect your answer too, is that we do it because we love it. And if you are passionate about something you tend to do it as well as possible.

But if you are a bookshop owner you need something else, a sound business case. You ask yourself, 'If my rent is this much, and my salary is this much, then how many books will I need to sell..?' Assuming, therefore, that you place a high value on books, and you have convinced yourself of the business case, then one day you find yourself standing behind a till, waiting for the customers to arrive and thinking, 'Is this the biggest mistake of my life?'

The customers do come. They mess up the displays, ask awkward questions. Occasionally someone might even buy a book. And if you are lucky and your in-comings are greater than your outgoings, even if the difference is only sixpence, then in that six pence you find something very precious: happiness. And that is when the fun of independent book selling begins.

The bookshop supports, and is supported by, three book clubs which we have set up. We also supply books to numerous other clubs throughout Lausanne. We have a children's book club, although it is probably better described as a book riot. We run cultural events, author readings and have even helped to launch other small businesses.

Everyday you make connections, putting people in touch with one another. Very soon you find yourself close to, if not at the very heart of, a community of book lovers.

That is the thrill. That is the passion. Walking into a bookshop.

So, if you accept these arguments about the value of a bookshop you should ask yourself why you buy online. Sometimes, not always, you may save yourself a few francs. But those francs are reinvested in your community. You feel the benefits many times over.

It does not even have to be an independent bookshop. Go to a chain bookshop if you like. Or to a knowledgeable, modestly priced, friendly, fun-loving, shit-kicking independent. It's up to you. But please go to a bookshop.

I know I was flippant when I began this speech. Keep writing, keep loving it. Stay foolish.

The Flavor Bible

2009-05-25T14:56:00.004+02:00

It seems appropriate to review the book that prompted me to start the blog: 'The Flavor Bible' by Karen Page and Andrew Dornenburg.

This is not a traditional cookery book. It is something even better. Page and Dornenburg spent eight years speaking to the top chefs in the US. They were trying to work out which ingredients produced the best flavors when used together. In short, they were looking for deliciousness.

What they have published are the results of almost a decade of research. Take a food, almost any food, and the book will describe the taste and then list a long line of ingredients that bring out or compliment the flavor.

I think the book is for amateur and professional cooks who want to create their own dishes or improve their culinary intuition. While it does provide information on how to cook a particular food it does not contain recipes.

Look out for this title. I think it is going to join 'The Silver Spoon' and 'Culinary Artistry' as a classic cook book.

You can hear me talking about this book on World Radio Switzerland (WRS) here. If you are thinking of buying it then consider your local, independent bookstore.

Obligatory First Post

2009-05-25T13:42:00.000+02:00

Owning a bookstore gives you a different perspective on books. When the postman brings you about 500 new books a week you start to think of them more like book-shaped objects. You weigh them, price them, index them, use them to cosh your colleagues with. Then you go home and think, 'I've got nothing to read!'. I am not joking. I forget to take them home and am stuck with the books I have read a hundred times before.

Then the other day I recommended a book and sparked a trans-Atlantic conversation email exchange between half-a-dozen people I hardly knew. It reminded me of the power of books. Characters from fiction that rely on you, the reader, to imagine them into life. These facets of your imagination who can amuse you, bore or annoy you, disappoint and uplift. Or non-fiction titles that lead you down new roads and can introduce you to parts of yourself you had not considered before.

Books, beautiful books. A lifetime of reading. And let us not forget sharing. Recommending books is a privilege. This is not a decision between the red dress and the green one. This is the choice between Paul Auster and Jane Austin. Coe and Coehlo. While the answer for books and clothes happens to be the same - 'Why not take both?' - the question is the most crucial part of the equation. 'What shall I read?'. I hope this blog might offer you some assistance.

But, be warned.

I am a picky reader. If on the first page - or in some cases the first line - the author uses a cliché then I drop the book. I don't care if it is a New York Times bestseller or if it 'changed your life'. I want writers to be craftspeople and storytellers. They must have something to say and be able to say it well. The same is true for non-fiction. Either the idea you have is book-length or it shouldn't be published in that format. Repetition doesn't make an idea better or more compelling.

Along the way I hope to give some insights of what it is like to own a bookstore. I imagine some of my more exuberant customers will force their way onto these pages. For myself, I want to fall in love with literature again. Repeat after me, 'I am a book, I am not an ISBN number'.