I’ve been having a lot of bloggy-like thoughts lately, so we’ll see how this goes.
I’m a bookseller. Years ago, a friend of mine asked for a job application for me and I’ve been with the same store ever since. I thought at the time that if I was ever going to work retail (and all of my friends worked retail) that a bookstore was the only way to go about it. I even called it my “dream job,” which was a little crazy in retrospect.
However, it is absolutely true that I love books. Even stupid books. Even ridiculous books. Even books that are so ridiculously over-rated it makes me want to barf.
In my job, I see lots of books that make me laugh. For reasons ridiculous or brilliant, I am often amazed at what gets published. Someone out there dedicated a chunk of their life creating this crazy book, then managed to convince someone to spend money on it, print it up, and ship it all across the country.
For instance, someone thought it would be a great idea to rewrite Pride and Prejudice with zombie mayhem. And not only did it get published, but it set off a literary landslide of sequels, calendars, stationery, and knock-offs. The latest of these is the pair of Wild and Wanton editions of Pride and Prejudice and Wuthering Heights.
In the book world, reception to these tends to be mixed. Purists find them repugnant. Some think they’re hilarious. I would put them all together on a single shelf if I could, Android Karenina next to Tom Sawyer and the Undead, The Meowmorphosis just before The Zombies of Lake Woebegotten.
I would run the geekiest bookstore known to humankind.
Kelouisa 