Bookseller's Choice

Bookseller’s Choice

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About Brad’s Choices

“Poetry is probably my deepest love, even if I do gadabout

more with the likes of fiction and history. I don’t just mean

the Poetry section, even though I do take great joy

caretaking it. What I mean is, no matter what I read, I tend

to be most interested in how a writer is using language --

what they do with words and the spaces between them.

There is sometimes more poetry shacked up in the

paragraphs of prose than at its home in verse.

For me, more important than most stories are the worlds -

- the legions of consciousnesses and identities, unruly

most of the time -- created in the telling of those stories.

One result of this is that I tend to err on the side of reading

slowest the books I value the most.”

The Peregrine, by J. A. Baker

I’ve been referring to this as the Moby-Dick of

“bird books” for a while. Shorter, of course, but

so is a bird’s life compared to a whale’s ...but no

less ambitious or profound. Rich beyond its page

count. Join the cult following!

In Memory of

Memory, By Maria

Stepanova, Sasha

Dugdale (Translator)

Truly mesmerizing piece

of writing. The mining of

memories, of yours and of

others, those imagined,

idealized or invoked, turns

excavation into an art-

form. Stepanova’s novel

has claimed its place as

one of the great examples.

The Living Mountain, by Nan

Shepherd

Under-known for far too long, Nan is finally

starting to get credit for some of the most

innovative nature writing of the past

century. Her focus here is her home, the

Cairngorm Mountains in Scotland.

Strikingly, she eschews the male obsession

with the heights / the ascent, and focuses her

eye, body, and prose on the plateaus.

Pond - by Claire-Louise Bennett

My friends were inundated with texts from me raving

about and quoting this book. One of the most kick-down-

the-door debuts in recent memory. Get lost in Bennett's

narrator's headspace, and you may not wish to be found.

One of those quiet sorts of books that are actually

screaming.

Time is the Thing a Body Moves

Through - by T Fleishmann

Line for line, one of the best written books in

the store. I found myself stopping for long

moments between sentences, or even clauses,

both to marvel and to tease out what was

happening on the page. A book about art, love,

and community: about living.

I Hope We Choose Love - by Kai Cheng Thom

What a book. My co-worker, Adelaide, has been

enthusiastically talking about this one for a while. Upon

reading, I had to join the chorus.

The questions that inform Thom’s book are a challenge -

- a challenge prompted by hope; hope motivated by love -

- that we might do better to ourselves and to our

communities.

Seiobo There Below - by László Krasznahorkai,

Ottilie Mulzet (Translated by)

Mysterious...mesmerizing...magical. László

Krasznahorkai is, for me, “lit-bro” me all you want, the

greatest living novelist. High praise, eh? How about this?

This is his masterpiece. I’ve read this multiple times since

it’s release, and will keep reading for years to come.

Inward Morning - by Henry Bugbee

Confession: despite my love of lyrical wilderness

existentialism, of which Bugbee’s work is

considered an underground classic, I’m decidedly

not the outdoor type . . . and would be the first to be

fed to the bears if the shit hit the fan.

Island Zombie - by

Roni Horn

Another nature-focused

assemblage of journals,

Brad? Seriously! Roni Horn

is a visual artist with a

serious ear for language.

Her pieces here about

weather, in particular, are

truly stunning. One of the

early joys of the year was

dipping into and out of this.

Dictée - by Theresa Hak Kyung Cha

I steer pretty decisively toward writing that

defies form and genre. If ever there was an

example of this, it is Dictée, which is as

defiantly original today as it was when it was

first written before Cha’s murder in 1982.

Bertolt - by Jacques Goldstyn, Claudia Zoe

Bedrick (Translator)

This book continues to give me joy. Each time we sell out

- which is often - and it returns, I re-read it, and I’m in

love with it all over again. As I’ve said at the store,

“Think The Giving Tree, without the masochism.” Hold

on, don’t get mad! I just mean, because here the tree

isn’t being celebrated for being consumed, but for a

living something with which we might also share.

Dialogues - by Paul Valéry

“Truth is before us, and we no longer understand

anything at all.”

Yes, these covers leave a lot to be desired, & the books

cost too much. There’s no getting around that. But . . .

oh my. Oh my! Do spend time with with the Dialogues,

whether by thievery or expensive purchase. Your

soul, or whatever remains thereof, will thank you.

Suite for Barbara Loden, Exposition, & The White

Dress - by Nathalie Léger

Léger’s trilogy of essay-novels are among the most

exhilaratingly creative pieces of writing I’ve read in years.

Again, very genre-defiant, as you’ve come to expect, but

exceedingly welcome to all readers. Just a pure, if

somewhat heady joy!

Sharks, Death, Surfers - by Melissa McCarthy

One of the great “this is why you shop at good indie

bookstore” books you’re likely to find, because

where and how else would you know about this

bizarre convergence of cultural & natural history?

No-No Boy - by John Okada

First published in 1957, No-No Boy was virtually

ignored by a public eager to put World War II and

the Japanese internment behind them. Too often

we forget -- too often we silence.

It’s our responsibility us that Okada’s classic

should suffer neither.

Echo Tree - by Henry

Dumas

I’m beside myself with joy

that our friends at Coffee

House Press are re-

releasing this masterpiece

story collection. Would

that 2021 be the year of

Henry Dumas, perhaps we

might have learned

something from 2020

after all.

Counternarratives - by John Keene

If I could put Keene’s collection of short

stories and novellas into every one of these

catalogs, I probably would.

Counternarratives is one of the true works of

21st-century genius.

Border & Rule, by Harsha Walia

To my eyes & politics, this is one of the most significant

books of the year. Walia’s ability to take outrages that

have a tendency to compound and debilitate, and to

articulately synthesize them is remarkable in itself. She

demonstrates that the the world’s migrant/refugee crises

are inevitable outcomes of conquest, capitalist

globalization, and climate change generating mass

dispossession worldwide.

Black Nature - Camille Dungy (editor)

I know it’s not a competition, but if I had to decide

what is the best anthology in the store . . . it very

well may be this one. It’s stunning in its scope --

some 400 years of African American nature writing.

Superlatives stacked cannot do it justice. An

indispensable book, period … end of story.

The Delectable Negro - by Vincent Woodard

This is one of the most exciting books I just happened to

stumble upon this. Posthumously published, Woodard’s

thesis is jaw-droppingly original and compelling,

exploring the linkages (metaphorical and real) between

homoeroticism, cannibalism, and cultures of

consumption in the context of American literature and US

slave culture. A truly stunning piece of scholarship.

Being Property Once Myself - by Joshua

Bennett

Joshua Bennett is a renowned poet AND a helluva

literary-critical scholar. Here, he examines the

intersection of the non-human and human, man and

animal, and the role blackness has played / been

denied in the relationship.

Japan Supernatural - by Melanie Eastburn

(Editor)

This gorgeous book takes you on a journey through

the myriad array of yokai culture and yurei (ghosts).

works date from the 1700s to 2019 and include

detailed ukiyo-e woodblock prints, miniature netsuke

(toggles), metres-long scrolls & contemporary

photographs, paintings and installations.

The Art & Science of

Foodpairing - by

Peter Coucquyt,

Bernard Lahousse,

Johan Langenbick

This book blew my mind:

10,000 flavor matches laid

out in taste wheels and

color keys. When cooks go

to one ingredient, they

will find 10 food pairings

and a color wheel

revealing the taste results.

Arctic Heroes - By Ragnar Axelsson

(Photographer)

One of the most arresting nature

photography books I’ve spent time with. My

very own Alaskan husky, aptly named Diesel,

agrees! This book stops people in their

tracks.

For a video tour of the book see here:

https://vimeo.com/488857034

High As the Waters Rise - by Anja Kampmann,

Anna Posten (translator)

It’s pretty well-established in these parts that I’m really

not that into plot. Give me language that aspires to

something beyond even a story -- but to a moment in

time, to a depth of emotion, etc. Kampmann’s debut novel

is about love, meaning it circulates through and around it

by way of language. I loved it.

The Book of Unconformities - by Hugh

Raffles

Faced with profound grief, Hugh Raffles

reached out for … not solace, or maybe even

understanding, but ballast by thinking about

the solidity and endurance and possibly plain

old indifference of rocks.

An Inventory of Losses - by Judith Schlansky,

Jackie Smith (Translated by)

Much of living seems like an accumulation of losses.

That’s depressing, in a way. But there is something to the

accounting. There is, if nothing, but the grasping, if for

but a moment, the time it takes to do so. Anyway … Judith

Schlansky’s latest work, an exquisite grasping of what

refuses it, is phenomenal.

Floating Coast - by Bathsheba Demuth

This is the perfect sort of nonfiction for the reader who,

like me, believes topics are not stable, steady-state

objects. History has happened, but what has happened is

not static, and is in fact always still happening.

Bathsheba Demuth’s account of the history of the

Bering Strait, for example, is a stunning example of this.

Not at all a topic I thought I was interested in … but

sometimes it’s a joy to be wrong.

The Classical Music Lover’s Companion to

Orchestral Music - by Robert Philip

I’m a classical music dilettante, but definitely find I

respond best when I have some cues about what to

listen for. This book has been a treasure trove for

listening. Now in paperback.

Music From Elsewhere

- by Doug Skinner

Here you'll find tunes

hummed, strummed, and

sung by spirits, sprites,

and fairies,

extraterrestrial elevator

music, dreamed ditties,

marches for occult

ceremonies, secret

musical codes and

languages, music made by

animals, and more!

Liner Notes for the Revolution - by By

Daphne A. Brooks

This is one of the books I’m most excited

this spring! Daphne Brooks’ book kicks

down the door and demands long overdue

recognition and celebration of Black women

musicians as radical intellectuals..

Be sure to indulge in the 9-hour Spotify

playlist, too!

The History of the World in Seven Cheap Things -

by Raj Patel

Nature, money, work, care, food, energy, & lives … it’s

hard to argue we’ve not managed to cheapen them all, and

in the process have sold the world short.

Maybe let’s re-think this, yes?

Paths to Prison - by Isabelle Kirkham-

Lewitt (Editor)

The horrific reality of prison extends beyond

the immediate walls. It is informed by a logic

and constructed by way of a complex cultural

architecture. This is a fantastic entryway to re-

thinking the reaches of prison.

We Do This ‘Til We Free Us - by Mariame Kaba

What if social transformation and liberation isn't about

waiting for someone else to come along and save us?

What if ordinary people have the power to collectively

free ourselves? In this timely collection of essays and

interviews, Mariame Kaba reflects on the deep work of

abolition and transformative political struggle.

American Lucifers - by Jeremy Zallen

As a rule, capitalist “progress” occurs at the expense of

those whose labor makes it possible. An awareness of

this progress’ history (and these lives left behind, many

of them nearly forgotten) helps me as I reflect on where

it’s taking us. American Lucifers examines that the

history of artificial light and its profoundly dark

history.

Fulfillment - by Alec MacGillis

Potentially a game changer in terms of the human

and economic scope of its reporting. Without a

doubt the most compelling journalistic accounting

/ reckoning I’ve encountered of Amazon’s effect(s)

on American labor and inequality.

Afropessimism - by

Frank B. Wilderson

III

What a book! A mix of

biography and

philosophy, it is surely the

most accessible

articulation of

Wilderson’s provocative

theorizing of

afropessmism - i.e.,

whereby the Black slavery

is an ontological

condition. Challenging in

the best way.

How to Read Donald Duck - by Ariel

Dorfman, Armand Mattelart

A devastating indictment of a media giant, a

document of twentieth-century political

upheaval, and a reminder of the dark

undercurrent of pop culture. First published

in 1971, How to Read Donald Duck is a great

example of how deeply-set the logic of

imperialist capitalism is.

Picatrix - Dan Attrell (Translator), David

Porreca (Translator)

A manual for constructing talismans, mixing magical

compounds, summoning planetary spirits, and

determining astrological conditions -- all from a

original text compiled in Arabic from over two hundred

sources in the latter half of the tenth century?

Translated first into Castilian & then Latin? Count me in!

Notes Made While Falling, by Jenn

Ashworth

Visceral writing at its very best. Ashworth blends

memoir and cultural study into her reflection on

trauma (in this case of a childbirth gone very

poorly), and mines her experience for insight into

the creative process itself. Fascinating and

rewarding from beginning to end.

Devotions Upon Emergent Occasions and Death's

Duel - John Donne

I spent a significant portion of my Christmas Day reading

John Donne’s sermons & devotional material about

sickness & death to my sleeping dog … because that’s how

I celebrate.

I may not share Donne’s piety, but I will bow down to his

prose nearly any day.

Suicidal - by Jesse Bering

Many of us know this singular impulse. Either we’ve

suffered the loss of people we love to it; or we suffer

the thought itself. Bering’s dealing is bracing and

unlike any other I’ve encountered. Darkly funny at

times, but never glib.

Timefulness - by Marcia Bjornerud

Time is long.

This amazing book reveals how knowing the

rhythms of Earth's deep past and conceiving of

time as a geologist does can give us the perspective

we need for a more sustainable future. It invites a

new way of thinking about our place in time,

showing how our everyday lives are shaped by

processes that vastly predate us, and how our

actions today will in turn have consequences that

will outlast us by generations.

The Medea Hypothesis

- by Peter Ward

Is life its own worst enemy?

In his very provocative

book, geobiologist Peter

Ward’s answer is an

unequivocal Yes! Before you

sigh, “Oh, more

misanthropy, Brad,

really?” -- he’s not just

talking about human life!

But he is talking to humans

that live, with a message

about harm reduction..

Underland - by Robert MacFarlane

Was I too subtle with the theme of this set of

books?

I’ve long been a fan of MacFarlane’s writing,

and here it is wed in a deep, powerful way

with a reflection on how time is etched into

the earth itself. MacFarlane writes has a way

of capturing both wonder and insight, and he

is a treasure.

15
Written After a Massacre in the Year 2018 - by 
Daniel Borzutzky
Daniel Bozutzky’s poetry is incandescent with anger at 
the violence suffered by those most vulnerable. What 
makes him a truly special poet, however, is how he 
harnesses his disappointment with the way things have 
been and are, and invites a pulsing hope for what might 
yet be. 
Nobody - by Alice Oswald
Read everything by Oswald, probably my 
favorite living poet at the moment, but for the 
sake of this I’ll focus on the latest. Fractured, 
sometimes in a frustrating way, but a 
frustration built by a sort of design, or perhaps 
better a necessity. Read it out loud to the Pacific 
Ocean, and see how it responds.
The Collected Poems of Lucille Clifton - by 
Lucille Clifton
An indispensable collection for every poetry library. 
Arguably the most important poetic visionary of the late-
20th century. Clifton was a gift to us. Our gift to her is the 
recitation and the sharing. So glad all these poems are 
together in one place. For a shorter collection, see How to 
Carry Water.
Dub - by Alexis Pauline Gumbs
Another poet whose oeuvre is expanding, radically and 
organically, into something like a complex  ecosystem. 
Dub is the concluding volume of a poetic trilogy that 
situates the lives of her ancestors, in all their joys, pains, 
and passions, within the life that sustains and lives 
within the ocean. Gumbs’ vision and verse are powerful.