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Olsson's: Buyer's Corner
Olsson's is a locally Owned & Operated, Independent chain of six book and recorded music stores in the Washington, D.C. area, started by John Olsson in 1972. Each week the Head Book Buyer blogs about interesting new books that are available.
Thursday, September 29, 2005
Joe Murphy on Holiday Gifts
Hi Everyone-
Well, I can tell fall is here when the really great holiday gifts start showing up in the stores, and we just received what may be this year's niftiest: The Complete New Yorker on DVD.
I doubt there's another periodical that better matches the taste of our customers than the witty, urbane, always insightful New Yorker. And this set is, let me make this clear, the WHOLE New Yorker. Literally every page of every issue since the magazine's inception. The articles, the cartoons, the "Talk of the Town," even all the advertisements. 4,109 issues, all in one place. You can flip through the pages, zoom in on a particular page, or—most helpfully—search for a particular article, cartoon, author, or artist. Cool, huh?
The other buyers and I felt strongly enough about the DVD set that we made it a Buyer's Choice, so we're selling it at 20% off. Supplies are limited—the publisher can't reprint it again before the holidays, so come get your copy today. Given its content, I think it may amount to the most important literary document of the last 100 years. So you need it!
One of the reasons to support independents is that we like to take chances on titles. So when Jim Tenney, who has decades of buying experience, pointed out to me that Kent State University Press was publishing a definitive edition of Hemingway's Under Kilimanjaro, I instantly agreed with him that it needed to be a Buyer's Choice. To clarify: this is a never before published Hemingway masterwork. While parts had been cannibalized into a few other works, this is the only complete edition of this great travel narrative, presented as Hemingway intended.
It's not something that many stores are going to feature. But we select books according to what fits our customers, and I really feel this completely unique publication is not to be missed. Take this rare opportunity to purchase this great work.
Hope you're all doing well. If you have any comments about what we feature in our stores, or anything else, feel free to contact me at jmurphy@olssons.com.
Hope all is well with you. Just wanted to take this opportunity to say that if you haven't been our stores lately, you're missing one of the most incredible literary seasons in the fifteen years I've been working at Olsson's. For proof, I'd like to cite recent issues of the New York Times Book Review and the Washington Post Book World.
Typically, between the two there is usually a review once every month to six weeks which is so glowing that we as booksellers need to hunker down and make sure we've gotten every copy we can get our hands on. For the last few weeks, there have been many such reviews, and it's left me amazed by the quality of what's coming out this fall. New authors are producing amazing first-time efforts, and veterans are coming out with works that re-define their careers. Just a few examples:
Both Frank Rich in the New York Times and Michael Dirda in the Washington Post have raved about Zadie Smith's new novel, On Beauty. Rich says: "On Beauty is that rare comic novel about the decisive cultural politics of the new century likely to amuse readers on the right as much as those on the left... Yet Smith is up to more as well: she wants to rise above the fray even as she wallows in it, to hit a high note of idealism rather than to sink into despair. How radical can you be? Blame it on her youth." Dirda says: "it's evident that Smith is a writer for the long haul, an artist whose books we will look forward to every few years, a real and deeply satisfying novelist." Both reviewers compare her (favorably!) to E. M. Forster. And by the way: we've got her! She's going to be reading and signing copies of "On Beauty" at our Lansburgh/Penn Quarter store on Wednesday, September 28th at 7pm. Come by and meet this major literary artist and buy yourself a signed first edition.
In the meantime, on to Salman Rushdie. Did you see the rave that Ron Charles gave his new book Shalimar the Clown in the September 11th Book World? Charles comments that Rushdie's analysis of extremism, on which he was well-versed long before the rest of us realized the threat, has become ever more insightful: "...Rushdie has written an intensely political novel, infused with recent events, but its emotional scope reaches so far beyond our current crisis and its vision into the vagaries of the human heart is so perceptive that one can imagine Shalimar the Clown being read long after this age of sacred terror has faded into history." It was my very great pleasure to meet Mr. Rushdie when he stopped by our offices last week to sign copies of this terrific new work. As a result of his visit, we have signed first editions available now at our stores or through our website. Supplies are limited, so pick some up today!
The publication of Lewis Dabney's great new biography of Edmund Wilson leads Colm Toibin to muse on the importance of this intriguing figure: "...because of his fascinating, restless mind and his habit of being right some of the time, he remains a central figure in the history of the United States in the 20th century." This long overdue biography covers both the tremendously influential intellectual and the tumultuous (in the form of a marriage to the equally outspoken Mary McCarthy), and it's essential to an understanding of this greatest of critics. Once again, I'm pleased to say we have the author: Mr.Dabney will be reading and signing the book at our Lansburgh/Penn Quarter store on Thursday, October 6th at 7pm. Don't miss a chance to hear a discussion of Wilson and to pick up this book: I know you will find it entrancing.
I'll leave it here for now, but that's really just the tip of the iceberg. As the weeks go on, I'll be sure to mention more of these incredible fall books (don't forget a personal favorite of mine, Hilary Spurling's majestic new biography, Matisse the Master).
As an independent bookseller, we've always tried to be a cultural meeting place. Come in, talk to our staff and managers about the great fall books (they really care!) and, please, email me with what you're looking forward to this fall at jmurphy@olssons.com.
Well, the last two weeks have certainly provided their share of sobering moments. Everyone I've talked to is equally heartsick about what has happened to the Gulf Coast since the hurricane. It causes one to wonder all over how human beings manage to cope with the unthinkable. Oddly (for me at least), this comes at a time when I happen to be reading a book on that very subject, Joan Didion's forthcoming memoir The Year of Magical Thinking.
Didion has always been a brilliant, razor-sharp writer, but this memoir of the sudden death of her husband and the extremely dire illness of her daughter—at the same time—is a powerfully moving and stunningly frank account of how she confronted this dual tragedy. Didion turned to her intellect and reason—as well as a good deal of literature, medical and otherwise—to try to cope rationally with the sudden, tragic changes in her life. It's not the approach that everyone might take, but that makes her story even more compelling. My own usual inclination is to avoid memoirs of tragedies, but the direct and straightforward manner in which Didion relates her experiences, combined with her beautifully wrought prose, make this an unforgettable reading experience. It's really something special. It comes out in October, and we'll be featuring it as a Buyer's Choice at 20% off. Please reserve your copy today at any of our stores.
Now that fall is on the way, I'd like to use this space to tell you about some of the forthcoming books I'm looking forward to this season. For this week, I'd like to mention Hilary Spurling's Matisse the Master.
In the interest of full disclosure: I'm a total sucker for art biographies. I've never had an art history class and am no expert, but I love reading about what formed various artists. Plus: they almost always make great characters for biographies, either because they were troubled, reclusive, or (best of all) spectacular jerks.
Matisse, according to Spurling, was none of the above, yet her first volume of Matisse's life (The Unknown Matisse) unravels like a terrific mystery. She explains that his sudden reversion during a particularly daring part of his career to a safer style was owing to his in-laws involvement in a huge financial fraud scandal and his need to help them out. And she describes his advances in techique as breathlessly as she relates the story of that scandal. The first volume ends with Matisse about to achieve major recognition, and I've been waiting five years to find out what happens next.
In any event, I recommend in advance this sure-to-be-terrific second volume. We'll be featuring it as a Buyer's Choice (I would have had a tantrum otherwise) at 20% off. And we have terrific full-size paperback remainders of the first volume at only $7.98. Even if you're not a museum groupie, check them out—trust me, art biographies are (when done well, of course) as gripping as a thriller! If you already have an art bio you love, let me know at artbios@olssons.com.
I don't know about you, but when a movie of one of my favorite books comes out, I face it with more dread than excitement. The odds against a good movie adaptation seem so great - Howards End and The Remains of the Day are two of very few really faithful and effective adaptions I can think of (even rarer is a movie that improves on the book - other than The Godfather, I'm stymied to name one).
So I'm holding my breath over this fall's adaptation of my single favorite novel, Robert Penn Warren's All the King's Men.
It's so painfully perfect, so beautifully realized, so complete unto itself, that I can only imagine a movie, well, sullying it. I never saw the forties version because I didn't want to alter my mental image of the characters and settings. There are good people involved this time around - Sean Penn, Kate Winslet, Jude Law - but no one I ever pictured as the complex demogogue Governor Willie Stark (Talos in Warren's original manuscript version) or the embittered former idealist/narrator Jack Burden.
So may I invite you to visit this wonderful novel while you can still read it fresh, before the no-doubt-worthy-but-impossible-to-live-up-to-the-original film version comes out this fall? We have both the standard version and the restored manuscript version of my personal candidate for the Great American Novel. And you can buy it without the movie cover, in case you're self-conscious on the Metro.
Please feel free to tell me if you can name some decent - or for that matter strikingly horrible - film adaptations of books you've loved at adaptations@olssons.com
Alexis Akre, a DC-area native, has worked at Olsson's for almost six years. She received her BA in English from Barnard College,
and lived in New York for several years. Since her return to her home town, Alexis has honed her gift for skewering both vapidity and
pretension with concise, well-worded psychological assessment. She can be seen tooling around town on her minty green bike, reading
one of the hundreds of books she has stacked in her home, and teaching her cat to do tricks.
Well, I can tell fall is here when the really great holiday gifts start showing up in the stores, and we just received what may be this year's niftiest: The Complete New Yorker on DVD.
One of the reasons to support independents is that we like to take chances on titles. So when Jim Tenney, who has decades of buying experience, pointed out to me that Kent State University Press was publishing a definitive edition of Hemingway's Under Kilimanjaro, I instantly agreed with him that it needed to be a Buyer's Choice. To clarify: this is a never before published Hemingway masterwork. While parts had been cannibalized into a few other works, this is the only complete edition of this great travel narrative, presented as Hemingway intended.
Both Frank Rich in the New York Times and Michael Dirda in the Washington Post have raved about Zadie Smith's new novel, On Beauty. Rich says: "On Beauty is that rare comic novel about the decisive cultural politics of the new century likely to amuse readers on the right as much as those on the left... Yet Smith is up to more as well: she wants to rise above the fray even as she wallows in it, to hit a high note of idealism rather than to sink into despair. How radical can you be? Blame it on her youth." Dirda says: "it's evident that Smith is a writer for the long haul, an artist whose books we will look forward to every few years, a real and deeply satisfying novelist." Both reviewers compare her (favorably!) to E. M. Forster. And by the way: we've got her! She's going to be reading and signing copies of "On Beauty" at our Lansburgh/Penn Quarter store on Wednesday, September 28th at 7pm. Come by and meet this major literary artist and buy yourself a signed first edition.
In the meantime, on to Salman Rushdie. Did you see the rave that Ron Charles gave his new book Shalimar the Clown in the September 11th Book World? Charles comments that Rushdie's analysis of extremism, on which he was well-versed long before the rest of us realized the threat, has become ever more insightful: "...Rushdie has written an intensely political novel, infused with recent events, but its emotional scope reaches so far beyond our current crisis and its vision into the vagaries of the human heart is so perceptive that one can imagine Shalimar the Clown being read long after this age of sacred terror has faded into history." It was my very great pleasure to meet Mr. Rushdie when he stopped by our offices last week to sign copies of this terrific new work. As a result of his visit, we have signed first editions available now at our stores or through our website. Supplies are limited, so pick some up today!
The publication of Lewis Dabney's great new biography of Edmund Wilson leads Colm Toibin to muse on the importance of this intriguing figure: "...because of his fascinating, restless mind and his habit of being right some of the time, he remains a central figure in the history of the United States in the 20th century." This long overdue biography covers both the tremendously influential intellectual and the tumultuous (in the form of a marriage to the equally outspoken Mary McCarthy), and it's essential to an understanding of this greatest of critics. Once again, I'm pleased to say we have the author: Mr.Dabney will be reading and signing the book at our Lansburgh/Penn Quarter store on Thursday, October 6th at 7pm. Don't miss a chance to hear a discussion of Wilson and to pick up this book: I know you will find it entrancing.
Well, the last two weeks have certainly provided their share of sobering moments. Everyone I've talked to is equally heartsick about what has happened to the Gulf Coast since the hurricane. It causes one to wonder all over how human beings manage to cope with the unthinkable. Oddly (for me at least), this comes at a time when I happen to be reading a book on that very subject, Joan Didion's forthcoming memoir The Year of Magical Thinking.
Now that fall is on the way, I'd like to use this space to tell you about some of the forthcoming books I'm looking forward to this season. For this week, I'd like to mention Hilary Spurling's Matisse the Master.
I don't know about you, but when a movie of one of my favorite books comes out, I face it with more dread than excitement. The odds against a good movie adaptation seem so great