Dispatches from New England, Spring 2023

Written By Millie Blackwell

Not long before we left Greytown in May, my book-loving friend Gareth Rapson asked me how many books I read a month. I’ve never been diligent at tracking my reading, nor have I ever put much value on reading quickly, so after a pause to consider, I came up with a current average of 2-3 books a month.

Gareth’s face told me that this seemed a bit light. 

In my defence, I read the first few chapters for probably 20-30 books a month - to get the feel for the new stock that’s arrived in store - and I read literally HUNDREDS of one-page book summaries a month as I do the store ordering. But to dedicate any amount of time to complete an entire book, it really has to grab my attention early. 

But the past six weeks have been an entirely different reading story. For the past six weeks Mr Blackwell & I have been on a fantastic work/vacation road trip around New York and the states that make up New England: Connecticut, Rhode Island, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, Vermont and Maine. We stayed mostly in hotels and AirBnBs so I have no cleaning to do, minimal meal prep and with a travel wardrobe & basic make-up, quite a bit less time each day on the personal preening. 

In June alone I made my way through eight books and a zine! Many of them are new and current release titles so I thought I’d just share a little bit about some of the books I read this month: 

Trust by Hernan Diaz

This year’s Pulitzer Prize for Fiction was shared jointly between Trust and Barbara Kinsolver’s Demon Copperhead - the latter being my favourite work of fiction in 2022.

While I don’t normally let major prizes influence my reading I had to know what the judges deemed equally good as Demon Copperhead. 

The framework for Trust is very clever, it’s the same story told from four perspectives, at four different points in time, in four narrative styles: a novel, the rough draft of an autobiography, a memoir, and parts of a major character’s journal.

Set primarily in New York City, each story takes place in or reflects upon the 1920s and the dealings of a wealthy financier named Andrew Bevel. Hernan’s writing was masterful and I really didn’t want this book to end.

The Road to Dalton by Shannon Bowring

Unfortunately you won’t be able to find this book on the shelves in New Zealand (at least not for now) but I picked up this debut novel while we were in Maine as I was in the mood for something set locally. 

Dalton itself is a fictional town in northern Maine, but for anyone who ever lived in a small town it will seem perfectly realistic! A large cast of very genuine characters, I developed so much empathy for their ups and serious downs thanks to Shannon Bowring’s gentle and thoughtful storytelling. 

Set in 1990, I also enjoyed little references to things I hadn’t remembered for a while: Inspector Gadget, grey Arcoroc mugs, and when a character asks for the Princess Diana haircut but feels the result “looks more like MacGyver”!

The Creative Act: A Way of Being by Rick Rubin

Legendary music producer Rick Rubin is known for his ability to pick winners across all kinds of musical genres.

He’s worked with acts like Beastie Boys, Run-DMC, Green Day, Metallica, Aerosmith, The Chicks, Neil Diamond, Johnny Cash and Adele.

We’d call this book a “big dipper” at the shop, in that it’s made up of a lot of short, non-sequential entries so you could open it anywhere and start reading anywhere. Some entries are as short as a single page. 

I made a tonne of notes from this book including his thoughts on: drawing inspiration from great works, using made up words, self doubt and how to turn it into something useful, paying attention, dealing with feedback, and even note-taking!

This one should be required reading for all creative types and creative-adjacent types like myself!

Perennial Seller by Ryan Holiday

I'm part of a business book club with my Mastermind group, hosted by retail coach Wendy Batten and this was the book pick for June. 

This is an older Ryan Holiday book I hadn't read, but I'm glad I had the chance to revisit this corner of his back catalogue.

It took me quite a long time to come around to Ryan Holiday - something about the title of his books always felt like spoilers to me, for example, Ego is the Enemy or Stillness is the Key - but since reading Courage is Calling during the lockdown years I've been working my way through a few of his books. Most of Ryan's books from the past five years focus on the philosophy and principles of Stoicism but even that often has applications for business. I've learned a lot from Discipline is Destiny that I've applied to the bookshop, and my friend Penny often likes to dip into Courage is Calling when she needs a little pep talk! 

Perennial Seller, is primarily aimed at writers and other creatives  but still had a lot of ideas that applied to retail businesses - after all, we all want our shops to be hits too, and for our customers to continue to revisit us year after year!

Pageboy, A Memoir by Elliot Page

I’d really rather stick to books that I enjoyed this month but feel compelled to include this one because it was such a big disappointment for me.

Elliot Page is the star of the movie, Juno (2007) - known at the time as Ellen Page - and his memoir covers his early family life, Hollywood and the movie industry, and his evolving understanding of his sexuality / gender identity. 

I’d looked forward to Elliot’s story for a unique insight into an underrepresented group. Being a creative person who has been through a lot of change, I’d hoped for a hero's journey. Of course, you’d be right if you cautioned me to remember that this is not a requirement of memoir, but I’d hoped for it all the same.

The chapters swing pretty wildly back and forward in time, a style that works for some memoirs but felt like a technique this editor was forced to employ just to break up the rather dull and repetitive stories of the author’s early years. 

While chastising family members for their lack of introspection and empathy I found Elliott equally self-absorbed and lacking in introspection - many of the stories just didn’t seem to go anywhere. By half way I could tell this book wasn’t going to be a favourite but I hung in there hoping it would get better, sadly I didn't feel that it improved.

50 Ways to Protect Book Stores by Danny Caine

Technically a zine rather than a book, this one is also not available in New Zealand but I just had to share way #34 that we can protect bookstores.

Because it’s not only the way to save bookstores, but all kind of independent retail and small town Main Streets - a topic that’s near and dear to my heart.

#34 Spend time wandering the neighbourhood

A quick story: After a series of increasingly aggressive sales calls from online review aggregator Yelp, I broke down and finally listened to their pitch. They wanted me to pay $25,000 a year for advertising to ensure Raven appeared first in Yelp search results. Thus, we’d appear above what they considered our competition, the Dusty Bookshelf down the street. We said no. First of all, our entire yearly marketing budget, which we calculate based on industry averages, is less than half of $25,000. Second, of course, we don’t view the Dusty Bookshelf as our competition. This is a key difference between the Silicon Valley view of things (Yelp) and the small-business view of things (the Raven): we believe a rising tide raises all ships. If our neighbour businesses are thriving, so are we. We are rooting for all the other shops and restaurants on our street because our business model is built on a steady stream of sidewalk traffic past (and hopefully through) our door. A great way to build that traffic is to have lots of small businesses in our small area of town. So here’s another cheap and easy way to protect bookstores: go downtown and wander.

Danny Caine is the co-owner of Raven Bookstore in Lawrence, Kansas.

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Oh, and in case you ever find yourself on a road trip around New York and New England, here is a list of Bookshops you might enjoy visiting too. 

My favourite Bookshops on this trip were:

Other great bookshops we visited:

Millie Blackwell

Mrs Blackwell is a bookseller from Greytown, New Zealand. Her bookshop in the village’s Main Street aims to delight the curious minds and romantic souls who cross its threshold. She frequently talks about herself in the third person.

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