How long have you worked at Lemuria?
3 months, almost.
Do you have a book collection or a hoard?
Maybe both. I think I collect books more than I hoard them, though. I hoard them for awhile, and then I do a de-weeding. I weed out my garden.
What do you do with your weeds?
I usually take them to an orphanage.
Are you serious?
No, I give them away as gifts. I re-gift them. I give people dirty, used books.
How long have you been reading?
Six years. I started reading my freshmen year in college. I could read, but I didn’t read books. Ask me what my first book was I read.
What was the first book you read?
Plato’s Republic. It’s what got me into reading. I never liked reading until I read that. What I like in any book are the ideas behind it. More so than the art, I guess. I don’t have to agree with the ideas, as long as they make you think.
What’s best is when something is really artful and it has a lot of things going. I may not like it if I don’t agree with the ideas, but I will appreciate it. More so than a book that says nothing.
How do you organize your books, or do you organize them at all?
They are organized, but not in any recognizable pattern. They are organized by how hot they are, side-by-side. How sexy they look together. The ones that are going to make each other sexier, I put those 2 together.
Can you give an example?
My signed first edition of Barry Hannah’s Bats out of Hell would look really hot beside that new A.M. Homes book, May We Be Forgiven. They are all mylared. And the spine on the A.M. Homes is nice and white and clean, but it really sets off that Bats out of Hell. The A.M. Homes wouldn’t look very good by itself, it would be a too sterile, too clinical. But
when it’s beside that Barry Hannah, it’s a fine book. It looks good.
That would be the middle part of the sandwich. I’d probably put Either Or by Kierkegaard. all you need to know is that it is green and black and it will look real good. The metaphorical bread. Oh yeah, that’s hot. A purely aesthetic bookcase.
You and Grandfather built your bookcase?
Yes, I was five.
What did you put on it before you read books?
I had animal books that I looked at. I looked at animals.
Any animals you liked in particular?
Yes, I like goats a lot. Bats and cats. I had a whole bunch of goat, bat, and cat books.
Is there a system to how you choose what to read next/the order you read books in?
No. I do have 2 books I read annually. Every year in December I read Moby Dick, and every year in October I read Frankenstein. Those are two of my favorite books. I try to read Samuel Beckett fairly often. I also try to read a Walker Percy novel once a year. So there is a sort of system: a chaotic system.
I try to have a non-fiction book , a novel, a science-fiction or fantasy novel, a philosophy book, and a collection of short stories going at once. I try to read that every month. It doesn’t always work, though.
What book have you liked most that came out this year?
The Yellow Birds by Kevin Powers.
What are you reading right now?
Among Others, Jo Walton and Less Than Nothing, Slavoj Zizek
When do you read?
I start reading at 12 at night. 12 to 3 I read. And then I wake up at 5 and read from 5 to 7 and then I take a nap and then I go to work. It doesn’t work all the time.
What do you look for in a good bookstore?
Porn bathrooms. No, I’m joking, though Lemuria has one. Don’t put that in there, that’s confidential. I want some Miss Jodi playing over the speaker system. I love some Miss Jodi.
What is your bookselling theory?
You have to disarm them. You can do anything. My tactic is acting like an idiot, and then like I don’t know anything, but then I spring a book on them. They are so taken aback, they have to pay for it right then. They’re pulling out their credit card and throwing me money.
Top 5 favorite books in your library right now:
1. Moby Dick, Melville
2. Lancelot, Walker Percy
3. Name of the Wind, Patrick Ruthfuss
4. The Unnamable, Samuel Beckett
5.Yellow Birds, Kevin Powers
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