Ep. 67 - Sam Miller: Buy Books Before the Bedlam
It isn’t unusual for shops to begin playing Jingle Bell Rock or Baby, It’s Cold Outside about a minute after summer ends, which shoppers either love or abhor. 2020 has been weird in numerous ways, and shopping for the winter holidays, whether it is Hanukkah, Kwanzaa or Christmas, is going to prove to be unusual.
Our little goblins and ghouls may still be counting their candy from Halloween and Thanksgiving is still several weeks away but small businesses including bookstores are encouraging shoppers to start grabbing those gifts early this year for multiple reasons. So today we talk to our favorite bookseller, Sam Miller of Carmichael Books in Louisville, about what books and gifts readers may want to check out this holiday season.
Sam tells us why independent bookstores across the country called October the new December, which new books will be hot this holiday season and what books that came out earlier in 2020 have had staying power. Finally Sam gives some suggestions to shoppers about what they can do, in addition to buying their gifts from local businesses, to help stores financially through this weird weird year to still keep their doors open in 2021.
Books Mentioned in this Episode:
1- A Promised Land by Barack Obama
2- The Lost Words by Robert MacFarlane and Jackie Morris
3- The Lost Spells by Robert MacFarlane and Jackie Morris
4- Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer
5- Shit, Actually: The Definitive, 100% Objective Guide to Modern Cinema by Lindy West
6- Shrill by Lindy West
7- Ottolenghi Flavor: A Cookbook by Yotam Ottolenghi and Ixta Belfrage
8- Modern Comfort Food: A Barefoot Contessa Cookbook by Ina Garten
9- This Will Make It Taste Good: A New Path to Simple Cooking by Vivian Howard
10- Black Sun (Between Earth and Sky) by Rebecca Roanhorse
11- Trail of Lightning by Rebecca Roanhorse
12- The Three-Body Problem by Cixin Liu
13- To Hold Up The Sky by Cixin Liu
14- The Ministry for the Future by Kim Stanley Robinson
15- Once and Future Witches by Alix Harrow
16- Pirenesi by Susanna Clarke
17- Jonathan Strange and Mr. Norell by Susanna Clarke
18- Secret Santa by Andrew Shaffer
19- We Are Santa by Ron Cooper
20- A Literary Holiday Cookbook by Alison Walsh
21- The Official Downton Abbey Cookbook by Annie Gray
22- A Cloud a Day by Gavin Pretor-Pinney
23- Men to Avoid in Art and Life by Nicole Tersigni
24- Stranger Planet by Nathan Pyle
25- Louisville Anthology edited by Erin Keane
26- A Charity Anthology for COVID -19 by Neil Gaiman
27- The Call Me Ishmael Phone Book: An Interactive Guide to Life-
28- Changing Books by Logan Smalley and Stephanie Kent
29- Estranged by Ethan Aldridge
30- The Changeling King by Ethan Aldridge
31- Olive, Mabel & Me by Andrew Cotter
32- The Searcher by Tana French
33- Metropolitan Stories by Christine Coulson
34- The One & Only Bob by Katherine Applegate
35- The Glass Hotel by Emily St. John Mandel
36 - Dreyer's English by Benjamin Dreyer
37- The Poet X by Elizabeth Acevedo
38- Red Comet: The Short Life and Blazing Art of Sylvia Plath by Heather Clark
39- All Adults Here by Emma Straub
40- The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett
41- Three-Martini Afternoons at the Ritz: The Rebellion of Sylvia Plath and Anne Sexton by Gail Crowther
42- Literary Rogues: A Scandalous History of Wayward Authors by Andrew Shaffer
43- This House is Haunted by John Boyne
44- The Boy in the Striped Pajamas by John Boyne
45- The Heart's Invisible Furies by John Boyne
46- Brain on Fire by Susannah Cahalan
47- The Daily Coyote by Shreve Stockton
48- The Milk Lady of Bangalore by Shoba Narayan
49- The Sound of a Wild Snail Eating by Elisabeth Tova Bailey
50- Hiddensee: A Tale of the Once and Future Nutcracker by Gregory Maguire
51- Last Christmas in Paris by Hazel Gaynor
52- The Hunting Party by Lucy Foley
53- The Guest List by Lucy Foley
54- Winter Solstice by Rosamunde Pilcher
55- Holidays on Ice by David Sedaris