Saturday was National Bookshop Day in Australia. And as I have been very good over the past few months, my housemates told me I could join them in their book-shopping adventures. It’s only fair, as I read the books too.
The day started out with a drive up to Melbourne. The drive itself was fairly uneventful, but we did stop at a drive-through carwash on the way. Once my housemate explained to me that it was okay because no water could get in the car, I rather enjoyed the experience. It was interesting, particularly when the surface protectant was sprayed -- it was blue and red foam that made interesting drops and rivulets on the windows.
After the carwash, it was to the parking garage and then to the first stop of the day. My housemate had planned three bookshop stops, at independent booksellers in Melbourne’s CBD. The first was at the aptly named Hill of Content Bookshop. The shop is down the hill from Melbourne's Parliament House. It’s a smallish bookstore but the second level makes it feel bigger than it is. We looked at several books while browsing, and bought two mysteries: The Janissary Tree and A Test of Wills. Both looked interesting, though I think my housemate has been dithering about The Janissary Tree for some time; she was quick to grab it as a definite purchase. Before heading downstairs, we wandered through the Travel section, but found nothing we didn't already know. Downstairs in the Fiction section, we looked at the remaining two books in Frank Moorhouse’s Edith Trilogy, but decided against them as we slogged through the initial book, Grand Days. Checking out was nice and easy, and we got a free bookmark. I always like when you get bookmarks in the books you purchase -- it saves having to locate one when you start the book, and is a nice reminder of where you got the book.
Leaving Hill of Content Bookshop, we walked about a block up the hill to The Paperback Bookshop. To say The Paperback Bookshop is tiny does a disservice to the word tiny. But the shop uses space fairly well and there was a large selection. We were on the lookout for a book (Evan’s Gallipoli) my housemate had seen on a previous visit. She meant to get it for her father. She was very happy to see it was still there and after a stop in the Fiction and Crime Fiction sections, was happy to leave with just that book. On the way out, we had to walk through the Biography/History section and just happened to see The Three Emperors. Now I know my housemate’s favorite historical period is Turn-of-the-Century Russia leading to the abdication and subsequent assassination of Tsar Nicholas II, and I knew she was not aware this book was available, so I made sure to alert her to the book. She bought it without more than a second thought.
Two bookshops done, and another one to go, we made a slight detour. My housemate’s birthdays are coming up -- they are eleven days apart -- and one of my housemates had a great idea for the other’s present. So we took a detour to a large department store to pick up the gift. As it turned out, the gift was on sale, so it was fortuitous that we were there that day. I hope he likes the gift.
The gift was not really heavy, but it was in a large box, so it was a bit bulky and we were getting quite warm in out winter clothes and coats. Even though we had to walk past the third bookstore to get to the car, we decided to do that and then come back to the bookstore unencumbered rather than drag the bulky purchase around the store. While at the car dropping off the gift, we also dropped off our coats and the books we had gotten at the first two stores and an unneeded umbrella that I didn’t really want to admit was uncomfortable to sit on. Freed of the unnecessaries, we headed back down the hill to the third bookstore of the day, Reader’s Feast.
One of my housemates says that Reader’s Feast is the kind of bookstore that makes you want to stay and browse and the kind that makes you want to read books. I can see his point, but Reader’s Feast is more the kind of bookstore that makes books works of art worthy of being displayed on shelves. It is in a building that spans a block, so it’s long and narrow, but still airy. As usual in any bookstore, our first stop was the Mystery/Crime Fiction section and the browse there was rewarded with two more books my housemate was looking for to share with her Dad. We picked up the next two next-in-series in Kerry Greenwood’s Phryne Fisher series: Queen of the Flowers and Death by Water. Then we wandered over to a huge display of Penguin Books. In the US, Penguin books are not sold with the generic orange & white color-blocked covers. Penguin Classics had the same black borders and work-of-art-covers as they do here in Australia, but the orange & white books were not common. Maybe Americans really do judge books by their covers. The orange & white books feel a bit generic and library-ish to me, but it if means we can have more books, I’m willing to forego interesting covers. And there is a new line of Penguin Crime Fiction in green & white covers. We investigated The Murders in the Rue Morgue, but decided against Poe based on the thriller aspect of his writing. Maybe next time we’ll give Poe a go. But this time we decided on Wilkie Collins’ The Moonstone and Edgar Wallace’s The Clue of the New Pin. That made four books already and we were hardly past the frost door of the shop. It was time to move on to Fiction for some browsing. In Fiction, we debated A Confederacy of Dunces; being native New Orleanians, both my housemate and I feel we should read the classic, but the covers were not right and we decided it would feel wrong reading that book in anything but the cover we know. Moving on from Fiction, we headed to Cooking. My housemate is in the market for new cookbooks. And she was spoilt for choice at Reader’s Feast. There were several vegetarian cookbooks that looked promising. And a couple of bread making cookbooks looked interesting. We flicked through an Australian Better Homes & Gardens cookbook, but when we saw that most of the recipes were ones we already had in our existing BH&G cookbook library, we discounted that as an option. Looking on the bottom shelf, we found a smallish book called Light Bites. It was exactly what we were looking for, some small plates, some main dishes, some soups, some side dishes, and some desserts. My housemate was sold. And with that book, her hands were full so it was time to check out. At the checkout, we entered the National Bookshop Day store raffle (but were not winners). On the way out, we stopped in the travel section to see if there was a new, interesting and helpful guide for our upcoming cruise of Eastern Canada/New England, but there was now so we headed to a craft store for a very important purchase.
The last item on our shopping list for the day was to check out ribbons for my fellow bear, Spencer. Spencer’s bow is in need of replacement and my housemate thought that he would like it better if I helped pick out the new ribbon. We briefly considered green & yellow “Aussie Aussie Aussie Oi Oi Oi” ribbon, but I knew that was just for the shock value and not for real. After about ten minutes’ consideration we decided on a nice cream-colored organza ribbon, very much like the ribbon in Spencer’s current bow. We thought it was a by-the-yard ribbon, but it turned out to be a by-the-spool ribbon, so we were happy. There is now plenty of ribbon for all Spencer’s bear-bow needs.
That last purchased ticked off out list, my housemate decided she was a bit hungry and very much thirsty. The craft store was in a mall with a food court so we headed down there to find what was on offer. We found a fast-food Mexican-ish place and got an order of seasoned french fries and a bottle of water. I had some of the seasoned fries, but none of the water while we flipped through the new cookbook investigating the recipes. Most sounded good though I have my doubts about Iceberg Lettuce Soup and Beet Ravioli with Dill Cream Sauce. While we were eating, we got some texts from our housemate and he said he was finished at the record store -- he had left us to our own devices at Hill of Content Bookshop to head to a Melbourne suburb where a large record store was closing down. It was a win/win for everyone. His texts said he was on the way back into town and would meet us when he found us.
We finished up our snack and headed back to the car to drop off the books, and me. My housemates had decided to use this trip to try out a Kansas City Barbeque place but I wanted no part of that. We met our housemate about a block from the car and walked back together. At the car, we quickly checked out each others' purchases and they left me to look after things in the car while they went to dinner. I had a lovely time flicking through all the books -- there are some new pictures of Tsar Nicholas II and King George V in The Three Emperors that I know my housemate has not seen. She will be happy about those.
My housemates returned from dinner, a bit overfull from the huge servings at the barbeque joint (I understand this is common at barbeque joints) and were ready to head home. After getting everything settled we were off.
The drive home was uneventful and included a stop for frozen cokes. Don’t tell them, but I took a couple of sips of the frozen cokes in the dark. They were very good. There was a traditional Coke one and a Strawberry-Kiwi one. I think I liked the Coke one a bit better, but only because it was brown and the drips would not show as much on my fur as the red of the Strawberry-Kiwi.
We got home before 9:30, but I was really too tired to investigate the new purchases and was in bed not too long after that. On the whole it was a great day out. I really enjoyed it.
I was excited to head out to National Bookshop Day, but really felt it was under-advertised and attended. Books are not exactly a niche market, and I really expected bigger crowds. Maybe that was because I am an avid reader, but I really felt almost disappointed with the poor turnout at the shops. My housemate and I deliberately avoided big-box chain bookstores, heading instead to the smaller independent shops. We walked past a big-box bookstore that had fundraisers dressed as fictional characters (although I am still trying to understand the Star Wars Storm-Troopers and Jar-Jar Binks; I am sure they were only books AFTER the movie came out). The characters really made it hard to walk past the store without wondering what was going on. I know the small, independent bookshops can't really compete with the big-box store's marketing, but I still felt a little bit cheated. National Bookshop Day or not, I definitely recommend that if you can, head out to independent bookshops in your area. You never know what treasures you may find in them. Ohh, and talk to the clerks, they will help you if you have no idea what you want. Last thought for the day, Classic books are so much more than the stuff that is required reading in schools; check out the stuff that is not assigned reading, that’s where the fun is.
Happy Reading Everyone,
Oliver
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