A Love Letter for the Local Bookstore

In honor of Independent Bookstore Day, an expression of love.

Today is Independent Bookstore Day, a day in which I celebrate Parnassus Books in Nashville, TN.

I discovered Parnassus Books at a pivotal time: the transition from college kid to full-fledged adult. I was traveling back and forth to Nashville for job interviews. An “A” student, I was (unrightfully) frustrated that companies weren’t tripping over each other to offer me a job, and needed somewhere to kill time between these seemingly-pointless meetings.

I walked into Parnassus Books and found, not a time-waster, but a haven. For a few hours, I could forget about my job search spreadsheet and self-imposed failure. I could seek refugee in my youth: carefree reading.

Local bookstores hold a special place in my heart. In order to show my support to my local bookstore, I promise to do the following:

1) Ask booksellers for a recommendation.

I imagine that local booksellers have the best life — they get to read, pet shop dogs, and mingle with authors all day. If you’re a bookseller and that’s not the truth, please don’t tell me. Let me live out this fantasy.

Besides being envy-enduring — these guys have a trove of knowledge when it comes to good books. So ask them. John Green puts it this way:

You cannot invent an algorithm that is as good at recommending books as a good bookseller,and that’s the secret weapon of the bookstore — is that no algorithm will ever understand readers the way that other readers can understand readers. (Source)

We think we know ourselves so well, but booksellers know us so much better.

Without the spot-on recommendations from local booksellers, I would have never discovered gems like Speak by Louisa Hall and Station 11 by Emily St. John Mandel. Which, by the way, are both great selection if you like subtle Sci-Fi told from multiple points of view (I’m serious).

2) Give books as gifts as often as possible.

I started adopting this practice with one of my best friends Liz. When she arrived at my apartment for “friend Christmas” I was giddy to see her gift to me was wrapped in the familiar (Parnassus) wrapping paper. Revealing my almost-identical present for her, we laughed over the fact that we very may well have bought each other the exact same thing.

She got me Bad Feminist by Roxane Gay, and I selected Mindy Kaling’s Why Not Me for her. (Side note: this should tell you everything you need to know about our friendship.) We learned that we had both scoured each other’s GoodReads and purchased our gifts at Parnassus, just hours apart.

Giving books as gifts is a sacred art. First off, they’re the perfect shape for wrapping. This comes in handy if you happen to be terrible at wrapping. Secondly, you’re not just giving an item. You’re giving an excuse to stay in bed reading on a Saturday morning. You’re giving hours of entertainment or learning. You’re giving each other the chance to discuss it together. And, who knows, if it’s a book you’ve been meaning to read, you may be first in line to borrow it.

Reserve this practice for those who appreciate a good book, someone who will smile and say, “I’ve heard about this one!” No need for our perfectly selected titles to collect dust on shelves. Some people have no interest in reading, and that’s okay — though we may not understand it. Get those guys a candle or something.

3) Make time to wander.

We all suffer from busy-syndrome, and none of us have time to walk at a leisurely pace, much, less wander. Given a blank slate of time, I can come up with a sleuth of errands and tasks to fill it: Clean out my closet. Renew my license. Buy new shoes that I didn’t need yesterday but suddenly really need today. You name it.

In this busy culture we’ve created for ourselves, it’s so much easier to let algorithms make our choices for us. But occasionally, give yourself the gift of finding the perfect book at random.

Don’t forget to wander into sections you may never even considered. Comedy. Self-help. Historical fiction. Pick a spine that sparks your interest and flip through it. Read a few pages. If the first one is not a winner, play again. This is how I discovered one of my favorites, The Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay by Michael Chabon.

Sam Jordison illustrates this beautifully in The joys of bookshop browsing:

All those Amazon recommendations, Facebook friend requests, tweets, reviews, and yes, blogs, sometimes get too noisy. It is a relief to go into a bookshop and quietly pick up a book. It satisfies my hunter-gatherer vanity. And there’s the simple pleasure of judging a book by its cover — which, contrary to popular cliche, is effective and fun.

So I promise allow myself to truly wander, to make less “quick trips.” Besides, local bookstores are the only place you can sit on the floor as an adult and not be judged.

4) Save the good ones.

As much as I love physical books, I am not against e-readers. In fact, my local library has a program that allows you to download eBooks on my Kindle, and I love it. It’s the perfect way to give books that vaguely peak my interest a chance. Or even try something completely out of my standard genres without the monetary risk.

However, occasionally I’ll come across a book that consumes me. I stop paying attention to the “minutes remaining” at the bottom and become immersed in the actual content. I find myself frustrated that I can’t peak ahead or make notes in the margins.

In our digital age, we sometimes forget that books are more than data dumps into our brains. We’re not all wanna-be CEOs trying to get in our “5-books-a-week” quota. They are tangible possessions. We can flip through them. We can come back to them again and again. And when a book is that good, I promise to drive straight to Parnassus and buy it. Because some books deserve a spot in your bookcase no matter what.

The act of picking that book up off the shop shelf will be more thrilling than any “100% downloaded” message will be. Trust me.

Learn more about Independent Bookstore Day here.

For a good read about Parnassus Books, read Ann Patchett’s article The Bookstore Strikes Back.