Author Archives: wendywelch

The Collective Noun for Booksellers

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angelicThis time last week I was hanging with friends who own a bookstore in Eureka (MariaJoseph Books). I mentioned to Angelic that after the signing and dance workshop (yeah, you heard me) I wanted to swing by another bookstore on the way home, one BSR used books in Granite City, Illinois, because their owner Bruce Campbell had taken a shine to one of our foster cats, Hazel, and friended us on FB.

Angelic laughed. “I know Bruce. He and Joe (Angelic’s husband) met at Pudd’nHead when they closed. They were both scavenging shelves.”

Pudd’nHead was a lovely bookstore in Webster Groves. It closed last year–a real loss for WG’s charming downtown area. So Angelic and Joe decided to drive out with us.

What is the collective noun for booksellers, anyway? A gathering of booksellers? A set of booksellers? A Dickens of booksellers?

We had let Bruce know we were coming; his wife Stacie took one look at us walking in the door, and said, “You’re Wendy, right?”

(I keep forgetting my picture is on the jacket flap of Little Bookstore. When people I’ve not met recognize me, I’m startled and think they’re psychic.)bevy of booksellers

Bruce had gotten trapped doing an errand, but Stacie and Angelic and I moved up and down the aisles of their store, discussing pricing issues, stock turnover, and cat occupancy levels. Jack said the energy crackling around us could have powered Los Angeles for three days.

An empowerment of booksellers? A haven of booksellers?  A binding of booksellers?

willyBSR also has a literary bunny – the first I’ve seen besides my agent Pamela’s Louise. While Louise is something of a Manhattan sophisticate, BSR’s Willy was… more outgoing. He raced up and down and then tried to pounce me in a male sort of way.

As Angelic, Stacie and I agreed, when ya got it, ya flaunt it.

A Trollope of booksellers? A Steel of booksellers?

ivy shelvesJack took some photos as Angelic, Stacie and I talked a blue streak, ambling the stock. BSR’s story was like ours: out of work in a bad economy, they had $250 in savings. They piled their book collection together, bought an entire inventory of metal shelves and bookends from a closing store for $200, set their prices as $2.50 paperback, $5 hardback, and threw open their doors with one month’s rent between them and failure (the last of a final paycheck from a former job).

That was 2010. I admired their bookends, and Stacie gave me a dozen.

A generosity of booksellers? A cooperation of booksellers?

We compared notes on how we’d solved those pesky early-years economic problems–like eating or paying light bills–and talked about favorite customers. It was one of Stacie’s who’d come in waving Little Bookstore, saying “You must have read it, ’cause this is how you got started, right?! Did you write this under another name?”

A stealth of booksellers?

While we were there, another bookstore owner called, LuAnn from Afterwords Books in Edwardsville, Illinois. She’d read on FB that we were nearby and wanted us to come on up.  Afterwords had a very difficult time moving lock, stock, and shelving in 2012, and we’d befriended LuAnn in the midst of it. We couldn’t this trip, but we’ve made plans to when Jack heads to Colorado in October for his annual Prison Visiting Service Conference.ivy reading

So, the bookstore is dead, you say? Amazon rules–and we all must play by theirs? Dog eat dog (or cat eat cat) and devil take the hindmost?

Ha. God bless the local entrepreneur who fights fire with water. We fly below the radar, offering Amazon price matching plans, doing good in our communities, anchoring our downtown districts, holding open our doors against the Goliath box stores by using REAL customer service and gentle, name-remembering welcomes instead of professional greeters.

A blessing of booksellers?

And God doubly bless the people like Stacie and Bruce, Angelic and Joe, Lou Ann, Larry Bowen out in Rolla, Missouri, and yes, Jack and me, who all know that small shops can do big things in and for their community.

TA-DA!

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Jack created our new downstairs bedroom pretty much from scratch. This is what it looked like before he started.

IMG_3508 With two rooms downstairs, he finished the big one for me as an office and yarn storage space. (There’s a blog called “His Square, White Heart” that describes that room, back a few months ago.) But then he began casting his eye on the second space….

How it was at the beginning.

How it was at the beginning.

Well, okay, so maybe I said something like, “What will we do with that smaller room at the back?” Anyway, the point is, he decided it would make a good bedroom. And it does. You can see how smart Jack was about finding all the crevices and getting the most storage space possible. For a hanging closet, we bought an old cedar wardrobe from our friends at Vintage on Main (a secondhand store a couple blocks up). The nice lady who worked there surprised me by putting in a couple of dresses she thought I’d like as a bonus!

So… behold Jack’s handiwork! (He and Bert decided to model for us.)

We used the high shelf behind the bed for shoes and winter blanket storage.

We used the high shelf behind the bed for shoes and winter blanket storage.

In a fit of what we modestly think of as genius, I realized all my wicker baskets that had stored yarn would be useful downstairs in the various crevices. We didn't have to spend money on new ways to store things!

In a fit of what we modestly think of as genius, I realized all my wicker baskets that had stored yarn would be useful downstairs in the various crevices. We didn’t have to spend money on new ways to store things! (You can see the original brick at the back of that chest storage area.)

bedroom 4

We bought those burlap-esque white containers, but we had all the wicker laundry baskets. Those hold our clothes and the white bits serve as the “I don’t have to justify why it’s here” junk pockets. I think this set of shelves was Jack’s greatest stroke of brilliance. The basement walls sloped heavily, with a kind of cement wattle at the bottom and brick at the top. The white wall shows how far in the wattle sloped, but Jack reclaimed the space at the top by installing this shelf.

So the Bookstore goes on above us, and Jack and I have a little hideaway where we can read and relax. Jack still has his office and studio for recording his radio programs on the second floor, and I have my writing retreat downstairs. Soon the SECOND STORY CAFE will open in our former living room, and our second story storage space will turn into a proper functioning kitchen. Life is good!

The little standing lamp next to the bed is one of the finds from Vintage on Main. It really works with the limited space because it overhands my one-foot-square bedside table and leaves me room to pile on BOOKS. (And the occasional kitten)

The little standing lamp next to the bed is one of the finds from Vintage on Main. It works well with the limited space because it overhangs my one-foot-square bedside table and leaves me room to pile on BOOKS (and the occasional kitten).