2 December 2009 | 7:00–8:00pm
Auditorium, 2nd floor, ARCH Building, 3601 Locust Walk

Allan Iverson is coming back to the Sixers, so now’s probably a good time to mention that his favorite book is Green Eggs and Ham.

The Phanatic, meanwhile, muses “I love to check books out from the library that detail the history of baseball. It’s fun to read about how the game has changed since its inception. Players dressed in funny looking uniforms, shared baseball gloves and teams didn’t even have mascots!”

I think it’s worth noting that I have never seen the Philadelphia Phanatic in a library, though he does appear to be the published author of five books, including The Phillie Phanatic’s Moving Day, a poignant tale of his journey from Veteran’s Stadium, across the parking lot, and into Citizen’s Bank Park.

Then there’s this:

Based on the Eagles’ performance this past weekend, I’m pretty sure Andy Reid is holding their playbook.

A new feature continues today at Philly Dame. Based on the series One in Eight Million by the New York Times, 1.5 Million to One will profile a Philadelphian each Wednesday to ask some questions about our city’s past and future.

Zack Noyce is a library student at Drexel University, a part-time employee at the University of Pennsylvania Library, a proud resident of West Philadelphia, a Utah native, an avid Twitterer, and a former columnist for the Daily Pennsylvanian. Zack was kind enough to sit down and answer a few questions about his adopted city. Thanks Zack!

Who is your favorite Declaration of Independence signer?

I’ll go with Josiah Bartlett of New Hampshire. Signing the founding document of our great nation and then lurking in obscurity for more than two centuries before emerging as a critically-acclaimed two-term president is pretty darn impressive.

If you had unlimited money and resources to change one thing about Philly, what would you change?

I’d create about 300,000 more jobs that pay a living wage.

Who is your favorite Philly-based artist?

I think I’ve gotta go with Ryan Howard and the Phillies. It’s quite impressive the way they’ve painted the entire city red these past two years.

Who would win in a fight, Ben Franklin or Betsy Ross?

Ben Franklin or who? Oh yeah that lady who didn’t even know how to make six-pointed stars. I gotta go with the inventor of the glass armonica here.

Final question…what’s your favorite Philadelphia-area website?

It pains me to admit that my homepage is philly.com. It’s terrible, but it’s the only site with the resources to become what I want to be my favorite Philly web site. Someday, perhaps it become a tolerable site. I hope against hope and dream against dream that it becomes what it should be, but until then, I’ll have to leave 15 Philly blogs in my RSS aggregator. If I had to pick just one though, I’d probably go with Attyood.

George Anastasia

His other books are Blood and Honor which Jimmy Breslin called it “the best gangster book ever written,” the New York Times bestseller The Summer Wind about the Thomas Capano-Anne Marie Fahey murder case; The Goodfella Tapes, and Mobfiles: Mobsters, Molls, and Murder.

His work has appeared in Penthouse, Playboy and The Village Voice. He also has been featured on several network television news magazine reports about organized crime and has worked as a consultant on projects for ABC, the Discovery Channel, the History Channel and National Geographic. George was kind enough to answer a series of questions about his writing. Thank you, George!

You’ve covered the mob for over 25 years for the Philadelphia Inquirer and written four books on the mafia. What draws you to the subject?

(George Anastasia) I think Americans have always been fascinated with the outlaw – Jessie James, Billy the Kid, Bonnie and Clyde – and that the fascination with the Mafia is an extension of that. As an Italian-American I look at the Mafia – or in America actually it’s Cosa Nostra – as the dark side of the Italian-American experience. Cosa Nostra took the positive values of my heritage, things like honor, respect and a fierce sense of family loyalty, and bastardized them to justifiy a code of conduct that is outside the law, corrupt and treacherous.

As a reporter I have always found the topic rich. The stories and the people are fascinating. For all those reasons, I suppose, I was pulled toward writing about the wiseguys. I also benefited from the fact that as a new reporter at the Inquirer in 1976 I was assigned to cover the dawn of casino gambling in Atlantic City. Part of the debate back then was would legalized gaming bring the mob. In fact, the mob already was in Atlantic City. It became part of the story I was covering and then after Angelo Bruno was killed in 1980, things careened out of control and I started to write more and more about the mob and carved out a beat that I’m still working.

I say again and again, as a writer, you can’t make this stuff up any better than it is.

How has your reporting — and coverage of the mafia in general — changed in the past 25 years? Were you ever nervous that what you were writing could provoke violence or cause your sources to stop talking to you?

(George Anastasia) Over the years I’ve gotten better sources and more people know me. In the beginning I would cover trials, arrests, criminal events and try to build off of those things. But sources – both in law enforcement and in the underworld – add another dimension. Stories are still built around those classic questions, who, what, where and when. But I think the question that gets you to the better stories is WHY. In the beginning I could ask that question, but it was very seldom answered. Now, at least some time, I can get an answer.

The only time I had a problem was when John Stanfa was the boss. He was born and raised in Sicily and there they kill prosecutors, investigators, reporters, whoever. He put a hit out on me because he didn’t like some of the things I was writing. But nothing ever came of it, thankfully. And now he’s serving five consecutive life terms. I think that was an aberration and goes back to his origins. Nicky Scarfo never liked me, but he knew that doing anything to a reporter creates more problems than it solves. In the last go around, Joey Merlino and the young guys around him seemed to enjoy the attention. They had adopted that John Gotti celebrity gangster syndrome. What’s the point of being a mobster if nobody knows who you are? It was the antithesis of Angelo Bruno. Bruno’s philosophy was make money, not headlines. Stay in the shadows. Merlino and those guys seemed to crave attention. They were accessible. I had cell phone numbers. I had lunch and dinner with them on occasion. It was a unique situation that I don’t think will ever exist again. But it helped be flesh out and frame stories in ways that I could never do before.

You grew up in South Philadelphia. Did you frequent the library? What books did you like to read when you were younger?

(George Anastasia) I was born in South Philadelphia, but my family moved to South Jersey when I was four. We were part of that great migration to the suburbs. But I had relatives in South Philadelphia and I always had a feel for it. I read a lot of action/adventure stuff when I was young. I think I read all of the James Bond books by Ian Fleming. Then I got into Hemingway. I also read the swashbuckler stories. One of the greatest opening lines of all time was in “Scaramouche” by Rafael Sabatini: “He was born with a gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad.”

What a great lead! How could you not want to know who the hell this guy was and what he was up to?

Why do you think so many authors draw on the mafia as a source of inspiration for their own fictional work?

(George Anastasia) I was once asked to write a piece about the Sopranos for an anthology. It was Italian-American writers and their take on the show, its popularity and what it said about us and about America. One of the things I said in the piece was that if Shakespeare were alive today, he’d be writing for the Sopranos. Think about it. Whenever Shakespeare wanted to write about passion and humor and people who were a little over the top and who grabbed life with both hands and squeezed as hard as they could, he set his plays in Italy. When he was going for the morose, we got England or Scotland.

I think what Shakespeare found with Italy, many authors today find with the Mafia.

That’s not to say that the Mafia defines Italians. I get into this debate a lot with other Italian-Americans and Italian-American groups who argue that my writing about the Mafia reinforces the stereo-type and that shows like the Sopranos made all Americans think that all Italians are gangsters.

I don’t believe that for a minute. My standard response is that any ethnic group that could give America Antonin Scalia and Camille Paglia in the same generation doesn’t have to worry about Tony Soprano being its poster boy.

If you had to pick one book aside from your own for people to learn about the mafia, what book would you choose?

(George Anastasia) “The Leopard” by Giuseppe Lampedusa. It’s an historic novel about Sicily. And you can’t understand the Mafia unless you understand Sicily.

What are your favorite books to read that are not crime-related?

(George Anastasia) I love all the novels by Jorge Amado, the great Brazilian writer. I like Mario Vargas Llosa’s novels. I just read a novel “City of Thieves” by David Benioff that I thought was great.  “Corelli’s Mandolin” is another favorite. I like some of Richard Russo’s stuff, but not the more recent books. “Straight Man” are the two that I like best.

And finally…you’re stuck with one of Ben Franklin, Betsy Ross, or Thomas Jefferson on a remote island. Who do you pick to spend eternity with, and how do you both get off the island?

(George Anastasia) I pick Ben Franklin. I spent some time in France and I think we’d have a lot to talk about. Also, he’d be smart enough to invent something that would get us off the island.

Thank you so much George. Once again, George is the author the author of five books, including The Last Gangster a New York Times bestseller that chronicles the demise of the Philadelphia mob.

His other books are Blood and Honor which Jimmy Breslin called it “the best gangster book ever written,” the New York Times bestseller The Summer Wind about the Thomas Capano-Anne Marie Fahey murder case; The Goodfella Tapes, and Mobfiles: Mobsters, Molls, and Murder.

Your first novel, Standing Still, is about a woman, Claire, who takes the place of her daughter during a home invasion kidnapping. I’m wondering how you came up with the idea for this and what your process for writing it was like.

I had just come from a disastrous meeting in New York with my (now former) agent– who rejected a book I’d been slaving over, a book that she’d seen and approved along the way.   She chided me to write something “closer to my life experience” and I was furious at her for that simplistic advice.  I thought “I’ll show her, dammit . . .I’ll come up with a better plot, a more personal plot, before my train even arrives back in Philadelphia!”  So I basically forced myself, on that train ride, to think of a plot that had more personal resonance, and I decided on a character who, like me and my mom and my sister, suffered from panic disorder.  Then I put her in a situation where she is forced to be brave, to overcome her panic.   (And the fact that Tom Wolfe came and sat next to me in the Amtrak holding area was a sign of some kind.  He was all dressed in white, including spats, in the middle of a snow storm, so I think he was an angel!)

I wrote the first draft, quickly, in about five months, with a real fire and fury, the kind that comes from being truly pissed off, and a little too competitive for my own good.

Your descriptions of Claire’s panic disorder are extremely realistic. What sources did you use to create that realism in your novel?

I suffered from panic attacks for many years, as did my sister and my mother.  Claire’s reactions are based partly on my experiences and partly on those of my mother, who was truly paralyzed by the disorder, and became agoraphobic for many years because of it.  The cognitive therapy techniques Claire employs came from  my own therapy at The Beck Institute, which was life-changing.  I did a little bit of traditional research about the prevalence of panic disorder and the use of drug treatments.

You’re based here in the Philadelphia region. If you were trapped on SEPTA with only 5 books to tide you over for a major delay, what would they be and why?

Why, SEPTA is never delayed!  However, in the rare instance it would be — today, right this instant, I would grab The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitgerald, A Prayer for Owen Meany, by John Irving,  The Lovely Bones by Alice Sebold,  The Time Traveler’s Wife, by Audrey Niffenegger,  and The Lovely Bones, by Jonathan Tropper.   Gatsby is one of my all-time favorites, and the others are my favorites from the last decade or so.  (If you’re going to be trapped, you may as well re-read a sure thing.)   And if anyone hasn’t heard of Tropper’s book — don’t delay.  It’s tender and almost unbearably hilarious.

You’re also a member of the Liar’s Club, a Philadelphia-based collective of authors who travel the region and support each other and independent booksellers. Can you tell me a little about your involvement in the group and where you’re going next?

We all pitch in to promote our books but also to support bookstores, libraries and reading at all levels.  For the last year, we’ve been throwing parties at independent bookstores on our own dime — free food, book giveaways, trivia games about the bookstore etc — to help shine a spotlight on the great work they do in their communities.  We’ll be at Wellington Square Books in Exton this Saturday the 5th from 12-2, and at Farley’s and Canterbury Tales in New Hope all day December 12th.   And autographed books make great gifts, hint hint.

What are you working on now?

I just finished The Bird House for Simon & Schuster, which is coming out either next fall or Spring the following year.  It’s about a grandmother and granddaughter who do a class project on the family history — and all the family secrets rise to the surface.

And lastly, you’re on a desert island with either Ben Franklin, Betsy Ross, Edgar Allan Poe, Walt Whitman or Thomas Jefferson. Which one would you pick and how would the two of you get off the island?

Wow . . . much as I’d enjoy the company of Whitman or Poe . . .and although Betsy Ross could certainly construct a large flag that could be seen by a plane . . . .I have a feeling Ben Franklin would be able to invent some getaway contraption with scraps of things lying around.  He’s more MacGyver-y.

Thank you so much Kelly!

You can purchase Kelly Simmons’ novel Standing Still online through your your local independent bookstore through Indiebound.com, Amazon, or Barnes & Noble.

More pictures at The New Yorker (or click on the picture to go to Stilkey’s book gallery.)

• The Philadelphia Center for the Book held their first literary salon.

• Save the date for Read and Romp 2010 (January 31, 2010)

• Waldo Hunt, 88, the king of the pop-up novel is dead

My favorite question:

So let’s get down to the business of your new book. What are Spanx?
You know what? Spanx are a sham. Spanx are an evil hoax perpetrated upon womanhood. It happened to me when I was in a store. I don’t have time to shop so I grabbed a pair of tights and figured I would try them on at home. I put them on and I can’t get them on. I try to put these on and it’s like a tourniquet … So I thought, what is this garment? I started to do the research. It is in fact body-shaping underwear and it says things on the website like, “It’s power panties.” The only thing I could think, truly, is that if women had power, they wouldn’t need Spanx. Aren’t I right? So I threw them away.

The University of Pennsylvania Rare Books Library has a series of excellent image collections on their website for anyone to view. I stumbled upon the Raymond Biswanger collection of literary landscapes today, which absolutely blew my mind. Biswanger’s hobby was photographing the places that authors either visited during their lifetimes or wrote about in their novels. Featured are picture collections of Poe, Wordsworth, Shakespeare, and the Brontes, among others. I highly recommend the pictures taken of Poe’s romps around Philadelphia, shot in the 1950’s.

Holmes’ story is not confined to Chicago or the Midwest, where he murdered the majority of his victims. In the early 1890’s, he moved to Philadelphia, into an apartment at 1316 Callowhill St. There, he set up a phony patent office and planned the murders of three additional victims. Holmes was eventually caught after a Philadelphia detective tracked him down in Canada and extradited him back to Philly. Holmes’ four page confession was published in the Philadelphia Inquirer. The exclusive was hyped as:

“The Most Fearful and Horrible Murderer Ever Known in the Annals of Crime. His Confession Was Written Exclusively for Next SUNDAY’S INQUIRER. The Most Remarkable Story of Murder and Inhuman Villainy Ever Made Public. CONVICTION LIES IN EVERY LINE. The only way to describe it is to say it was written by Satan himself or one of his chosen monsters.” (From Liz Spikol’s excellent cover story about Holmes in Philadelphia Weekly.)

Holmes was executed inside Moyamensing Prison (10th and Reed) on May 7, 1896. His body is buried in an unmarked grave at Holy Cross Cemetary.

1. William Carlos Williams
2. Joseph Auslander
3. Maxine Kumin

Caldecott Medal Recipients With Ties to Philadelphia

1. Trina Schart Hyman
2. David Wiesner
3. Maurice Sendak

Books With Broad Street in the Title

1. Walking Together Forever: Broad Street Bullies Then and Now
2. The Strange Case of the Broad Street Pump: John Snow and the Mystery of Cholera
3. The Jewish Community Around North Broad Street
4. Broad Street Bully
5. Walking Broad: Looking for the Heart of Brotherly Love

Books With Camac Street in the Title

1. Murder on Camac

Books Called The Waffle Man: And Other Memories of South Philadelphia That Inexplicably Cost $455 Dollars And Have Unknown Binding

1. The Waffle Man: And Other Memories of South Philadelphia

World’s Longest Domino Rally with Children’s Books:

March of the Librarians:

The Bibliofiles Book Cart Drill Team:

Charles Brockden Brown wrote successfully about Philadelphia’s yellow fever epidemic and was one of the first literary stars of the gothic movement.  My favorite Brown trivia bit is this: He lived in a house where the Midtown II restaurant now stands, at 11th and Sansom. For some reason, I picture his house as the restaurant — and Brown writing a brooding, supernatural novel at 2AM while everyone around him is eating pancakes.

Anyhoo, if you’re interested in learning more about Philadelphia’s role in shaping the mystery genre, I highly recommend heading over to Philadelphia librarian Linda Bertland’s comprehensive website called: Resources for School Librarians. Bertland lists mysteries set here, authors raised here, and fictious detectives working here in a section called Mysteries in Philadelphia.

I have not found a decent map charting all of these literary figures in Philadelphia, so I have decided to make my own. If you know of any sites of historical literary importance, please let me know.

12:00-5:00PM, Franklin Fountain, 2nd and Market.
Free.

A new feature continues today at Philly Dame. Based on the series One in Eight Million by the New York Times, 1.5 Million to One will profile a Philadelphian each Wednesday to ask some questions about our city’s past and future.

Jess Ward is a kick-ass librarian, a burger club leader, a photographer, and a wonderful food blogger covering all things Philly at her blog, Fries With That Shake! Jess’s enthusiasm about the Philadelphia restaurant scene is utterly contagious — and she was kind enough to sit down and answer a few questions about writing, music, and Philly. (You can follow all things Philly hamburger related over at Jess’s BurgerBaroness Twitter account.)

You’re sitting on a bench in Rittenhouse. What book are you reading and what music are you listening to?

(Jess Ward) I’m still obsessed wtih Dirty Projectors’ Bitte Orca so I would probably be listening to that. I would probably be reading Tiny Acts of Rebellion: 97 Almost-Legal Ways To Stick It To The Man by Rich Fulcher because I’m always trying to learn new ways of sticking it to The Man. And I am on a serious Mighty Boosh kick these days.

(Jess Ward) The clothespin no question. I love that clothespin and I find the LOVE statue kind of irritating. Isn’t that terrible? I hate LOVE or something. I think I just like to imagine a world of oversized objects. I think it would win in the fight because it is much larger and intimidating. It could also squish the LOVE statue to death. Oh man I want to see this fight happen.

I think 9th St. is an obvious choice but I’ll still pick it. I would begin at Sang Kee with their amazing wonton soup. Stroll down to the Italian Market and pick up fresh mozzarella. And finish off the trip with some tacos on Washington Ave and pick up a banh mi for the walk home. What a tasty stretch of pavement.

I love the diagrams that Sara does over at Girls Can Tell. She does a lot of food and kitchen related diagrams like home canning, kitchen aid mixers and burgers! I like her work because they are hand-screenprinted housewares so not only are they awesome to look at but they are actually useful. I like my art practical.

What’s your favorite Philadelphia website?

When I’m not stuffing my face with burgers, I also enjoy a good laugh. I try not to do both at the same time because I might choke to death and that wouldn’t be very funny. Well maybe a little. So when I need to know what funny things are happening in Philly I like to visit Comic vs. Audience. It is a Philly focused comedy blog. It has a great database of Philly based stand-up comedians and sketch and improv groups. Also a good source for finding what funny people are visiting our fine city.

Thanks Jess! Once again, Jess is the owner and operator of Fries With That Shake!

The mysterious man — Eugene Varshavsky — placed third despite not being a known entity in the Sudoku community. (Yes, that exists.) Also, Varshavsky was wearing a dark hoodie, leading to speculation that he somehow cheated his way to the top of the Sudoku world. (The * of the Sudoku World.) My hunch is that he was wearing an earpiece connected to a Sean-Connery-lookalike on the outside, who quickly relayed the correct answers to him while setting up a heist to pilfer antique Word Jumbles from a library down the street.

Anyhoo, it turns out that yup, he did cheat. Varshavsky will forfeit his 3,000 bucks in prize money — and will be ineligible to participate in next month’s Mad Libs Olympic Trials.

I first met Lisa Scottoline at a reading she gave at the Kelly Writer’s House at the University of Pennsylvania for the Gay Talese Lecture Series back in 2004. I brought my mom, a HUGE Lisa Scottoline fan. (I think she owns every book Lisa’s ever written.) Lisa is a Philly native, a Penn English grad (whoo!) turned trial lawyer turned bestselling mystery author. During the reading, she told the crowd that she gave herself a year to write her first novel — and in the process, maxed out all of her credit cards and wasn’t sure whether she was going to finish. But she did it — and the result was Everywhere That Mary Went, her first novel in the Mary DiNunzio series. The novel was even nominated for the Edgar Awards, mystery writing’s highest honor.

Lisa has a new book out, called Why My Third Husband Will Be A Dog, and is doing a series of readings this week at bookstores around the area. If you haven’t seen her read in person – I highly recommend it. She’s extremely bubbly and inviting and down-to-earth — and that comes across as she reads. Anyhoo, the first one’s scheduled for today! If you can, go! It’s totally worth it.

Today, Barnes and Noble, 12:30 PM.

1805 Walnut St.

If you’re taking Regional Rail: (40 minutes, tops)

Clocking in at 153 pages, Italo Calvino’s classic Cosmicomics is perfect for ignoring the huddled masses yearning to get home on the R7. Each short story is, on the surface, about one particular episode taking place during the creation of the universe. Beyond the science, though, Calvino assigns human characteristics to single-celled organisms, bringing human hopes, fears, and dreams to the amoeba evolving on our planet.

An added bonus: the first story sounds like a delay at Suburban Station:

There was no way of telling time; whenever we started counting the nebula’s turns there were disagreements, because we didn’t have any reference points in the darkness, and we ended up arguing. So we preferred to let the centuries flow by as if they were minutes; there was nothing to do but wait, keep covered as best we could, doze, speak out now and then to make sure we were all still there; and, naturally, scratch ourselves; because–they can say what they like– all those particles spinning around had only one effect, a trouble-some itching. (Calvino, 3)

If you’re driving somewhere on the East Coast:

Please don’t read anything. Keep your eyes on the road.

If you’re taking the Broad Street Line (Express):

If you’re traveling SEPTA express this holiday season, you have between 5-10 minutes to read something decent. Two of those minutes will probably be spent reading subway ads for defense lawyers and bail bondsmen. That leaves 8 minutes tops to find a decent story. Depending on whether you’re going north or south — and more importantly — whether you can speed read, you might want to try Nabokov’s shortest novel, The Eye, which clocks in at an anorexic 128 pages. (Fun facts: The Eye is called Sogliadati in Russian. It originally appeared in serial form, making a chapter or two perfect subway reading material. The first American translation was published in Playboy. Playboy did not appear until the 332th Thanksgiving. So why were they thankful the previous 331 years?)

If you’re AMTRAKing somewhere on the Northeast Corridor:

Oh, to spend three hours whizzing through the open plains of New Jersey and Connecticut on the passenger rails. A perfect amount of time to learn all about the ingredients that will make up your family’s Thanksgiving meal. There’s sugar and turkey and cranberries and pecans and potatoes and fighting and crying and police cars and how to break out of prison. You’ll probably only have time to read one of these guides in three hours — so may I suggest starting with the last one first, just in case.

If you’re flying to the West Coast:

6 hours. Estimated 12 hour delay in the Philadelphia International Airport. Named directly for your woes: In Search of Lost Time. 4211 pages. Goes through the medal detector like a charm. Comes in a 6-Pack. Pretend it’s cheap beer and smash each novel against your forehead when you’re done. Given the delays, you might finish all 6.

Tonight, at 6 pm, New Yorker essayist Adam Gopnik will speak with Rutgers University Professor of English George Levine, author of  Darwin Loves You: Natural Selection and the Re-enchantment of the World. This conversation will focus on his qualities as a patient observer, a lucid writer engaged with the world, and as a modern man.

6pm, free.
Benjamin Franklin Hall at 427 Chestnut St.
Please rsvp to rsvp_museumATamphilsoc.org

According to the rules:

The purpose of the Competition is to encourage and reward full time Penn students, under the age of thirty who have an interest in and passion for book collecting. For purposes of this Competition, the book is broadly defined to include a wide range of genres, ranging from antiquarian books through modern first editions, comics, graphic novels, and literary magazines or zines.

Deadline is February 28, 2010.

Entries should be mailed to:

David McKnight, Director
Rare Book and Manuscript Library
Van Pelt-Dietrich Library Center
University of Pennsylvania
3420 Walnut Street
Philadelphia, PA 19104-6202

Cost: 14$ / 7$ students

1901 Vine Street, 19103

For information: 215-567-4341

Bookstores with Online Sales:

The AIA Bookstore and Design Center, located at 1218 Arch Street, sells books directly through the website.

Arnecliffe Books, a primarily mail-order rare and out-of-print bookstore in Havertown, PA has it’s titles online at Abebooks.com.

Bauman Rare Books in Philadelphia has out-of-print titles in a variety of subjects on Abebooks.com.

Black and Nobel, the urban lit bookstore located at Broad and Erie, sells books directly through the website.

Blue Merle Books is an online-only bookstore located in Northeast Philadelphia.

Bob’s Rare Books in Haddonfield, NJ lists rare titles online for sale.

The Book Trader. The independent used bookstore at 2nd and Market has over 5,000 rare books listed on their AbeBooks.com website.

Brickbat Books, at 709 S. 4th St, requests that you email them at brickbatbooksATgmail.com to place orders. (Their shopping cart is under construction.)

Friends of the Free Library, the non-profit used bookstore affiliated with the Free Library of Philadelphia also sells titles online through Amazon.

Gilmores Books, located at 43 E. Chestnut Hill Ave, specializes in used and out-of-print books.

Giovanni’s Room, The LGBT bookstore at 12th and Pine sells their books online directly through their website.

Headhouse Books, at 619 S. Second St, requests that you email them at salesATheadhousebooks.com to place orders. (Their shopping cart is under construction.)

Joseph Fox Bookshop. The oldest independent bookstore, at 1724 Sansom Street, sells their books online directly through their website.

Mostly Books, the bookstore at 529 Bainbridge St., has all of their titles listed on their Amazon store.

Penn Book Center, at 130 S. 34th St, sells their academic and literary titles online through Indiebound.com

Philadelphia Print Shop, specializing in hard to find prints and maps of the city of Philadelphia.

Quaker Books, the bookstore of the Friends General Conference, sells Quaker titles at their website.

Walk A Crooked Mile, the bookshop inside the Mt. Airy train station on the R7 line, sells their titles online here.

Whodunit?, the used bookstore at 1931 Chestnut St., sells their titles online through AbeBooks.com. They specialize in mystery books.

Bookstores Without Online Sales:

Big Blue Marble Bookstore 551 Carpenter Lane

Bindlestiff Books, 4530 Baltimore Ave.

Children’s Book World, 17 Haverford Station Rd.

Germ Books 2005 Frankford Ave.

House of Our Own, 3920 Spruce St.

Last Word Bookstore 220 S. 40th St.

Wooden Shoe Books, 704 South St.

From Greg Williams, Walk A Crooked Mile’s owner:

When I opened the shop, I wanted to be a bookseller but I also wanted to be a community builder and I’m proud that Walk a Crooked Mile Books has become a part of the warp and woof of Mount Airy. We started a free concert series nearly ten years ago and have had countless wonderful evenings of music outside the shop. We have sponsored the Umpteenth Mount Airy Yard Sale for umpteenth plus Saturdays. We’ve seen countless young babies grow to toddlers who come to watch the train come in, and then start finding books to read in our $1 kid’s books, and they are now in High School. We’ve served coffee and tea to thousands of you and you have let us into your lives. We are grateful for all of this.

On Walk a Crooked Mile’s website, Greg lists 5 things you can do to help them survive in this economic climate. Number one on the list is shopping at the store this holiday season, either in person or online here.

One of the authors reading tonight is Malinda Lo. Her novel, ASH, is a reimagining of the Cinderella story centered around Ash, a teenage girl who eventually falls for a woman instead of the prince. Malinda is the former managing editor of AfterEllen.com, the largest entertainment news website for lesbians and bisexual women. She is a graduate of Wellesley College and has master’s degrees from Harvard and Stanford universities. Malinda now lives in Northern California with her partner and their dog. Malinda was kind enough to answer these questions while in Philadelphia for both the NCTE conference and the Giovanni’s Room fundraiser. Thanks, Malinda!

1. When did you decide to write a novel and why did you pick the young adult genre?

(Malinda Lo) I’ve always loved to write and have been writing since I was a child. I wrote my first novel when I was 13, but there was a long gap after college when I didn’t write any fiction. Even though I had always wanted to be a writer, I didn’t quite believe that I could do that as a job. But when I was 28 I decided to finally go for it, so I became a freelance writer (mostly freelancing for LGBT magazines and websites; I later became managing editor of AfterEllen.com) and simultaneously began to write ASH. I did not choose to write in the young adult genre, actually; I simply wrote the book. It wasn’t until I was ready to submit it for publication that I began to think about which genre it fit into, and that’s when I realized it was a YA novel.

2. How did you decide to base Ash on the Cinderella fairy tale? What other novels/books influenced your writing?

(Malinda Lo) I chose to retell Cinderella for two reasons: it was my favorite fairy tale when I was a child, and I never read a retelling that truly spoke to me. Therefore, I decided to write the book that I wanted to read. I’ve been most influenced by Robin McKinley, who has written a number of fairy tale retellings, including Deerskin and, most famously, Beauty (a retelling of “Beauty and the Beast”).

3. You were just named one of the Out 100. Did you get to meet Sarah Waters?

(Malinda Lo) Ha! I have met Sarah Waters, but not through the Out 100. I’ve interviewed her several times for my freelance work, and I met her in person for a video interview I did for AfterEllen.com after her novel The Night Watch was released. I truly admire her writing — I think her books are brilliant.

4. What are you working on now?

(Malinda Lo) I’m working on another YA novel set in the world of ASH, but several hundreds of years earlier, so there are no crossover characters. It’s called HUNTRESS, and it’s my version of a hero’s quest — with lesbians. It’s due out in spring 2011.

5. Okay, last question — for the Philadelphia readers. If you were stuck on a desert island with either Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, or Betsy Ross — who would you pick, and how would you escape off the island?

(Malinda Lo) I think I’d choose to be stuck with Ben Franklin. I’d really hope he could invent some kind of communication device that would enable us to get someone to rescue us!

Thanks, Malinda. If you’d like to read more author interviews, click here. Happy reading!

There were only two problems: I’m not an English teacher and I hadn’t exactly registered for this convention.

Sneaking in was not a possibility. Security guards in grey jackets patrol the convention centers halls, specifically to prevent Philadelphians from waltzing in and listening to their favorite authors speak. Actually, I tried sneaking in — and was asked for my convention badge within minutes. Foiled. Drat.

So I went up to the registration tent. “Is there a way that I can go to see Gordon Korman?” I asked. “I read all of his books when I was little and would really just get a kick out of seeing him speak. I’m happy to pay if you’d like.”

The woman nodded and waved her hand at the mention of money. “Yup,” she said. “You’re welcome to go see him.” She printed out a badge that said Melody Kramer Philadelphia PA HERE TO LISTEN TO GORDON KORMAN ONLY, which I put around my neck.

Off to the fourth floor, for the middle school teacher’s luncheon, where Korman was the keynote. We tittered about students who use adverbs incorrectly and joked about 8th graders’ behaviorial tics — and then Gordon Korman came out on the stage, to give his speech.

He started out by noting that most books considered classics for middle schoolers center around the death of a dog. (And they do — Old Yeller, Jack London, Fluke, etc) This got a chuckle. He then explained how his books were different in that they were just humorous and a good read — and not so much “message” books. He detailed some of his new books hitting the market and recommended some writing strategies for middle school aged people.

After his talk, I went down to the off-limits exhibit room. (Because of the name tag reading HERE TO LISTEN TO GORDON KORMAN ONLY.) Nevertheless, I stood in a line with other Korman fans (some of whom brought original copies of the MacDonald Hall series) to purchase his newest books and get them autographed. He signed three books for me and I left the exhibit room immediately after. Basically, I didn’t want to get arrested for sneaking into a room with thousands of English teachers — though that actually seems like an excellent plot for a future Gordon Korman novel.

While researching this post, I also accidentally discovered that there is an entire online community dedicated to Bruno and Boots fan fiction. Sometimes I wish when I hit “delete cache” that certain bits of knowledge or memories in my brain could also be destroyed. This is one of those times. Enjoy?

One of the authors reading tomorrow night is young adult novelist Mark Hardy. Mark is the author of Nothing Pink, a novel about a teenager named Vincent struggling to reconcile his sexuality with his deeply religious childhood. Mark and his partner Jim live in Raleigh, NC where Mark teaches second grade at Creech Road Elementary School. He also works as a national literacy consultant and was kind enough to conduct this interview while waiting for his car to be repaired on the way to Philadelphia. Thank you, Mark!

When did you first conceive of the idea of writing a novel and why did you decide to write this book for a young adult audience?

(Mark Hardy) As a teacher, I came to realize that when I was a teen, I never found myself in the literature I read. Not once. Not even in gay erotica. One summer soon after this realization, I took a short story writing course with young adult author, Carolyn Coman. In order to write a story, I needed a protagonist I loved. Vincent immediately appeared. Because this was Vincent’s story, and he tells it as a young adult, the novel is categorized YA. Although, apparently the 1970s setting and theological themes make the book appealing for adults like me, who were themselves teens during that era.

In Nothing Pink, Vincent struggles to reconcile his gay identity with his Christian upbringing. How did you come up with the idea?

(Mark Hardy) Once Vincent appeared on the scene, my first job was to get to know him. As he revealed himself to me, his crisis was clearly a spiritual one. As I tried to discern the thing he most desperately wanted, it was obviously unconditional love and acceptance from God and family; freedom from the tyranny of his religious upbringing. Even though I was more than thirty years old at the time, I was in a similar crisis. As I wrote the book, Vincent and I both wrestled with and reconciled religion and sexuality.

What other young adult literature would you recommend for someone struggling with his or her sexuality? Are there any books in particular that you think are “must reads?”

(Mark Hardy) As far as great titles for YA, I would actually not recommend titles, but rather a queer YA lit blog or two. How fortunate that young people struggling with identity issues today have such a wide range of readers’ advisory tools on the internet so that they may find books that not only speak to them as young queer people, but that also appeal to their interests outside of being gay.

Try these: I’m here. I’m queer. Now, what the hell do I read?. Additionally, ALA’s roundtable on GLBTQ YA lit is worth looking at.

That said, Cameron’s SOMEDAY THIS PAIN WILL BE USEFUL TO YOU is awesome. And I can’t forget to mention Sanchez’s THE GOD BOX, which is similar in theme.

What kind of response did you get after Nothing Pink came out?

(Mark Hardy) My closest friends who stuck by me throughout the decade I took to write Nothing Pink rejoiced and helped me celebrate. Very few members of my family said a word. For the most part, reviewers were generous and gracious. I still weep with gratitude when I read favorable reviews. I am blessed to have personally met and corresponded with readers who have been touched and moved by NOTHING PINK. Many, many people-gay and straight, find themselves as they live Vincent’s story.

Are you working on anything now?

(Mark Hardy) I am working at teaching 2^nd grade and also on three writing projects: a second YA novel, ICED TEA SKY, a short story for submission to an anthology of micro-fiction that Persea is publishing, and a professional book for teachers of writing.

Okay, one last question. You’re stuck on a desert island, with either Betsy Ross, Ben Franklin, or Thomas Jefferson. Who do you pick and how do the two of you get off the island?

(Mark Hardy) First of all, I would definitely leave Thomas Jefferson on the island. The hypocrisy of some of his writing angers me. So much of it is was untrue at the time written and remains untrue today. I’d have to take Betsy with me off the island. We carve needles out of fish bones and sew our clothes (and Thom’s and Ben’s) into parasails. We float naked over the ocean until we land on a nearby, inhabited island.

Reading — in order — are  Mark Hardy, Thom Nickels, Scott Sherman, Livia Llewellyn, David Carter, Victoria Brownworth, Paul Russell, Steve Berman, Radclyffe, Rob Byrnes, Mark Merlis, Malinda Lo, Bob Smith, S. Renee Bess, Ken Harvey, Bobbi Marolt, Bill Konigsberg, Tim Brough, and Perry Brass.

If you can’t make the event, you can also buy books from these authors directly from Giovanni’s Room’s website.

And! this afternoon and tomorrow, I will be posting interviews with Mark Hardy and Malinda Lo, who graciously agreed to talk to me about their books and the way they write. Yay!

The Center for Literacy is holding a “literary freeze” for 2 minutes today in order to remind Philadelphians that many adults in our city have trouble with reading.

If you’d like to “freeze for reading,” come to the Plaza at 11:50, book in hand.

3805 Locust St.

6pm, free.

New Yorker staff writer George Packer will read from his new essay collection, Interesting Times: Writings from a Turbulent Decade. Packer is also the author of The Assassins’ Gate: America in Iraq, and Blood of the Liberals. My hunch is that there will be little crossover crowd with the comedy writing lecture mentioned above.

1901 Vine Street

7:30pm, free.

Lastly, the Big Blue Marble Bookstore in Mt. Airy is hosting young adult authors Delia Sherman and Catherine Gilbert Murdock. Murdock is the author of the Dairy Queen trilogy and the fantasy Princess Ben. Sherman is the author of Changeling, the story of the mortal changeling of Central Park. Books will be available for purchase at Big Blue Marble.

551 Carpenter Lane

7:00 pm, free.

But that’s not why I’m excited. Just look at this lineup they have! It’s like English Teacher Woodstock! Guest speakers include Julie Andrews, Junot Diaz, Joyce Carol Oates, Tracy Kidder, Brian Selznick, Lorene Cary, Nancy Pearl, Nicolas Sparks, Jeff Kinney — and my personal and absolute favorite author of all time, Gordon Korman.

I own every single one of Gordon Korman’s books published before and during my YA prime, from 1978-1995. His first book, This Can’t Be Happening at MacDonald Hall, was the first book of his that I read (in fourth grade) and was published when Gordon Korman was in 7th grade. The man wrote his first book in junior high.

Korman’s books fascinated me for two reasons: one, they were set in Canada (how exotic) and two, they took place in a boarding school. (Think Exeter.) I was a kid from South Jersey who basically didn’t leave my zip code until college. Korman’s books were funny and sharp and exotic — full of weird little characters like Elmer Drimsdale, the nerd who breeds fish in his bathtub, and Mr. Sturgeon, the exasperated headmaster who resembles a fish and doesn’t know what to do with his students, the Canadian middle-school version of Saved by the Bell’s cast.

I read Korman’s books 15 years ago and I still remember specific details. I remember the name of the all girls’ finishing school across the street, Miss Scrimmage’s Finishing School for Young Ladies. I even remember rollerblading around my house, pretending to be a hockey player at a Canadian boarding school.

Sadly, Wikipedia notes that This Can’t Be Happening at MacDonald Hall was rereleased in 2003 under a new title, This Can’t Be Happening – with both a “new look” and “updated slang.” I don’t know what that means, but I’m assuming “updated slang” means “not as awesome as the original, which didn’t need to be updated.”

If you can get your hands on a used copy of the original, I highly recommend it. I found a few at Amazon, but you might be able to spot it at a garage or library sale. Actually, now that I’m looking, all of the MacDonald Hall books appear to be out of print and/or “rereleased.” I rounded up the MacDonald Hall titles at Amazon — if you decide to buy them, make sure you go for the USED copies, as they will contain the original text. (The first folio of Korman, if you will.)

I totally lost track of my train of thought on this post. Oh yes, if you want to see Gordon Korman live and in the flesh, he’ll be speaking at 12:30 on Friday at the Convention Center. 12th and Market. English Teachers Convention. Good stuff. Be there.

• Elizabeth Wellington at the Inquirer profiles Posing Beauty: African American Images From the 1890s to the Present.

• The National Council of Teachers of English comes Philadelphia for their 99th annual convention. Among the speakers: Julie Andrews, Junot Diaz, and Joyce Carol Oates.

• Q&A with author Ali Eteraz over at Philly Weekly

• Listen to over 400 author podcasts courtesy of the Free Library of Philadelphia

Between 1886 and 1923 many towns across the country received Carnegie library funds, some 1406 towns with 1679 libraries in total. Pennsylvania had 58 such libraries, each bearing the Carnegie’s slogan about the purposes of libraries above the door: “Let There Be Light.”

Twenty-five of these libraries are in Philadelphia. Weirdly, Carnegie refused to donate to the Main Branch of the Philadelphia public library. Plan Philly has a nice overview of the remaining Carnegie libraries in the city (some have been torn down) and the Free Library has several letters from Carnegie about the libraries, including my favorite, which says

Philadelphia is slow, but even if she were a creeper like the snail, you would make her get there.

After 56 years in the business and 31 years at Action News, Dave Roberts has decided to hang up his umbrella and retire. His last day will be December 11. A nice photo gallery of Dave (and Gary Papa) in the late 80’s is here.

Tonight, the Kelly Writer’s House is hosting Christian Bök, a writer and creator of no one — but two – artificial languages used on TV shows.

Bök is also the author of Eunoia, a five chapter book that features and uses a different vowel in each chapter. An excerpt: “Enfettered, these sentences repress free speech.” Another: “Dutch smut churns up blushful succubus lusts.”

He also makes books out of Rubik’s Cubes, performs sound poetry, and writes deep thoughts about Legos. Bök will read from his work, followed by a discussion with members of the Penn English Department.

3805 Locust St.

6pm, free.

A new feature starts today at Philly Dame. Based on the series One in Eight Million by the New York Times, 1.5 Million to One will profile a Philadelphian each Wednesday to ask some questions about our city’s past and future.

Albert Yee is a freelance photographer, an employee of the Fair Food Farmstand in Reading Terminal Market, a fig lover, a fiancee, and a prolific food blogger. He recently shot the cover of Grid Magazine’s November issue (see below) and was featured in the Philadelphia Inquirer for his SEPTA blog, SEPTA Fail.

1. Who’s your favorite Declaration signer and why?

(Albert Yee) I don’t know much about the signers other than they were old white men, but I’ll take Ben Rush. He was big into medicine – what we know as modern medicine and the good old bloodletting stuff – and was an abolitionist.

Mucca Pazza @ Johnny Brenda’s by Albert Yee

2. If you had unlimited money and resources, what one thing would you add/subtract/change in Philadelphia?

(Albert Yee) I would provide solid healthcare for all. That would allow people to concentrate on more important matters than finding a job –any job — with benefits for themselves and their families. People could pursue career paths previously unthinkable to them knowing that they would have their health intact.

Philadelphia Skyline by Albert Yee

3. Who’s your favorite Philadelphia-based artist?

(Albert Yee) I’ve been a HUGE fan of Zoe Strauss’s work for almost as long as I’ve been here in Philly. In the last 5+ years I’ve gotten to know her and we’ve become friends. I even stop by her house in the middle of the night down in South Philly leaving her notes while heading home from a late night out. I can’t think of another artist, currently based in Philly, who is more Philly than Zoe. She exudes Philly – the good side – to the max. She’s raw and polished; gritty and flawless.

Reading Terminal Market by Albert Yee

4. Betsy Ross or Ben Franklin?

(Albert Yee) Ben Franklin – you know, he invented blogs, wit and 5-question quizzes. Damn, he probably invented Betsy Ross.

City Hall by Albert Yee

5. Favorite Philadelphia website?

(Albert Yee) It was PhillySkyline.com, but Brad’s moving on to, literally, greener pastures and the site will be an archive very very soon. The city is losing one of it’s greatest advocates and a hell of a photog/storyteller/reporter. Goodbye drinks will be sad, but you gotta do what you gotta do.

ginko gold night

Originally uploaded by moocatmoocat