CSotD: Authors without Borders
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Derf Backderf addresses the most important question about the Borders closing: Whaaa?
I don't get it.
I get the cartoon. (Though you'll probably need to click on it to get a legible sized copy)
What I don't get is the outpouring of grief over the closing of a crappy big box retailer that had aided in the destruction of independent bookstores around the country. For instance, here's a relatively steel-eyed explanation of what went wrong, but the comments make it sound like Rudolf Valentino has died all over again.
It's hard to improve on Derf's sarcasm, but I'm thinking that, if ClearChannel ever went out of business, we'd —gasp! — have to start listening to radio stations with live disc jockeys who select tunes by using their imaginations and knowledge of music instead of a chart drawn up with an algorithm based on focus group studies.
And if Olive Garden closed, we'd have to — gasp encore! — go back to Italian restaurants with actual cooks instead of minimum wage food assemblers.
It would be horrible.
Three observations and a comics-based anecdote:
1. Perhaps the chief mourners live in urban areas with massive Borders stores where you have some chance of actually finding the book you wanted in stock. That's not the case out here in the sticks, where the Borders stores are large but not huge, unless the book you want is a best seller. A current best seller. Beyond that, see above.
2. Another possibility is that those weeping the loudest are too young to remember real bookstores. When I was first out of college, I lived in Colorado Springs and shopped at The Chinook Bookshop, which was a very strong independent bookstore. The staff was stable and there for the long term and each had a specialty — you knew that, in drama or poetry, you should ask Mark, for instance, while Judy, one of the owners, knew everything there was to know about current and classic children's literature.
Except for Claudia, who was a local legend with her scary-smart encyclopedic knowledge of all genres. You could say, "It's about this guy on an island, like, off the coast of …" and she would lead you right to the book on the shelf — whether it was a history book, travel guide or novel.
And it would be on the shelf. Chinook wasn't huge, but it was very well-stocked, and one of their secrets was that, if someone special-ordered a title, they'd order two copies, on the theory that somebody else would walk in the next week and want the same book, or at least that someone would see it and buy it. It was a policy that seldom failed, and you could drop by, ask for something fairly obscure and there would be a pretty good chance that they'd have it.
3. One thing that has changed and will continue to hurt bricks-and-mortar stores is Amazon. There were books that Chinook didn't have in stock, but they could have it, usually in three days or sometimes a week at the latest, and, in those days, that was a good deal. But "I can order it for you" has little appeal today, since I can order it for myself and not only have it delivered to my doorstep, but likely with a 20% discount as well.
Two years ago, when it came time to get my comic collections for Christmas giving, I decided to support the local indie. It cost me another twenty bucks in lost discounts and then I had to wait two weeks — not the promised four days — to get the books, which caused some real rushing-around, since I also needed to get them signed before I could get them out to their recipients in time for the holiday.
Bookstores, to survive, damn well better have it on the shelf. This gives an edge, in the future, to the stores that specialize in a particular genre — mysteries, children's lit, comics, whatever — rather than general-interest book stores.
Bonus observation:
Even their much-touted "Going Out Of Business Sale" is a rip-off.
And the comics-based anecdote:
Terri Libenson is celebrating the release of the first Pajama Diaries collection, and, the day the Borders closing was announced, she posted on Facebook: "A few weeks ago we set up a book signing at Borders for Sept. Go ahead and laugh."
Which, judging from the comments, everyone did.
There followed the suggestion that she simply set up on the sidewalk outside the closed store, which, in turn, prompted a suggestion that there be more such random guerrilla signings staged, under the aegis of a new group that gives us the headline for today's post — "Authors without Borders."
I like the idea. It's totally impractical, but I like it anyway.
So what does the closing of Borders mean? Read Derf again. That's what it means.
And then buy Terri's book. If you use the Amazon widget on the right rail here, I get a little kickback, but if you go here instead, Terri not only gets the kickback but will sign your copy. I can't compete with that.
And neither can WalMart or RiteAid or Borders or whateverthehell their name was.
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