Stories

Yesterday I sat through two and a half of the most excruciating hours of my life. Sat through, twisted my torso through, felt like throwing up through. But I stayed there riveted, horrified, sickened and saddened beyond belief.

I was at a movie, "Twelve Years a Slave." A movie that should, in my humble yet convinced opinion, be required viewing for every American over the age of fifteen. It is based on the true story of a black man, a father, a husband, a violinist, a cultured, educated, middle class citizen of Saratoga Springs New York in the 1840's who is kidnapped, brought to the south and sold into slavery. It is the story of what he witnessed, endured, and survived for twelve years before being rescued and reunited with his family.

The movie, directed by Steve McQueen, gives it to us full strength, undiluted. The camera lens takes us into the open, oozing, purple wall of the wound. Close up and into the bubbling beads of fresh blood made by the long taut leather lashing out, slashing, ripping red rivers into chocolate skin.

It's a story of a despicable part of our history and needs to be told correctly for many reasons. And it is torturous to sit through.

Many, many years ago there was an older man who came to our store pretty much weekly for about nine or ten years. He wasn't all that talkative, he came with a plan and left with all the things on his list and always 12 small white grapefruit. Not much conversation, not even any dialoge about the weather, even if it had rained every day in June. Things never changed. He always smelled of mothballs and pipe tobacco. Monk wore old Hathaway wool shirts, real cotton khaki trousers, leather and rubber L.L. Bean boots half laced up and we never saw him without a pipe in his mouth filled with unburned tobacco.  He drove a large old pale yellow Ford Squire station wagon that looked retired from his other home in Connecticut. He came on the same day every week at roughly the same time.

We never saw him with anyone, but some weeks his grocery basket was heavier than other weeks and he would be downright grouchy, usually around the beginning of August. We could tell by his cantankerous attitude that he had family coming to visit.  There is no stopping anyone from visiting friends or family in Maine the first couple weeks of August even if they aren't that fond of each other. My sister and I were sure to have the freshest grapefruit awaiting him because he wasn't shy about telling you the following week that "they were getting a little dry" and his tone could be quite unpleasant.

First, here’s what I didn’t read: anything that included a vampire or a werewolf. I did read about one ghost—in Anne Tyler’s The Beginner's Goodbye.

Much of my summer reading focused, as usual, on mysteries: I read all three of Gillian Flynn’s novels, starting with this summer’s blockbuster Gone Girl and then working my way through her two earlier ones — Dark Places and the even darker Sharp Objects. Three clever and engaging picks were Joanne Dobson’s academic mystery Cold and Pure and Very Dead, Harry Dolan’s pomo noir tale Bad Things Happen, and Tana French’s Broken Harbor (just as riveting as her other novels).  

I devoted two nights to James Renner’s The Man from Primrose Lane, which veered from noir to sci fi, and made me think longingly of the relatively simpler physics of The Time Traveler's Wife, by Audrey Niffinegger, a past summer’s selection. It did occur to me that some might find my liking for mysteries obsessive when I realized that I was reading Jo Nesbo’s Headhunters while watching an episode of Inspector Lewis. Mysteries, however, with their murders, trickery, and restoration of order, remain an excellent antidote to articles on education (I read roughly 500 of those).

Since we love books WAY more than college basketball, we just had to share this. So cool!

In its fourth and biggest year yet, Out of Print's Book Madness tournament has given hundreds of thousands of fans a chance to vote their favorite books to glory. This year, Out of Print is taking it to the next level with "Hero vs. Villain."

Like college basketball's March Madness tournament, readers can complete a bracket and compete against fellow bookworms. But this year, it's all about the characters themselves, with fans voting on their favorite heroes and villains from classic lit.

Is Big Brother any match for President Snow? Will Harry Potter's magic be enough to defeat Atticus Finch? It is time to decide once and for all!

Brackets can be submitted through Sunday, March 23rd for a chance to win a $500 Out of Print gift card and other prizes. Voting begins March 24th.

To participate please visit, http://outofprintclothing.com/book-madness