On top of eradicating a much-loved local chain, the closure of Olsson’s bookstores also played havoc with the schedules of a few authors who had readings scheduled at the stores. At least one writer has found a new date and place to do a little self-promotion: Michael Kimball, Baltimore author of the novel Dear Everybody and guy who’ll write your life story on a postcard if you ask—will now speak Wednesday, Nov. 5, at the Georgetown Barnes & Noble. He’ll be joined by fellow Baltimorean Jessica Anya Blau, author of The Summer of Naked Swim Parties. For more on Dear Everybody, check out the video below:

If you’re an author whose Olsson’s reading has been rescheduled, drop a line and/or make mention of it in the comments.

If you can’t make the trip up to Baltimore this week for the country’s biggest convention dedicated to crime fiction, you can at least meet two of Bouchercon’s guests of honor in D.C. tonight. Barbara Peters and Robert Rosenwald, owners of the Poisoned Pen bookstore/publisher in Scottsdale, Ariz. (and winners of Bouchercon’s 2008 lifetime achievement award), are at the Library of Congress, speaking on the topic “Books—Before and Beyond: Publishing in the 21st Century.” Among the subjects under discussion are book trailers, game-book tie-ins, devices like the Kindle, and other initiatives that are likely to have a modest-at-best impact on book sales in the future. The event starts at 6 p.m. at the LoC’s Montpelier Room.

As you may have heard, some smart guy who helps give out the Nobel Prize in literature recently said that Americans are simply too “insular” and possessed of a restricting “ignorance” to produce great writing. So we have much to learn from the arrival of Suhayl Saadi, who’s here for a month of readings and lectures at George Washington University. Saadi, who according to a press release is “known throughout the UK as the preeminent Scottish-Pakistani writer,” has received much acclaim for his 2004 debut novel, Psychoraag, which he’ll be reading from tonight. The book doesn’t have a U.S. publisher—we’re insular and ignorant, remember—but copies will be available for purchase at his D.C. readings and at the campus bookstore. Or you can just legally read the whole thing for free. Americans like free stuff.

Tonight’s reading from Psychoraag is at 8 p.m. in the City View Room, seventh floor of 1957 E St. NW. A second event, during while he’ll discuss “the role that memory, time, place, and multiple voices play in ‘destabilizing’ literature,” takes place Monday, Oct. 13, 8:15 p.m. in room B07 of the Media and Public Affairs Building at George Washington University.

As word has spread about Olsson’s closing its five stores yesterday, folks have flocked to the testimonials page the bookseller set up. A handful of writers have weighed in with their memories; a selection follows.

Like others above, I first entered the Georgetown store in the early 1980s and spent hours in the stacks finding new favorites. Olsson’s has given readers of DC good service.
And it has given writers in DC great support. When my first book came out two years ago, I was so pleased to give a reading at the Old Town store, where my family made up half the audience. I was getting ready to give a reading of my new book there next month when I got this sad news.
Thank you for everything! May the music and the word go on. —David Taylor

I am so terribly sad to hear this news. This is a huge loss for the community of book lovers. Ever since I moved to Old Town in 1974, Olsson’s has been part of my life. Upon finishing a good novel, I would walk down to Olsson’s and select another good read from Olsson’s big table or from the shelved staff picks. Olsson’s and I came full circle in July when I did a reading of my own book at the Old Town store. I was proud to be associated with Olsson’s at that event. This wonderful book store exuded a warmth that occurs only when the entire staff truly cares about books. —Solveig Eggerz

I share the sentiments expressed here (barring #15): vote local with your dollars, folks…it goes a long way toward shaping the kind of world that we live in.
On November 7, 2003, I visited the Arlington store to promote my book, UNFINISHED BUSINESS: THE LIFE & TIMES OF DANNY GATTON (an appropriately DC-centric subject). About 15 people turned out, and they asked me a lot of intelligent questions. After I finished, I also did an interview with Michael Buckley (WRNR-FM).
My favorite moment came from a guy who said, “I used to deliver the Washington Post during the ’70s, and Danny’s house was on my route: lots of barking, [antique] cars everywhere: it was one scary looking house!” All of us in that room shared a good laugh about that one.
I’ve done signings and gigs where the staff barely grunted in your direction, let alone looked you in the eye — that wasn’t the case here! Your staff went out of its way to make me feel welcome, and the clientele definitely came across as true book lovers.
I’d always hoped to come back on the heels of another book, so I’m as saddened as everyone else is here by the news. My best wishes go out to the employees and their families, and — once again — thanks for a great night! You made me feel right at home, and that’s all anybody like me can ask. —Ralph Heibutzki

Hola everyone,
I’m terribly sad about the closing of Olsson’s, and the cancellation of my own event there (originally set for Thursday, October 2, for a performance of my new memoir “Mexican Enough”). Thanks to all the staff who have supported my work over the years. I wish you the very best in your next endeavors. Thanks also to the readers/Olsson fans who have written me, asking about my event. I hope to reschedule in the spring. Please visit my website, http://www.MexicanEnough.com, for details.
Saludos,
Stephanie Elizondo Griest

Bad news for D.C. bookstores today: DCist reports that Olsson’s Dupont Circle store has closed. This follows the bookseller filing for bankruptcy in July; earlier this month Shelf Awareness reported that the local chain’s head book buyer and general manager, Alexis Akre, left the company.

Nobody’s picking up the phone at any of the chain’s stores. More as we hear it, but this is clearly a bad turn of events for both readers and authors. Olsson’s, especially the Dupont Circle store, provided a haven for readings by writers who weren’t big-deal enough to nab a slot at Politics & Prose; the events page on the chain’s Web site, still live, gives you a sense of that. Dupont Circle still has some top-shelf used shops, including Second Story Books and Books for America. But the fact that the sole places selling new books in Dupont is now Kramerbooks, a place that’s all about brunch and bestsellers, or Books-a-Million, which just deals in bestsellers, is more than a little disheartening.

Update: A press release on Olsson’s homepage announces that the company filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy:

Stephen Wallace-Haines, Olsson’s general manager stated: “In the end, all the roads towards reorganization led to this dead end: we did not have the money required to pay for product in advance, to collect reserves to buy for Christmas, and satisfy the demands of rent and operational costs. We were losing money just by staying open.”

Ta-Nehisi Coates, former Washington City Paper alum, had his amazing Baltimore-centric memoir published this year. This week, the Baltimore City Paper selected it as Best Book About Baltimore in it’s Best OF published this week. Another good read—Coates’ good-natured brag.

Silver Spring novelist and mathematician Manil Suri was at the Brooklyn Book Festival last weekend to promote his new novel, The Age of Shiva. You can dig in our archives to find our interview with Suri, but the more entertaining viewing is the video below, in which he performs a Bollywood dance onstage at the fest:

For those that are still mourning/thinking about/re-reading David Foster Wallace, McSweeney’s is a must read right now.

This isn’t the most relevant detail to fuss over, I know, given the horrible fact of Wallace’s passing. For me, and for at least one of my colleagues, Wallace was a supremely important writer—a guy who could not only access a fearsome arsenal of postmodern tools, but employ them sensibly, and make it look like he wasn’t playing you. Because he wasn’t playing you—as overstuffed as Infinite Jest was, there was no question that he wrote out of a real worry over what it meant to live in a hypermediated, hypermedicated world, and he brought that same spirit to his reporting and essays. It’s a ridiculously difficult trick to keep pulling off: Look at everything Don DeLillo has written after Underworld, or just about everything Dave Eggers has written, period.

But who had the news of Wallace’s suicide first?

The AP, says Air America; searching Google News’ archives, it would appear that the Los Angeles Times had it.

The news, in fact, first came from a book blogger, Edward Champion, who followed up on an anonymous tip. I make no grand statements about this detail—certainly nothing about how bloggers and Twitterers and such are going to somehow supplant journalism. True, I first saw the news on Champion’s Twitter post, but I’m not hearing the replacing-journalism business until there’s a competent Twitterer at every city hall meeting. Still, I will call it a proof of how good, genuine journalism can be done by individual practitioners who care about their chosen beats—regardless of whether you’re attached to a media organization. And though outlets like the AP and LAT certainly have their own resources with which to find a story, let the record show that they didn’t find this one first.

September is get-back-to-work month, which means a lot of publishers are going to start guilting you about reading serious literature. Hunkering down at home with the voice of a generation is one option. But you can also cheat a little by getting out of the house and letting others read to you. This month marks the return of three sizable book festivals. A quick guide follows.

Hyman S. & Freda Bernstein Jewish Literary Festival

What: Ten days of Jewish authors, authors of Jewish-themed books, and one film tribute to Amos Oz.

Where: Washington D.C. Jewish Community Center, 1529 16th St. NW.

When: Right now to Sept. 24.

The Big-Deal Event Is: Bernard-Henri Lévy, who discusses Left in Dark Times on Saturday, Sept. 20.

But You Really Should Check Out: Adam Langer, tonight, and Stephen Joel Trachtenberg, who speaks on Sept. 24.

Surprisingly, Thumpin’ It is Not a Sequel to Portnoy’s Complaint but Instead Is: the title of a book by Jacques Berlinerblau about “the use and abuse of the Bible in today’s presidential politics.” He speaks Friday, Sept. 19.

National Book Festival

What: Laura Bush-sponsored tribute to American literature and C-SPAN 2 tote bags. Plus: cookbooks, and, in a move that raises the hackles of at least one blog commenter here, folks dressed like characters in children’s books.

Where: The National Mall

When: Saturday, Sept. 27

The Big-Deal Event Is: Take your pick: Cokie Roberts, Richard Price, Neil Gaiman, Salman Rushdie, Alexander McCall Smith…

But You Really Should Check Out: Poet Stanley Plumly, U. of Maryland prof and author the well-received Posthumous Keats: A Personal Biography.

Number of Novels Attendee and Former NFL Running Back Tiki Barber Has Written: Five. Get on the stick, Marilynne Robinson!

Fall for the Book

What: Annual book festival designed to make Fairfax County interesting for a few days.

Where: Mostly around the George Mason University campus.

When: Sept. 21-26.

The Big-Deal Event Is: Chinua Achebe, celebrating the 50th anniversary of Things Fall Apart, at GMU’s Center for the Arts Monday, Sept. 22. Not to mention Sue Miller, Michael Cunningham, Ethan Canin, Charles Baxter….

But You Really Should Check Out: Porter Shreve, whose new novel, When the White House Was Ours, is set at a D.C. alternative school in 1976. It’s a story he knows from experience.

If You Were Hoping That Maybe, Somehow, Someday, Somebody Would Write a Book About Abraham Lincoln: Your ship’s come in. The schedule for Tuesday, Sept. 23 features no fewer than five Honest Abe scholars, including Daniel Mark Epstein, Andrew Ferguson, Michael Beschloss, Joshua Wolf Shenk, and James L. Swanson.

I can’t think of a writer who has consumed more of my friends’ time—debating on the phone, lamenting/praising/giggling over those footnotes, completely digging his essays, wishing we had written those essays, getting lost in his short stories and novels—than David Foster Wallace.

News came that he apparently hanged himself on Friday night. This should be bigger news. I flicked on the cable and it’s still news reporters hip high in hurricane water, Palin lies, and a WETA pledge drive.

I called the friend who not only finished Infinite Jest but I believe sometimes re-reads parts of it. He already knew. Three other friends had called.

I then dialed Utah to the literary pal in grad school, the one working on filling libraries with detailed stories about Altoona and heavy metal churches. He didn’t know.

“Oh God.”

“Shit.”

He said something like that.

“Fuck.”

“I can’t believe it.”

There just isn’t a lot to say at the moment.

Wallace had a lot to say on everything from cruise ships to porno to a tennis great. Here’s what he told Salon’s Laura Miller about writing in a thoughtful interview:

“If you, the writer, succumb to the idea that the audience is too stupid, then there are two pitfalls. Number one is the avant-garde pitfall, where you have the idea that you’re writing for other writers, so you don’t worry about making yourself accessible or relevant. You worry about making it structurally and technically cutting edge: involuted in the right ways, making the appropriate intertextual references, making it look smart. Not really caring about whether you’re communicating with a reader who cares something about that feeling in the stomach which is why we read. Then, the other end of it is very crass, cynical, commercial pieces of fiction that are done in a formulaic way — essentially television on the page — that manipulate the reader, that set out grotesquely simplified stuff in a childishly riveting way.

What’s weird is that I see these two sides fight with each other and really they both come out of the same thing, which is a contempt for the reader, an idea that literature’s current marginalization is the reader’s fault. The project that’s worth trying is to do stuff that has some of the richness and challenge and emotional and intellectual difficulty of avant-garde literary stuff, stuff that makes the reader confront things rather than ignore them, but to do that in such a way that it’s also pleasurable to read. The reader feels like someone is talking to him rather than striking a number of poses.

Part of it has to do with living in an era when there’s so much entertainment available, genuine entertainment, and figuring out how fiction is going to stake out its territory in that sort of era. You can try to confront what it is that makes fiction magical in a way that other kinds of art and entertainment aren’t. And to figure out how fiction can engage a reader, much of whose sensibility has been formed by pop culture, without simply becoming more shit in the pop culture machine. It’s unbelievably difficult and confusing and scary, but it’s neat. There’s so much mass commercial entertainment that’s so good and so slick, this is something that I don’t think any other generation has confronted. That’s what it’s like to be a writer now. I think it’s the best time to be alive ever and it’s probably the best time to be a writer. I’m not sure it’s the easiest time.”

Annals of Book-Nerd Handicapping: The litblog Galleycat is floating a few good reasons to believe that Oprah’s next book-club pick will be Edward P. Jones‘ All Aunt Hagar’s Children, a (tremendous) collection of District-set short stories. Official word comes down Sept. 19.

Editor & Publisher reported yesterday on the end of Leonard Downie’s tenure as Washington Post editor, mentioning that he’ll start dedicating his energies to writing books. He already has one novel in the can—The Rules of the Game, to be published by Knopf in January—which he says is “not about The Washington Post.”

Reading Knopf’s description of the book on Amazon, it’s hard to see how he’ll pull it off without a few Postie stand-ins. And back in April, as the video below shows, he told Nathan’s owner Carol Joynt that the book came “largely from my own experience.” In the interview, he also discusses the responses he got from his agent and editor after filing his first draft of sex scenes. That’s at about 1:30 (via):

In the mail today: State by State: A Panoramic Portrait of America, a collection that proudly announces on the cover that it features “50 writers on 50 states.” There’s a nice batch of writers essayifying on Georgia (Ha Jin), Maryland (Myla Goldberg), Ohio (Susan Orlean), and so on. Better still, D.C. didn’t get neglected: The book’s afterword is an interview with Edward P. Jones. The novelist and short story writer mostly expounds soberly on the District’s institutionalized racism, but his chat with Cressida Leyson ends on a more wistful note:

Do you ever wish that you belonged to a state?

No, I think I’ve just wished that we had the same rights that everyone else has…. I think it may have been ten years ago when this started, but D.C. license plates now have the phrase, “Taxation without representation.” I don’t have a car, but I think one of these days I’m going to find out a way to get one of those license plates just for myself.

Jones will take part in a signing and discussion of the book on September 16 at the Library of Congress; the event will also include a screening of a short film related to the book.

Many a book makes its way from the hands of the doe-eyed, hype-seeking paperback publisher to the illustrious, half-abandoned-cubicle-lined halls of the City Paper offices. Periodically, I will peruse our collection of these volumes, searching for the rare submission that rises above all others to offend me on the basis of its title alone. When I find this book, I will pluck it from the shelf, lazily skim its offerings until I confirm its offensiveness, then condemn it. Forever!

In this installment of … that, I didn’t have to search too hard to find my next top pick. This one was displayed prominently on the shelf and decorated with an anonymous yellow Post-It note that read, “TOP PICK!” The title, If You Want Closure In Your Relationship, Start With Your Legs, had the necessary gravitas to make me pick up the book. The author’s name, “Big Boom,” made me open that book, and explore its world.

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