Hello fellow book lover,
How have you been? July was a hectic month for us, with back-to-back events and book signings. But we spent some time reflecting on the first half of the year: the books we read, the events we curated, and the conversations we’ve had with each other, and our readers.
Our bestseller list for the first six months of 2023 was surprising, in the best way possible. It was wonderful to see the books that we had hosted discussions around, sent in our subscription boxes and loved reading ourselves make it to the list. From Aanchal Mallhotra’s The Book of Everlasting Things, a book about the memory and legacy of India’s Partition, to the Black River, a crime novel like no other — sharply commenting on the times we live in, these are all books that deeply resonate with us. They also echo our core values as an independent bookstore and booksellers, and it is an absolute pleasure to know that our customers took them home.
Many of us in the team went through bouts of reading slump in July, every reader's worst and most frustrating nightmare. We had to remind ourselves to be patient and look for the small bookish joys — picking up a delicious, pacy crime novel from the stables of Kerry Greenwood, revisiting old favourites that remind us how much we love books and the worlds they offer, or picking up a good old picture book. One of us found solace in Rebecca Solnit’s A Field Guide to Getting Lost, a book that passionately tells us about the importance of being lost, and the wonders uncertainty can bring us. Another team member picked up Out – a thrilling escape into the story of a murder of a man, by his wife!
Are they any books that helped you get out of a reading slump? We’d love to know — tell us in the comments of this blog post.
We’d like to leave you with this interview of Booker-nominated Martin Maclnnes by Nirica Srinivasan that we recently published on our blog. We hope it gives you a glimpse into the behind-the-scenes — the years of work that goes into nurturing and telling a story.