Every Wednesday, the Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association publishes the regional bestseller list. On Thursdays, we celebrate Thursday Themes to shine a spotlight on some of the books from the list and give our brains a different way of thinking about books. This week, the list is refreshed with some new-to-the-list titles. Until August Gabriel García Márquez, Anne McLean …
The Cat Who Saved Books is a love letter to book lovers, championing the emotional impact that stories have in the hearts and lives of readers. Tiger adds a bonus charming and Ghibli-esque aesthetic to this thoughtful, tender novel. — Andrew King, Secret Garden Bookshop, Seattle, WA It was International Dog Day last week, but …
Magical realism, myth, surrealism, fairytale, folk tale – call it what you will but this story is a major treat! Translated from the Japanese author’s (Maru Ayase) original by translator Haydn Trowell, this is the first of the author’s many novels to be translated into English. What a great decision! Our main character is tired …
In the fall of 2022 we lost one of the world’s leading men of letters, Spain’s Javier Marías. We shared the news with sadness on our blog, but included a hopeful tidbit: that we’d see one more novel from him. Here we are in the spring of 2023, and here it is. Retired spy Tomás Nevinson is lured …
A short but lingering novel… Elisa Shua Dusapin’s debut novel is ripe with atmosphere and a haunting sense of liminality. A young woman living in the tourist town of Sokcho befriends the enigmatic French graphic novelist who visits unconventionally in the dead of winter. She hopes to show him Sokcho’s barren truth, but finds herself …
In June, Watermark Book Company of Anacortes, WA partnered with Skagit Land Trust on a forest walk event with Jane Billinghurst, longtime translator for, editor of, and now co-author with Peter Wohlleben. From Watermark’s newsletter: What a cool author event! We had so much fun selling books at Jane Billinghurst’s forest walk. We have SIGNED …
It’s time for a Thursday Theme, where we shine a spotlight on some of the titles featured in this week’s Pacific Northwest Booksellers Association regional bestseller list. Little books can pack a punch, good things come in small packages, and it’s very possible to be both small and mighty. Small trim size and page count don’t keep …
On a … whimsical note, here is Sosuke Natsukawa’s The Cat Who Saved Books, which is about a young bookseller and a talking cat. The cat has a mission, you see—a mission to rescue books from mistreatment, misappropriation, and general misuse. Naturally, the bookseller agrees to help the cat. Mysteries ensue. –A Good Book, Sumner, …
Before the Coffee Gets Cold is a unique heartfelt Japanese story. The story is beautifully told and shows how heartache can be turned into happiness and bring people closer together. An unexpected and enjoyable find. –Trail’s End Bookstore, Winthrop, WA This little gem was a favorite of not just Trail’s End in Winthrop, WA, but …
“In a small back alley of Tokyo, there is a café that has been serving carefully brewed coffee for more than one hundred years. Local legend says that this shop offers something else besides coffee—the chance to travel back in time.” Kawaguchi wrote this story originally as a play which was adapted into a novel …
