A Few Quick Reads (Too Tired to Blog)

It’s Sunday, a day of rest. For me it meant opening Dog Ears Books at 11 o’clock instead of 10 o’clock, but because we had an evening of riotous living on our front porch last night, with guests expected and unexpected, I am allowing myself a work morning in quiet recovery mode. No long reports today. No in-depth book reviews. This whole post will be a quick read, containing half a dozen or so images that are themselves quick reads. The old Northport sign above, the one on the Leland side of the M-22 loop, begins today’s tour. Next come the beautiful new blue signs—



One thing I can’t help reading in the bookstore: t-shirts worn by visitors. This one from the U.P. caught my fancy on Saturday.



After the post the other day with the elaborate bookplate, I dug out a couple other favorites to show here. One is simple and subtle but imaginative in its way; the second, wildly colorful, obviously denoted a child’s book.



There you have my world today. I finished The Dogs of Bedlam Farm yesterday and will be writing about that book one day soon. Not today, though. Today I plan to sit quietly and happily reading until customers provide a happy interruption.

Sun and Waves, Books and More Books

Nature handed northern Michigan a pleasant surprise yesterday, with sunshine all day instead of the forecast rain. The very brief downpour around five o’clock was enough to water the garden. Now this morning, sun again! What did we do to deserve this?

I spent several hours on Wednesday with bookstore helper and angel Bruce Balas, pricing and figuring out where to shelve a beautiful batch of “new” (old) Civil War books. A few of these items made it onto the Dog Ears webpage, but there are many more than those few in the store in our greatly expanded Civil War section. One book has the most wonderful bookplate I've ever seen:


The dog, the fireplace, the upright bass--nothing seems missing here. I wonder if the previous owner's private library and home were really as palatial as they look on the bookplate.

Finally, after a late lunch, Sarah’s wish came true: We left town behind for a walk (I stumbled, she ran) on the shore of Lake Michigan, the rocky, rocky beach of Peterson Park. I tried to keep my shoes dry while eye-combing the surfline for stones, but the water was not too cold for Sarah.


No time for the proprietor to kick back and read back at the busy bookstore! There were people there. Bruce and I conferred on the problem of the trade paperback section, already so crowded that the alphabetical system was breaking down into piles of books on top of each other. We decided that two shelves of humor books could move up to where the art section used to be, an area of underutilized shelf space. Bruce left. A young couple on bicycles arrived. A torrential downpour ensued! So it was after 5:30 when I got closed up, walked to the store, shopped and came home to make dinner.

Later, however, at home on the porch after dinner, before a pruning and planting session in the yard, I got back into Anne-Marie Oomen’s book for a while, and before falling asleep Vikram Seth entertained me in 1948 India. Up early, I picked up An American Map again this morning, and it’s possible there will be a few moments later on to steal into The Dogs of Bedlam Farm for a little while, but I am going to try very hard not to start another book before finishing at least one of these three. I have my list to consider, after all, and my rule is that a book cannot go onto the list until I reach THE END!

Speaking of the list now--this is embarrassing--I looked back and could not find Elizabeth Kane Buzzelli’s Dead Sleeping Shaman on it! A dreadful oversight—and you know I devoured that tale, stealing the time back in May, shirking bookstore and housework duties to escape to Leetsville, Michigan, and the life of fictional writer-sleuth Emily Kincaid. Please overlook the fact that it appears only now, out of order, on my Books Read 2010 list. Elizabeth will be at the bookstore tomorrow, though, and it would be good if I could come up with a fabulous explanation. Something involving flying monkeys, maybe?

Any suggestions for my list omission or any further suggestions for Up North identity categories (see yesterday's post) will be welcome today.