Filed under: books | Tags: abraham lincoln vampire hunter, cool youtube video, grand central publishing, hachette, seth graham-smith
True Story! You should watch this video. Probably rated PG-13.
Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter by Seth Graham-Smith is available at the store on March 2 via Grand Central Publishing.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: JD salinger, JD salinger letters, little brown, lost jd salinger novels, morgan library & museum, new york city
If you’re going to be in New York City anytime between March 16 and April 11 you should, nay, NEED to stop by the Morgan Library & Museum and check out a recently declassified (there is no better word) cache of letters from famous authorial recluse, J.D. Salinger.
From the Morgan Museum:
Written to Michael Mitchell, who was commissioned by Salinger to create the dust jacket for The Catcher in the Rye, the letters cover a forty-year period and constitute an extraordinarily rare and revealing correspondence. They richly document a period of Salinger’s life that has remained obscure and provide hitherto unknown details about the daily habits and thought of this legendary author.
So, I’m guessing todo lists like:
“1) Go to Piggly Wiggly 2) Pick up brisket 3) See what this Facebook is all about 4) Tort Reform
NOPE.
More like (emphasis mine):
He wrote eloquently and poignantly about the challenges to creativity that come with middle age, and the self-doubt attendant upon his writing. But he confirmed what many of his devoted readers had long hoped: Salinger continued to adhere to a strict writing discipline and, by the mid-1960s, had completed at least two novels and continued to work on others.
Okay, Little Brown, no need for the Stephanie Meyer cash-cow any longer. “Cha-ching” I can hear in the background.
Filed under: books, reviews | Tags: about a mountain, book reviews, john d'agata, louise erdrich, shadow tag, unabridged bookstore is very helpful, we do not like squirrels
Here are two excellent books that were just reviewed by us, the helpful staff at Unabridged.
Stefan had this to say about … ABOUT A MOUNTAIN by John D’Agata
D’Agata crafts a stylish and circuitous investigation of the controversial government plan to store our nation’s nuclear waste inside of Yucca Mountain to illuminate the state of the modern metropolitan area. The prose whips by in a series of montages that affect a sublime, lucid quality that skilfully interweaves many desperate sources to tell the overarching story. There is a lot going on here, but D’Agata never lets the material consume the moment. Stefan loved, loved, loved! This book.
Shane read/loved/and recommends SHADOW TAG by Louise Erdrich. He said: 
What initially attracted me to Erdrich’s novel was not the plot, but rather the format in which the book is written. Shadow Tag alternates between excerpts from two diaries (one fake and one real) and third-person narration. The idea of keeping a manipulative fake diary (that you know your spouse is secretly reading) fascinated and disturbed me. And Shadow Tag did fascinate and disturb me – from beginning to end. Ultimate, it is about the collapse of a marriage and family. but with powerful imagery and engaging prose, Shadow Tag is a highly original tale, leaving the reader with profound insights into sex, love, and power. Some readers may be put off by the unlikable characters and bleak subject matter, but it is worth the plunge. Intense, poetic, chilling, raw and fearless – I really cannot recommend this unforgettable novel enough!
They are, of course, available for your pleasure. Stop by today to chat about them or, you know, whatever. Just not about squirrels. We are not currently fans of squirrels.
Filed under: books, reviews | Tags: book reviewers, galleycat, twitter, twitter book reviews
Hell, who isn’t on Twitter at least 74 times a day?
The problem in those 140 characters is that you can’t properly review a book. Thankfully, Galleycat has compiled a list of helpful peeps that all provide links to the necessary articles of their fancies. Or short and sweet just like how Twitter was imagined so many thousands of years ago.
Filed under: Uncategorized | Tags: amazon does not care about you, amazon is destroying the book, amazon is not a good business model, amazon sucks, john grisham, the chicago tribune
Finally The Trib starts to do something worthwhile. Sorry if I missed this a few days ago. This is a great article about the larger issue facing some small independent businesses. Ahem.
And (soft segue) if you didn’t see john Grisham’s appearance on THE TODAY SHOW this morning here are the quotables about the DISCOUNTING price wars: “A disaster” “short-term” “short-sighted” “a book is WORTH $24 – this devalues the book.”
Further reading: CHEAP: The High Cost of Discount Culture by Ellen Ruppel Shell
and
BIG-BOX SWINDLE: The True Cost of Mega-Retailers and the Fight for America’s Independent Businesses by Stacy Mitchell
We, of course, have both in stock.
Finally! Doing a newsletter! “We’re not done and we won’t be till our heads fall off though that may be a long way off … ” ahem. Quoth the Johns of the Giants.
It will be in your inbox presently with all the information that you require about various things, but mostly about books. Well. All about books.
Read it. Or Book It.
Filed under: books, bookstore news | Tags: how to walk to school, Jacqueline Edelberg, nettelhorst school, Susan Kurland, unabridged is donating to nettelhorst
We’ve had How to Walk to School for a little over a week, and it’s been great to see the responses from people who come and purchase the book. The rehabilitation of the school is a great symbol of pride for our neighborhood and we can definitely see it in all those who look at the book.
Don’t know about Nettelhorst, here’s a bit from the press release:
“When two gutsy moms ventured inside Nettelhorst, the neighborhood’s underutilized and struggling public elementary school, the new principal asked what it would take for them to enroll their children. Stunned by her candor, they returned the next day armed with an extensive wish list. The principal read their list and said “Well, let’s get started, girls! It’s going to be a busy year…”
How to Walk to School is the story—from the highs to the lows—of motivated neighborhood parents galvanizing and then organizing an entire community to take a leap of faith, transforming a challenged urban school into one of Chicago’s best, virtually overnight. Susan Kurland, Nettelhorst’s entrepreneurial new principal, and Jacqueline Edelberg, the neighborhood mom, prove that the fate of public education is not beyond our control. How to Walk to School provides an accessible and honest blueprint for reclaiming the great public schools our children deserve.“
Also for every book purchased through Unabridged we are donating 20% of the procedes (that’s 50% of the profits) to Nettelhorst school to make sure they continue their example of excelence.
Stop by and pick up a copy today!
Filed under: books, reviews | Tags: 10% off all europa editions, elegance of the hedgehog, europa editions, great books at unabridged, muriel barbery, unabridged book of the month
New book of the month! It’s so big it two needed extra days!
By now I am sure you’ve heard a friend, or a friend of a friend who’s read The Elegance of the Hedgehog and loved it, but now you have Ed who highly recommends this wonderful book.
This is what he had to say:
“I loved the Elegance of the Hedgehog – maybe my favorite novel of the year. In this double narrative, there is more to Renee – elderly, frumpy widowed concierge at an exclusive Paris apartment building – than meets the eye! And Palo Ma – 12 years old, philosophical, precocious – decides (in pretty typical french, existential fashion) that she’s going to kill herself on her 13th birthday.
The novel is tender and satirical, its characters inspiring the affection and enthusiasm readers similarly have for those of Alexander McCall Smith. Plot developments range from heartbreaking to the comic (at one point, Renee ponders whether her cat exists, or just her perception that exists!) The novel challenges stereotypes and class divisions all the while exploring the nature of beauty and the meaning of life.
Hooray for Elegance of the Hedgehog!“
Like all of our Europa Editions (an amazing Publisher who is doing great things for English Literature) at Unabridged Bookstore, it is 10% off the cover price.
ALSO! Here is some further reading about the author, Muriel Barbery.
Filed under: books, bookstore news | Tags: amazon is the devil, amazon sucks, bookstore closing, prarie ave. bookshop, shop local, support your independent bookstore, us needs a coherent internet tax policy
prarie ave. bookshop
The United States (and Chicago) is hemorrhaging bookstores. We are not just losing a place to purchase books, we are losing places that define communities.
It’s a meeting place, of sorts, for Chicago’s notoriously competitive architectural community.
“You would run into other architects there — or hide from other architects,” Eifler said.
What’s really sad about the whole bit is that their problems are not unique.
“People would come to the bookshop with their notepad, make notes of what they wanted and then go buy it somewhere else,” Wilbert Hasbrouck said last week. He blamed the 10.25 percent sales tax for driving buyers to online booksellers like Amazon.com.
Unfortunately for them, gatherings of people don’t pay the bills and keep the new books coming in the store.
Of course what’s needed is a tax policy that realizes the Internet isn’t going anywhere and a county, looking at you Todd Stroger, that doesn’t have contempt for the businesses that operate within its borders (among many other things).
So, remember kids, support your indies.
