Tag Archives: Little Bookstore of Big Stone Gap

My Grandmother, What Big….

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Weep and wail, you procrastinators. Our last trilogy of 50 Shades of Grey has left the bookstore. It went out in a brown paper bag inside a recycled “Books a Million” polystyrene bag. And the buyer—who of course was purchasing it for her grandmother, not herself—was careful to let no one observe her.

In fact, when “Liv” came into the bookstore during Christmas vacation from university, she walked straight to the trilogy’s star place on the “holiday specials” shelf and plucked them up. “I knew these would still be here,” she grinned. “This town’s too small for anyone to buy them from people they know.”

How right she was. ‘Tis the curse of a small town bookshop that one cannot sell books on addiction or copies of the Kama Sutra to customers one knows by name—and goes to church with, or attends the annual gala at the college with, or otherwise could make a lot of trouble for if one were to start naming titles. We swear ourselves to secrecy, but it matters not; people don’t buy “iffy” titles from us unless we don’t know who they (the customers) are.

But we were startled that young Liv, an intelligent, self-confident young woman who’d worked the shop for us many times during her high school summers, wanted the Shades of Grey trilogy.

“No, no,” she said, waving the paper bag concealing them in negation. “My grandmother wanted to read them, and I told her I knew where I could get them without anyone knowing, and that I’d do it for her for a late Christmas present.”

For her grandmother. Of course. We tried to shake her, but she stuck to this story, repeating it several times over our shared cup of tea and general catch-up in village gossip. Which included lots of names, but no titles.

And for those of you who hesitated to enter the bookshop and carry away these treasures of grammatical insight—sorry, I meant anatomical—please be advised that we don’t plan to restock those…books.

 

“Put the Kettle On”

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Is it traditional to make your last post of the Old Year a True Confession?

When Jack and I did that string of author signings in October/November, friends who had published warned me to expect similar questions at each bookstore. But we found that for the most part (excepting, “How did you find an agent?”) questions were rarely repeated in different places.

We found it was comments, not questions, that tended to circle recurring themes: readers loved “Last Cowboy”; lots of participants made “we’ll put the kettle on” references; and people often interrupted at appropriate places with “You’re Nuts!”

But the questions they asked were as diverse as the audiences and the shops themselves. So when someone asked me about my author advance, I wasn’t prepared. She only wanted to know what I’d done with the money, nothing more invasive, but it still startled me.

Truth is, the day after I signed the contract with St. Martin’s and everything was official, I went on a little spending bender. Yes, it’s embarrassing, but straight to the Signals catalog did I go, and dropped $60. You know those sweet little white cups with “Sereni-tea” etc. printed on them? I got the four I’d always wanted. Silly though it is, I’d coveted those things for years, thought they were cute, but considered it silly–even un-Quaker-esque–to pay $15 for a household item available for 10 cents at any yard sale.

Until I became an author, and a much-published friend’s exact words to me were, “You should go buy yourself something you want.”IMG_3508

Ah. Permission from an elder. That made it okay.

The Sereni-tea, Creativi-tea, Simplici-tea, Tranquili-tea mugs hang in the one corner of our bookshop that is private—our wee kitchen with the microwave, electric skillet and teakettle from which Jack produces masterful meals. And every time I walk past them, I smile. Perhaps at my folly, or perhaps because I own them. Sometimes it doesn’t do to analyze.