Where do you work and how long have you been there?
I work for Penguin Random House. I started in 1990 with Bantam Books in the NY office.

Where might we be surprised that you have also worked?
I was Associate Professor of Theater at Midwestern State University in Wichita Falls, TX in the ‘80s

What do you like to read? What’s your current favorite book to handsell?
I love to read narrative non-fiction, clever thrillers, and witty, character-driven science fiction (like those written by my son, Michael R. Underwood). My favorite handsell lately is “This is Chance” (coming in 2020 from Random House).

Who are you when you’re not slingin’ books?
A husband to my theatre-costumer wife Becky, father to my teacher-daughter CeCe and writer-son Mike.  And a slightly too intense Indiana University Hoosiers sports fan.

What’s your favorite part of your job?
Working with reps and bookstores to make sense of data to help them grow their business.  And reading. Lots of reading.

Where do you work and how long have you been there? 
We opened Bookbug in 2018 and its now neighbor this is a bookstore in 2017. These places and their purpose are my work and my loves.

Where might we be surprised that you have also worked? 
My first gig out of college was opening and sorting mail (and identifying template form letters from a giant, clumsy binder) for then Vice President Al Gore's Senate office. It was not meaningful work, but it was the kind of job I thought I needed when I went to D.C. with no experience. Also, it paid me nothing. I worked nights and weekends at a busy restaurant where I became strangely (obsessively) invested in being the best server I could be. I was (stupidly) embarrassed to tell people about that job, but it is the one--more than the one on Capitol Hill or any of  others thereafter--that helped form me into who I am to customers today.

What do you like to read? What's your current favorite book to handsell? 
I love to read elegant, powerful sentences. Period. If there are several upfront in a novel, a work of non-fiction, a children's book, I'm had. Some customers and colleagues also know me as a passionate reader of and advocate for wordless picture books and graphic narratives. This may seem contrary to my claim about elegant, powerful sentences on a page. It is not.

This season I am loving to handsell There There by Tommy Orange, Breakout by Kate Messner, Adrian Simcox Does NOT Have a Horse by Marcy Campbell, These Truths by Jill Lepore, Friday Black by Nana Kwame Adjei-Brenyah, and We are all Me by Jordan Crane

Who are you when you're not in the store? 
I am not a person who compartmentalizes myself. I realized, especially in young parenthood, how frequently I was asked to do this, in a way that people of a differently-presenting gender than mine were not. My work is my life and my life is my work. I do not leave my family and passions outside of my workspace (the bookstore), and I do not leave my work to tend the bookstore and its mission outside of my home, my travels, and my interactions with friends. I love being the bookstore person to a young child who recognizes me at the grocery, and I love being the expressive girls' soccer fan/dance-party enthusiast to the young soccer player or middle-aged acquaintance who recognizes me in the store. I am the same person in all places of my startlingly generous life.

What's your favorite bookstore other than the one you work in? 
My answer to this question has everything to do with the fact that these stores: Kramer's Books in Washington, DC and McNally Jackson in New York's SOHO were profound and necessary havens/ inspirations to me during a time in life when I needed to lean on them. This was well before I understood (and was distracted by) the complexities of a bookstore's operation, and I was able to appreciate these stores for how they embraced me quietly and personally, alone. I remember traveling to both by foot, though they were assumed far from where I lived, and I would always leave them less tired and more nourished.

this is a bookstore & Bookbug
3019 Oakland Dr, Kalamazoo, MI 49008
Facebook
Twitter @BookbugKzoo
Instagram @bookbugkzoo

Where do you work and how long have you been there?
The Seminary Co-op Bookstores, which includes the Seminary Co-op and 57th Street Books. I have been there for just over four years and an enthusiast for 25 years.

Where might we be surprised that you have also worked?
I spent two years as a live-work writer at the Djerassi Resident Artist Program in Woodside, California. I lived in a cabin in the middle of a 580-acre redwood forest spotted with site-specific sculptures. I had a view of the Pacific Ocean and Neil Young’s barn (he lived next door). I would drive to Redwood City at least once a week where the inimitable Walter Martin ran Chimera, a bookstore that specialized in French poetry (Martin translated a volume of the complete Baudelaire) and classical records. His taste was impeccable and he refused my many offers to work for books. That rejection was something I grew accustomed to: Moe’s Books in Berkeley, Twice Sold Tales in Seattle, Walden Pond Books in Oakland, and Graywolf Books in San Leandro (Tommy Orange used to work there) all refused me.

What do you like to read? What's your current favorite book to handsell?
While I’ll read anything that catches my interest or is enthusiastically recommended by someone I trust, left to my own tendencies, I read poetry, modernist literature, sacred texts, and books on “how to live and what to do”. Some current favorite handsells include Simone Weil’s Gravity and Grace, Clarice Lispector’s Agua Viva, Martin Buber’s recently reissued Daniel, and Princeton’s latest take on Cicero, How to Be a Friend. And Whitman always.

Who are you when you're not in the store?
A shy reader who takes great joy in spending time with my wife in our shared library and our shaded garden. And an inveterate patron of bookstores and libraries.

What's your favorite bookstore other than the one you work in?
I love mission-driven bookstores as well as bookstores that perfectly represent their communities. I think Women and Children First is a vibrant and exceptional bookstore whose current owners have done a wonderful job preserving their storied history while establishing a vision for a store that fits that historic character but serves a 21st century customer. City Lights is sublime, especially their poetry room. Uncle Bobbie’s is a joyful space with a brilliant collection. Moe’s Books might be one of the best bookstores in the country, and I have lamented not having had an opportunity to have met Moe Moskowitz, the visionary founder (I feel the same way about the legendary Stuart Brent). I have a deep respect for Boswell’s and the work that Daniel Goldin does creating and reflecting his brilliant community. And Wild Rumpus, of course, is pure magic.

Where do you work and how long have you been there?
I’m a partner at Abraham Associates, and I’m in my 12th year with Stu and the gang. Before that, I covered a good part of the midwest for Publishers Group West for about 6 years.

Where might we be surprised that you have also worked?
What would be more surprising?
1. I worked in a funky hot dog shop in downtown Downers Grove IL … for about a week. Hot dog water is disgusting water.
2. I spent a summer driving around with a couple other teens and pre-teens hanging “the circus is coming!” posters in neighborhoods all around Chicago.
3. I spent a couple of summers in my youth as a swanky country club caddy. Everything you saw in Caddyshack is real.
4. I spent part of one year during college working third shift, moving boxes from freight liners to delivery trucks in a Fed Ex Ground warehouse.
5. I worked in advertising agency right out of college – a tough first year in the workplace, but I loved getting to experience all the well-known ad agency stereotypes.
6. I also spent 9 months working at a dot-com before I was a sales rep. I got to watch a bunch of fast-talking people with one decent idea burn through their venture capital faster than you would believe.
All true.

What do you like to read?
My go-to comfort reading are classic mysteries. I was raised on Agatha Christie and her generation, and I spent the summer after college reading the collected Sherlock Holmes but I fell in love with noir and hard-boiled detectives when I started working in bookstores. I’ve been self-medicating since Nov 2016 by re-reading Rex Stout’s Nero Wolfe mysteries in quiet hours, between work reading.

I grew up a science fiction & fantasy reader, too. And I love graphic novels and comic books. And literary fiction. And when time permits, I love history. So that keeps me busy.

Who are you when you're not on the road?
I’m the music-listening, recipe-and-restaurant-investigating, cocktail-making, stay-at-home partner to Laura. I love the part of the year when I get to be quiet and still, work at home, and have a tasty meal on the table when Laura gets home from work.

What bookstore(s) do you consider to be a hidden gem?
Where to start? I spend so much time in stores all around our territory that none of them seem hidden to me. 

BUT since you’re making me choose from among my many, many beloved stores around the country:
My go-to local bookstore since we’ve moved to Minneapolis: Moon Palace Books.
The one that has a bookstore vibe most like the store I managed in California and feels most like coming home to me: Unabridged Bookstore in Chicago IL.
Most amazing blend of books and comics: Atomic Books in Baltimore MD
Getaway Vacation Town bookstore that I wished were much, much closer to me: Mclean and Eakin in Petoskey MI
Most amazing blend of books, coffee, snacks, comics, knitting, journals and pencils, and oh yes, built in a former movie theatre? Coffeetree Books in Morehead KY. Ok, that one’s a true hidden gem, and more people should visit Morehead! If you’re going, I can also tell you about a BBQ food truck near the store…

What publisher do you think more people should know about?
This is an even more tricky question than making me pick hidden gem bookstores. I love all my children! But here are three.
Coffeehouse Press (notable book: TELL ME HOW IT ENDS by Valeria Luiselli)
Gallic Books (notable author: my favorite French writer, Antoine Laurain, master of the tending-towards-black social comedy)
Biblioasis_books (notable series: Seth’s Christmas Ghost Stories – a yearly series of spooky short ghost stories, selected, designed, and edited by graphic novelist Seth.)

What is one of your most memorable moments or events as a rep?
This predates my actual rep life, but it’s all connected. My first bookselling job was at Anderson's Bookshop, in their Downers Grove store where the reps rarely set foot for buying appointments. An attentive sales rep passed the word along to the main office in NY that I was a fan of Jonathan Carroll and was hand-selling his novel Outside The Dog Museum. Soon enough, a package showed up for me, with a copy of his next book and a kind note welcoming me to the Jonathan Carroll Club. I’ve been smitten with sales reps and their power to share the love of books ever since. I’ve tried to live up to that example ever since.

I love sharing bookseller enthusiasm up the chain to my publishers. And I love sharing exciting new books and authors with booksellers.

Where do you work and how long have you been there?
Bookbrokers & Kramer's Cafe in the Grand Traverse Mall, Traverse City, MI - started Bookbrokers in 1989, this is our seventh location 

Where might we be surprised that you have also worked?
Actually had this store in the same mall in the 90s - at that time, we couldn't put a used bookstore in Mall so we brought in our sidelines: comics, cards and prints; now the mall wanted just the used bookstore, so we are very happy

What do you like to read? What's your current favorite book to handsell?
It's a mix - love my local Author books, so Deborah Wolf and Doug Stanton's latest, are my favorites, as well as my favorites to sell, as well as all of the local Author books...

Who are you when you're not in the store?
I'm here almost every hour (haven't had a day off since May 1st), so I usually just relax and read when I'm not at the store

What's your favorite bookstore other than the one you work in?
All time favorites are Arnold's of TC and Oxford Too of Atlanta, GA - both are gone, but they are still my guidelines as to how to run a used bookstore, amazing that my store has been around longer than both of theirs combined - they are missed!

Bookbrokers & Kramer's Cafe
Twitter: @Bookbrokers1
bookbrokers1.com

Where do you work and how long have you been there?
I work at Women & Children First bookstore in Chicago. I've been working there for three years. Before I became an employee, I went to the store for their annual pride open mic and hosted a zine release party there right after the ownership change. The zine was called Second to None: Queer & Trans Chicago Voices. Those were some of my first interactions with the store.  

Where might we be surprised that you have also worked?
Nowhere I've worked is that surprising! I've mostly worked as an educator in literary settings at places like the Poetry Foundation (who publishes Poetry magazine) and Young Chicago Authors.   

What do you like to read? What's your current favorite book to handsell?
I love reading contemporary poetry. I order the poetry books at Women & Children First and curate our poetry events. I'm really proud of the poetry community that's grown around the store. I also read a lot of books by queer and trans authors. As a trans writer, cultivating spaces for trans literature is really important to me.     

One of my favorite books to handsell is Samantha Irby's We Are Never Meeting In Real Life. She's a friend of the store and it's incredible to see how her career has developed. When anyone asks for a funny book, it's the first one I recommend. I'm a big fan of her work.    

Who are you when you're not in the store?
My lives in and outside of the store are pretty intertwined. I'm a trans poet and I've launched my books at Women & Children First. Most recently, I edited an anthology called Subject to Change: Trans Poetry & Conversation which was published by Sibling Rivalry Press. I have a chapbook called On My Way to Liberation forthcoming from Haymarket Books this summer. As mentioned earlier, I'm also an educator. I co-lead a queer poetry salon called Queeriosity at Young Chicago Authors. When I'm not at the store, I am usually either writing, performing, or teaching.     

What's your favorite bookstore other than the one you work in?
Quimby's is one of my favorite bookstores. They've supported my work for a long time and dropping off my work there is one of the best feelings in the world. The manager Liz Mason is a really important part of Chicago's literary landscape, especially in the zine and comic communities. There are publications at Quimby's that you can't find anywhere else. I've always felt at home there. 

H. Melt
Twitter: @hmeltchicago
Instagram: @hmeltchi

Women & Children First
5233 N Clark St, Chicago, IL 60640
womenandchildrenfirst.com
Twitter: @wcfbook
Instagram: @wcfbook

Where do you work and how long have you been there?
I am with Abraham Associates and have been working with them for 7 1/2 months! I have had my first season on the road and now I am getting ready for season 2.

Where might we be surprised that you have also worked?
I have had several jobs that tend to surprise people. My first job was as a telemarketer for a Funeral Home. Nothing like being 14 years old and cold calling people trying to set up an appointment to pre-arrange their funeral services. I worked at the cemetery for 4 years and my last job was leading in funerals and staying with the burial until it was placed in it's resting spot.

What do you like to read? What's your current favorite book to handsell?
I really enjoy Sci-fi/ Fantasy and tend to read things most people might find a little strange. I try to not put myself into any kind of reading corner and read all genres. 

One of my favorite titles to sell during my spring season was Julian Is a Mermaid from Candlewick - If you have not seen this beautiful picture book I recommend you check it out. Another favorite title of mine from spring was Little Fish (Arsenal Pulp Press) by Casey Plett! I have so many more but I won't keep you all day.

Who are you when you're not on the road?
I am on the board and a showrunner for a non-profit art collective in Aurora, IL called ArtBar. We host monthly themed pop-up art shows and when I am not on the road selling or attending sales conferences I am at Two Brothers Roundhouse every First Friday selling all of the ART!

I also sculpt things by dry felting. I have made a Mothman, Swampthing and most recently Cuphead (a really cool video game character). You can see them on Instagram @Anniepokely

Other than that I tend to read and watch movies at home with my husband and kitties.

What bookstore do you consider to be a hidden gem?
This is really a tough one for me!! There are so many new stores I was able to visit this year and I have found so many new favorites.

I had the joy of visiting the new Cover to Cover Books in Columbus, OH. Melia Wolf, the owner was recently featured in the bookseller feature. Melia did such an amazing job with the design and curation of her new store! It is definitely worth a visit if you are ever in the area.

What publisher do you think more people should know about?
There are a few new publishers coming to Consortium Books Distributors. I am really looking forward to sharing their books with my accounts this season. For adult titles World Editions & for awesome kids board books Hazy Dell Press. 

And from SCB Distributors I really like Boss Fight Books- They are similar to 33 1/3 books but focus on classic video games!

What is one of your most memorable moments or events as a rep?
It would have to be my first official sales conference. It was very overwhelming but everyone made me feel so welcomed and now I have had two seasons of conferences and I look forward to seeing everyone each time!

Sandra Law
Instagram @anniepokely
Twitter @polkafan

Abraham Associates
5120a Cedar Lake Rd.
St. Louis Park, MN 55416 
www.abrahamassociatesinc.com
Instagram @abrahamassociates
Twitter @abrahambookreps

When did your store open and where are you located?
We opened in March of 2016. We are located in the bustling and eclectic Wicker park neighborhood in Chicago. We are located just north west of the Loop - off the blue line. 

Tell us something interesting about your store.
It is owned by two sisters - both who led former lives as educators. Also, there are rumors that 1. one of the first televisions was sold in this building. 2. One of HH Holmes secret businesses was across the street and there are rumors that they found bodies there. 

Do you have a holiday tradition at the store?
Well, we've only been around for two years, so "tradition" is still gaining roots. We do love throwing a party - we do an author soiree every year with all of the local writers - and it has become a really great community building thing for writers. Our Halloween party last year was so much fun we hope to up the ante on that and continue with that in the future. I don't know. We try anything once. Most things twice. There are so many things that are becoming a tradition - I guess we will have to wait and see! 

What's the most memorable event or moment at your store?
Goodness. So many. A few months ago Tori Amos came in as a customer and I struggled really hard to keep my chill. Her music basically defined my adolescence in the 90s. Book -wise, I would say the midnight release of The Cursed Child. We had a big party that night and the anticipation as we cut open those boxes was palpable. 

What bookstore do you consider to be a hidden gem?
I think Sandmeyer's down in the South Loop is a hidden gem. There is a quite mystique to that bookstore that I thoroughly enjoy. I was fortunate in my college and grad school years to have Prairie Lights AND Boulder Bookstore - though Trident bookstore in Boulder is a fun gem as well.

Volumes Bookcafe
1474 N Milwaukee Ave,
Chicago, IL 60622
volumesbooks.com
IG @volumesbooks
Twitter @volumesbooks

Where do you work and how long have you been there?
Volumes Bookcafe in Chicago's Wicker Park neighborhood

Well, I've been here long before we opened. Volumes is me. I am Volumes. 
 
Where might we be surprised that you have also worked?
SO MANY. In my youth I worked a number of jobs at a golf course. I've also worked retail at Woodfield Mall in the 90s (which, for anyone who remembers those days, knows what chaos that was). I've been a dog walker on the side. A life guard. A Lit agent intern. A college professor. A high school teacher. I've had a lot of jobs. This makes me sound old. 

What do you like to read? What's your current favorite book to handsell?
I'm kind of all over the place. I just like reading. I do gravitate towards the weird - and I have a bizarre obsession with any and all books that touch on time - Fiction and Non-Fiction. 

Right now I really enjoy handselling Geek Love. It's an old favorite. We made it our book of the month - I hope it surprises and delights people in the way that book did for me. It took my breath away. 

Who are you when you're not in the store?
I am Volumes. Volumes is me. Jk. I am here every day so I don't get a lot of free time to just be me. 

I'm a big baseball fan, so I am excited for the new season. I'm also a crafter. I can't sit still at home, so if I am not working, I am making bags or book origami or I'm painting. I do a lot of weird stuff. Now I get to channel that into window displays and such for the store, so it loops back 

What's your favorite bookstore other than the one you work in?
Prairie Lights is a favorite. I did my undergraduate degree at u Iowa and I used to make Prairie Lights a reward for myself. If I did ok on a test, I could go and wander and buy one book. It usually meant I'd buy five, but I have a lot of fond memories from that store. Boulder Bookstore was my graduate school bookstore, and I spent many an hour in there.

Volumes Bookcafe
1474 N Milwaukee Ave,
Chicago, IL 60622
volumesbooks.com
IG @volumesbooks
Twitter @volumesbooks