March's Apple-a-Month pick: New Finnish Grammar

It's taken us a while to get around to revealing to the wider world our Apple-a-Month selection for March, but we assure you it's no reflection on the strength of this fine novel by Diego Marani (translated by Judith Landry). If anything, the opposite is the case, this being one of the more memorable books I've read in months, one that continues to haunt me. Here's the praise I sung to our subscribers:

I've been a bookseller long enough to know that this book is going to be a tough sell. As memorable and heartbreaking a novel as any I've read in recent memory, New Finnish Grammar is saddled with both a dry title and unassuming packaging. It's unlikely that either of these things are going to grab a hold of you the way the extraordinary story hidden inside of this book will; you'd be forgiven for passing the book by, as I did for months. (Finland? Grammar? I'll stick with Fifty Shades of Gray, thanks.) But, when I finally gave in to the nagging voice that insists I read a certain book, I found myself caught up in a heartbreaking story about a man with no memory, no language and no homeland. Narrated in an earnest, straightforward voice, New Finnish Grammar manages nonetheless to speak to profound questions of identity and meaning, all while remaining as compelling as The English Patient.

At the time we mailed New Finnish Grammar, we weren't aware that it, along with Magdalena Tulli's In Red, our November selection, would be included among the finalists of the Best Translated Book Award. We're crossing our fingers that either of these books--or both!--will take home the prize.

And, for our subscribers, April's book will come with a special treat, so keep an eye on your mailboxes in the coming week. We think you'll be pleased by the surprise.

A Rare, Brave Story

I can't post my usual light musings because I just read Escape from Camp 14: One Man's Remarkable Odyssey from North Korea to Freedom in the West, reporter Blaine Harden's story of a young man's torture in, and escape from, a North Korean prison labor camp.

There’s no lyrical levity to lighten up this insider account. It’s a graphic and straightforward reporting of Shin Dong-Hyuk’s starvation, torture by sadistic guards, watching family members executed, a classmate beaten to death, and Shin’s mental anguish after his escape.

There’s some competition, I realize, for what nation’s citizens live the most harrowing lives of deprivation and degradation. But, it seems little media light has been shed on the horrifying inhumanity occurring within North Korea’s grey fields visible on satellite imagery.

The US intelligence community is aware of North Korea’s estimated 200,000 prison camp slavery victims. I appeal to US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta (if he’s reading this) to hold the Kim regime accountable for its atrocities.

Though I know this sentiment will contradict our official snarky vantage in this progressive urban vacuum, but reading Shin’s experience made me grateful to be American (despite our country’s own inequities, including with criminal justice and incarceration).

I urge Panetta and anyone not conversant in the reality above the DMZ, outside the Stalinist sound stage of Pyongyang, to read Escape from Camp 14.

"There is a pleasure in the pathless woods"

Photo by Bryan Larson

I've always thought that one of the questions our HR manager should ask potential employees during their interview is, "How good are you at giving directions?" This, because without a doubt the question we're most frequently asked is, "Where are your ____ books?" (Health, business, science fiction, philosophy, &c.) I answer this request often enough that it seems like just about everyone who comes into the store is here for the first time, newly arrived and wide-eyed.

We more than welcome new customers, of course, and it's natural that those who frequent the store are more aware--even if only vaguely--of Green Apple's layout, as shifting and possibly inscrutable as that may be (sometimes even for those of us who work here). Which is to say that the frequency of this question seems to be a good sign for us; the day no one asks where, for instance, poetry is will surely be a sign of impending doom.

And while we've stenciled apples onto floors, given names to parts of the store, printed maps, and slapped signs (atop of older signs, next to newer signs) to the walls, the fact of the matter is that even with all of these helpful pointers, bookstores are, to my mind, the most difficult retail environment to navigate. By difficult I don't mean troublesome, but tricky, like following an overgrown path through a forest. The person who asked at the front counter where writings on nature are will, by the time he or she gets upstairs, have been so sidetracked as to have already forgotten where we were sending them.

This is why so many people speak fondly of getting lost in a bookstore or why we browse for books: I've never heard someone say they're browsing for a pair of jeans.

But we do technically browse for jeans. And we do technically search for books. The difference that exists between the two, I think, is the receptivity the bookstore fosters, the sense of wandering and happy discovery that exists in a space that, Borgesianly, opens up to infinity. Think about the contents of a bookstore: pages upon pages full of dreams, plots, characters, facts, photographs, indexes, footnotes, reaching back into history, forward into the future, stretching out across the present, or into other impossibilities. It's dizzying, yet we invite it. We seek it out.

Rather than coming to any conclusions here--I may not have had even one to draw--I'm going to let this meandering post mirror the way we experience bookstores, and conclude an excerpt from Lo Chih Cheng's "Bookstore in a Dream":

The forest that awes and fascinates us the most

is this bookstore...

Nobody, not even the 89-year old third-generation

shopkeeper, Mr. L.,

Nobody knows the bookstore's true dimensions--

not even the literature Professor T., who last

year in pursuit of some

remaindered book,

was submerged forever in the quicksand of letters,

or the critic who, after many years, came dashing out of a

mural

or the new breed of bats biting his neck...

Really, even in the closely guarded stacks east of Section

B--

in the shrubbery, mainly of biographies and fables--

we will occasionally run into the

skeletons of the lost...

Clement Street- not just for Tupperware

If Alissa Anderson has her way, Clement Street won’t be known mainly for cheap toilet brushes, and someone hoisting a dead hog on his shoulder, because her delightfully curated pop-up store, Foggy Notion, just around the corner from Green Apple, displays a unique selection of handmade and organic decorative appointments, potent potions, and hefty accessoires, bringing a bit of Hayes Valley chic to our sometimes too-sensible street.

Here’s some of the locally crafted luxurious goods found here:

• Anderson’s own necklaces with chandelier crystals and old-fashioned keys ($30-$75), thin, multi-pocket wallets with heavy-duty snaps redeemed from vintage pleather tennis racket covers ($20-$40), pencil and cosmetic pouches made from soft leather Venezuelan Pampero rum-bottle bags ($36), that Anderson, (granddaughter of seamstress Concetta Longo) sews herself in the shop/studio on an industrial Juki sewing machine, under the brand “mittenmaker.”

• Sturdy Job + Boss clutches and bucket totes by Oakland’s Brook Lane and Kirby McKenzie using the hand-dipped Shibori dye-bath technique ($130 to $310).

• Plush “Lay Swing” pillows by Grass Valley partners Carabeth Rowley and Tahiti Pehrson, with intricate papercut stencil work, hand silkscreened on vintage seersucker.

• Portland’s Little Otsu greeting cards ($3)

• Berkeley’s Juniper Ridge room sprays ($20) like “Steep Ravine” and “Cascade Glacier” from sustainably wildcrafted aromatics like spicy laurel, woodsy cedar, sweet desert piñon, citrusy Douglas Fir, and pungent sage. Ten percent of their profits go to defending western Wilderness causes such as Desert Survivors and the California Wilderness Coalition.

• Bernal Heights-dweller, and CCA Wattis Institute Curator Jana Blankenship’s “Captain Blankenship” brand “Russalka” palmarosa bath salts ($20) and perfumes ($20) like “meteor” with ylang ylang.

• 26th and Balboa Jonathan Anzalone and Joseph Ferriso's Anzfer Farms Driftwood Bud vases ($15) and lamps ($75).

• Portland, Oregon Matt Pierce’s water-repellant, canvas Wood & Faulk bags ($170-$250).

“If I can do as well as December from word-of-mouth and street traffic, then I can do better this year,” said Anderson, 33, an eight-year 6th and Clement Street resident.

Foggy Notion (inspired by the song from Velvet Underground’s 1969 “VU” album, and the Avenues’ familiar vapor, of course), is throwing an Earth Day party April 22, featuring Dogpatch dweller, sculptor and jewelry designer Robyn Miller’s vintage fashions and accessories, and used records from Andy Cabic of neo-folk band, Vetiver (whose thoughtful new Richmond District-inspired LP, “Errant Charm,” (Sub Pop, $22), by Cabic and Thom Monahan, is on sale.

Treasure Island Woodworker Drew Bennett used reclaimed Douglas Fir and Redwood to construct the store’s handsome counter.

Store owner Anderson, a Wakefield Memorial High School (Buffy Sainte Marie, class of 1958) and Smith College grad, is also a former Vetiver cellist.

275 6th Avenue 415-683-5654
foggy-notion.com

Wild about WILD by Cheryl Strayed

Our April Book of the Month, guaranteed to please, is Wild: From Lost to Found on the Pacific Crest Trail by Cheryl Strayed.

Wild is, at its base, a memoir of a struggling young woman and her challenging solo hike along the Pacific Crest Trail (1,100 miles of it!). But it's so much more--full of heart, humor, hope, and humanity.

You will probably be hearing about this book everywhere. Believe thehype. (e.g. Sunday New York Times Book Review, SF Chronicle, GoodReads). I, for one, am willing to put my reputation of 18.5 years as a bookseller on the line for this one. You will love it.

Further proof? My wife and I almost never read the same book (it seems inefficient to us--is that weird?). In rare instances, we will more or less force the other to read something--she had me read Behind the Beautiful Forevers (which is excellent), and she read (and loved)

Wild. So it's not a guy book or a women's book--it's just a great book.

Buy if from your favorite local independent bookseller! If that's Green Apple, here's a link to the book and to the eBook. Those who act quickly might get a signed copy, as the author was gracious enough to stop by the store today.

A Time Of Darkness and Despair

My first visit to Green Apple Books? I remember it well. The creaky floors, Cruddy (by Lynda Barry) on display for $6, and, up on the mezzanine, my favorite section of all - True Crime. As with Mystery and Science Fiction, it is the (hopefully not too) worn and tattered paperback which is the linchpin of this section. Repressing a shriek of delight I grasped Say You Love Satan (David St. Clair) and The Search For The Green River Killer (Carlton Smith). Foolishly I set them down to wander the store some more, then was unable to find the mezzanine again! Years later I was able to read the Carlton book, but St. Clair's renowned work on the hessian Satanic drug addicts of New Jersey continues to elude me.

     Eventually I started working at Green Apple, and am known as the store's resident authority on this section, though our bookkeeper is more widely read in this field than me. The dynamics of used true crime had changed in the meanwhile. As I remember the glorious '80s and '90s, every used bookstore was hip deep in trashy, gnarly paperbacks priced under $3. Browse shops in San Francisco these days and these titles are few and far between. So, a few weeks back, when two boxes of of mass market true crime treasure came in across our buy counter, I glimpsed for the first time many titles which captured my attention. Convinced a ravenous market existed for these books, I was determined to read as many as I could before they hit the shelves. Over a period of two weeks, I tore through Angel of Darkness (Dennis McDougal), The Misbegotten Son (Jack Olsen), Freed To Kill (Gera-Lind Kolarik with Wayne Klatt), Ted Bundy: The Killer Next Door (Steven Winn & David Merrill), and The Gainsville Ripper (Mary Ryzuk).
   
     It wasn't all good times. I knew immersion in this level of depravity would have negative effects on my mental health. Children cannot understand that even though a bad thing happened, it is incredibly unlikely to happen to them. After reading true crime for two weeks, I developed this same problem. Before, I was able to control my fear of being abducted and cut up about by realizing, if this terrible thing happens to one person, that's too many, but it does happen. But if it happens in the US to 270 people in one year, the odds of any one individual falling victim is 1 in one million. In practice, even these odds are lessened by my being male, fairly privileged, and avoiding dangerous situations. For example, I do not get hell of wasted drunk, climb in a stranger's car, and take the pills he offers. I don't accept offers to pose naked and tied up for money, even a hundred bucks. This kind of risk reduction has served me well over the years. But logic was defeated after 1500 pages of terrible happenings. The most casual encounters seemed to me to be a set-up. Many men seemed to be hiding a secret and horrifying life. Stopping to tie my shoe, I felt like a limping and lonely antelope on the savannah. While camping, I had to struggle not to run the 50 yards from the river back to our campsite (it looked more like 50 miles) after a branch broke in the distance. I thought it a security breach that my friend told a staggering drunk the name of the campground we were looking for. He seemed an ancillary character, no doubt soon to be picked up by his brother, a maniac with a history of fire-starting and head injuries, recently released from prison...  

     Plato recommended all things in moderation, but that's not really me. In this instance, I am more like the character sang about by Johnny Cash on Live At San Quentin - "I had all that I wanted of a lot of things I had, and a lot more than I needed of some things that turned out bad." It will be at least ten days before I'm ready for Driven To Kill  (Gary King), while Camouflaged Killer (David Gibb) still waits on the shelf at home.

A Perfect Tenn

Recently I passed over my pile of new releases to read The Lady of Larkspur Lotion, (1941) from 27 Wagons Full of Cotton and Other Plays by Tennessee Williams, which I purchased for 91 cents at the old 9th Avenue Books years ago. The six-page one-act drama portrays a self-deluded lady who turns tricks in a New Orleans fleabag SRO to pay rent, but thinks she’s a Hapsburg rubber plantation heiress, and who contains many of the archetypal characteristics of all the playwright’s female characters.

My favorite of Tennessee’s outcasts like Sweet Bird of Youth’s lonely, aging film star, Alexandra Del Lago, or Battle of Angel’s ostracized Cassandra Whiteside, refuse to accept personal embarrassment or pity.

Tennessee Williams, (March 26 is the 101st anniversary of his birth), transcended his borderline psychosis by writing five to eight hours per day, seven days a week for 50 years, creating uncompromisingly private plays about public confession that hunger for truth and uphold the sanctity of imagination.

The best art is about art, I've heard, and Tennessee’s poignant art illustrates the victory of fertile and immortal expression, over cold, complex, harsh reality.

A Streetcar Named Desire's Blanche DuBois (whose monologues I have performed in a casual open mic talent show) says “I don’t want realism. I want magic,” summing up my affinity for these vulgar, degenerate, disenfranchised outcasts and the usually male, virile, young wanderers they prey upon, who feel entrapped in scandal, their past catching up with them, who choose the kindness of strangers over commitment to moral principle.

I was introduced to Williams’s decadent and hungry females in a San Francisco State class led by poet and internationally respected Hemingway scholar Robin Gajdusek, in 1992, the final year of his teaching career. In that Tuesday night class I’d feel the fizzy brain high you get listening to a passionate and brilliant lecturer, as Gajdusek revealed Tennessee’s metaphors and themes of Dyonesian ressurrection, illuminating the symbolic pebbles beneath the stream in Williams’s supple ear for gothic-tinged conversation, my wrist aching from furious note-scribbling. When a grandiose student interrupted to opine at tedious length, I’d rage inside, “We’re wasting precious time.”

If I had chosen Beowulf or Dickens to fulfill my single author class requirement, would I be pulling them off the shelf just for fun, 20 years later?

Gajdusek, who died in 2003 at age 78, also wrote Resurrection, A War Journey, recounting fighting with F Company, 37th regiment of the 95th Infantry Division in its assault on a German-occupied fort in Metz, France, 1944, the poetry collection, A Voyager’s Notebook” (1989), and eight other poetry volumes.

Thank you Professor Gajdusek and thank you Tennessee Williams!