Robert Gray Essay, Image of the Day, A Heart So Fierce and Broken by Brigid Kemmerer, House Lessons by Erica Bauermeister, and the Authenticity Project by Clare Pooley

Welcome to Covid 19 Summer of Isolation! I can hardly believe that it's July already, and that soon we'll be looking at fall leaves and trying to think of ways to have safe and socially distant Halloween parties for kids.  This is an interesting article from Shelf Awareness (based in Seattle) by founder Robert Gray that discusses the "new normal" of social distancing in bookstores, those lucky enough to have reopened this summer.

Robert Gray: Measuring Customer Service by the Foot

What's the difference between three feet and six feet? If you answered 25 years... well, you wouldn't, but I might. "Space" has long been a critical word in the bookselling world--sales floor space, shelf space, community space, cozy space. We think about space often, though we were not always compelled to measure it for every personal encounter. Until now, that is, as we normalize the Covid-19 era of six-foot spacing.

In the mid-1990s, one of our most loyal bookstore customers was a corporate consultant for the hotel, cruise ship and restaurant industry. He routinely flew all over the planet to hold seminars for, primarily, frontline and middle management staff. A great believer in the importance of "the last three feet," he focused on that critical moment when a member of the company's staff personally, physically, psychologically and emotionally transfers "product"--a meal, a room key, an entertainment recommendation--across the unfathomable gap between the corporation and an individual consumer/guest.

For decades three feet has been my preferred retail metric, but over the past few months the prevailing measurement has suddenly doubled to six feet. Thanks, Covid-19.

This week I've been thinking even more about retail footage and social/physical distancing for a couple of reasons. The first prompt came from learning that Amazon has launched a creepy personnel tracking system http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz44669892 that "applies artificial intelligence and machine learning to the camera footage in our buildings to help site leaders identify high traffic areas and implement additional measures to improve social distancing."

Called Distance Assistant http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz44669893, the system uses augmented reality "to create a magic-mirror-like tool that helps associates see their physical distancing from others. Working backwards from a concept of immediate visual feedback, and inspired by existing examples like radar speed check signs, our 'Distance Assistant' provides employees with live feedback on social distancing via a 50 inch monitor, a camera, and a local computing device. The standalone unit uses machine learning models to differentiate people from their surroundings. Combined with depth sensors, it creates an accurate distance measurement between associates." Privacy activists have... raised concerns.

At Third Place Books, Seattle In addition, I've been monitoring the gradual but steady move toward reopening of independent bookstores as lockdown restrictions are lifted haphazardly state by state, nation by nation. Masks, appointment shopping, limits on number of customers allowed inside, plexiglass POS shields, hand sanitizer stations everywhere and so many other precautions have effectively put the "last three feet" ceremony on hold for the future, foreseeable or otherwise.

In fact, the traditional handselling ritual is hard to re-imagine right now. Masked up, you sanitize your hands, take a book off a shelf or display, offer it toward a physically distanced patron while spinning your brief tale about what makes this an irresistible read, then place the book on an antiseptic surface nearby. The masked customer, hands also freshly sanitized, picks up the book, studies the jacket, makes a quicker-than-usual decision, then either returns it to the neutral space or rushes off toward a cashier.

I'm certain bookstores are already figuring out how to bring magic to physically-distanced handselling because that's what great booksellers do. After all, for the past three months, they've found a way to make online ordering, curbside pickup and local deliveries exciting and personal.

The Seattle Times reported not long ago that bookseller Tegan Tigani http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz44669894

of the Queen Anne Book Company http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz44669895 had been working from home since March 25: "During a typical shift at the bookstore, Tigani would talk books with customers all day long. Pivoting to online retailing was not in her life plan, but she's spent most of April and May processing online orders and taking phone calls from the many die-hard QABC customers who are sticking with their neighborhood shop."

Tigani said: "I try to always add a little personality," citing as an example a personal note she had written to a regular customer who was sending books to her children back east. "Even though we are doing this in a way that is no-touch, we still have a way to touch."

Another couple of interesting articles on bookstores that have bookstore cats who roam the aisles and help their local booksellers with projects large and small!

Image of the Day: Sir Terry Scratchett Says 'Mask Up!

Nowhere Bookshop http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz44813137 in San Antonio, Tex., the new independent founded by author Jenny Lawson, was hoping to open before the shutdown but is still closed to the public, and is offering curbside pick-up. When the store does manage to open up, there's a friendly cat, Sir Terry Scratchett, ready to remind all visitors to mask up.

 BTW, I really want a copy of this book...my mom, who is a huge cat person, would love it!

Image of the Day: Raven Book Store's The Sound and the Purry

From Danny Caine at Raven Book Store http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz44854673, Lawrence, Kan.:

"We recently discovered that this winter, Raven bookseller Lily Bay had been opening a word document every time Dashiell, one of our cats, fell asleep on the keyboard. The result was 50+ pages of, shall we say, 'experimental' text. With Lily and Dashiell's permission, we've decided to publish the document as a limited-edition zine called The Sound and the Purry: A Novel by Dashiell the Bookstore Cat http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz44854674. All proceeds will go to the NAACP Legal Defense Fund and the Lawrence Humane Society, where Dashiell and his fellow Raven cat Ngaio originated." The novel will be released tomorrow, July 7, and the store is holding a live q&a with Dashiell on Crowdcast  http://www.shelf-awareness.com/ct/uz3642037Biz44854675 at 2 p.m. Central.

 A Heart so Fierce and Broken by Brigid Kemmerer is the sequel to last year's wonderful A Curse so Dark and Lonely, which was a retelling of the classic Beauty and the Beast fairy tale. In this book, though, things progress rapidly for the cast of characters, particularly Grey and Lia Mara, whose stories alternate each chapter. Here's the blurb: In the sequel to New York Times bestselling A Curse So Dark and Lonely, Brigid Kemmerer returns to the world of Emberfall in a lush fantasy where friends become foes and love blooms in the darkest of places.

Find the heir, win the crown.
The curse is finally broken, but Prince Rhen of Emberfall faces darker troubles still. Rumors circulate that he is not the true heir and that forbidden magic has been unleashed in Emberfall. Although Rhen has Harper by his side, his guardsman Grey is missing, leaving more questions than answers.

Win the crown, save the kingdom.
Grey may be the heir, but he doesn't want anyone to know his secret. On the run since he destroyed Lilith, he has no desire to challenge Rhen--until Karis Luran once again threatens to take Emberfall by force. Her own daughter Lia Mara sees the flaws in her mother's violent plan, but can she convince Grey to stand against Rhen, even for the good of Emberfall? The heart-pounding, compulsively readable saga continues as loyalties are tested and new love blooms in a kingdom on the brink of war.

The author's prose is beautifully rendered here, clean and strong, while the plot runs at a gallop and still manages to engage readers into turning pages long past their bedtime. I loved it, and give it a well deserved A, with a recommendation to anyone who has read the first book in the series. No sophomore slump here!

House Lessons by Erica Bauermeister is the fifth book of hers that I've read, though it is her first non fiction title that I've picked up. I've interviewed EB twice for two different publications (I'm a retired journalist) and she's very like her prose: elegant, graceful and wise. There's no plot, per se, it's just the story of how the Bauermeisters (Erica and her family) bought a wreak of a home in Port Townsend and renovated it over the course of a couple of years, while also renovating their connections as a family in the busy tech-obsessed world of today. Here's the blurb: From New York Times bestselling author Erica Bauermeister comes a memoir about the power of home—and the transformative act of restoring one house in particular.

“I think anyone who saves an old house has to be a caretaker at heart, a believer in underdogs, someone whose imagination is inspired by limitations, not endless options.”
In this mesmerizing memoir-in-essays, Erica Bauermeister renovates a trash-filled house in eccentric Port Townsend, Washington, and in the process takes readers on a journey to discover the ways our spaces subliminally affect us. A personal, accessible, and literary exploration of the psychology of architecture, as well as a loving tribute to the connections we forge with the homes we care for and live in, this book is designed for anyone who’s ever fallen head over heels for a house. It is also a story of a marriage, of family, and of the kind of roots that settle deep into your heart. Discover what happens when a house has its own lessons to teach in this moving and insightful memoir that ultimately shows us how to make our own homes (and lives) better.  

This is one of those great books that makes you think and feel and fall in love with life. As someone who finds it soothing to look through real estate listings every night, and dream of owning a large and beautiful home with built in bookshelves and bathrooms and cozy corners to sit and read, this book spoke to me about the power of place, and our need as humans to have a safe home to come to at the end of the work day, where we can abide with family and friends. My only wish that wasn't fulfilled by this brilliant work was for more before and after photos or drawings of their Port Townsend home. Another well deserved A, with a recommendation to anyone who enjoys real estate, architecture and the philosophy of home and hearth. 

The Authenticity Project by Clare Pooley is a delightful novel that takes place in England (and a bit on a beach in Thailand) and is reminiscent of Elizabeth Berg's Arthur Truluv series. Here's the blurb: The story of a solitary green notebook that brings together six strangers and leads to unexpected friendship, and even love

Julian Jessop, an eccentric, lonely artist and septuagenarian believes that most people aren't really honest with each other. But what if they were? And so he writes--in a plain, green journal--the truth about his own life and leaves it in his local café. It's run by the incredibly tidy and efficient Monica, who furtively adds her own entry and leaves the book in the wine bar across the street. Before long, the others who find the green notebook add the truths about their own deepest selves--and soon find each other In Real Life at Monica's Café.

The Authenticity Project's cast of characters--including Hazard, the charming addict who makes a vow to get sober; Alice, the fabulous mommy Instagrammer whose real life is a lot less perfect than it looks online; and their other new friends--is by turns quirky and funny, heartbreakingly sad and painfully true-to-life. It's a story about being brave and putting your real self forward--and finding out that it's not as scary as it seems. In fact, it looks a lot like happiness.
The Authenticity Project is just the tonic for our times that readers are clamoring for--and one they will take to their hearts and read with unabashed pleasure.

The problem with some of the main characters is that they aren't authentic, or truthful with the notebook or themselves, which leads to a lot of chaos and heartbreak. Julian, for example, lies to himself and in the notebook by saying his wife is dead, when in reality, she left him because he was a two-timing, egotistical jerk who didn't appreciate her or treat her as anything but a maid. Hazard, meanwhile, is not a "charming" addict (I don't think I've met anyone yet who was addicted to alcohol or drugs who could be described as charming...violent, thieving, cruel and ugly, yes, but charming? No) at all, but is an immature and cruel asshat who doesn't deserve Monica or any woman at all, after all the women (and others) he's abused. If you're sensing a theme here, that most all of the men in this book are shite, you're right. Somehow, though, the reader is supposed to see them as lovable rogues, which makes no sense to me. Even the protagonist, Monica, seems codependent here, and her OCD makes her seem less, not more sympathetic. Anyway, the prose was decent, and the plot moved along briskly, earning this book a B, with the recommendation that if you're a feminist, you might want to give this one a pass. If you are not too picky about men and their foibles, no matter their age or proclivities, then you might want to pick up a copy and enjoy.