Tim Jollymore's Blog, page 2

Eat My Words Bookstore

They call the neighborhood Nordeast (the d has a decidedly beefy, deadish sound).  The general area was home to the Sri Lanka Curry House at one time, and my daughter Annie and her “other,” Neil, lived there these last three years enjoying the human vibrancy and turmoil.

Nordeast has long been the “ethnic” neighborhood of Minneapolis, home still to working people.  Here and there are feelings of rejuvenation and perennial care.

Neighbors

The neighboring businesses look clean and well-built.

More neighbors

The icons of the past stick out.  Saints Cyril and Methodius Church is a

Saints Cyril and Methodius

Slovakian church still serving the community.  The sign on the Linden tree speaks to the need for cultural history.

Eat My Words moved in this February but looks well lived in already. 

Books and Music Too

The author’s chair

I read twice this evening to the Tamminen-Jahns, to a Nikkola, and to Lara, a recent transplant from New York who walked up to our corner of the world from way Downtown. We were a small group, but we easily filled the two and a half hours with stories, laughter, and a good vegetable stew: No wonder it’s called EAT my words.

Imagine Lara here.            FANS & FRIENDS.

 

Picture this: The Author at Barnes and Noble-Roseville

You’ll have to picture it.  I took no shots myself.  Let me use words.  Sunday. Fast moving customers, striding to the Nook Counter, to the video section, browsing the new arrivals and “must read this book” tables, and, often enough stopping by LISTENER IN THE SNOW table to talk about the adventure.

I scored! Philip brought me a latte on the house and set about getting the announcements going. It seemed that every time the staff announced my signing, folk came over to see what the fun was all about. Some took a rain check and many took the book.

Exciting? Yes, every stop, every step has a lesson if only one can learn to read it.

And if the Nook Reader doesn’t jump over the Hillary display and run out the door, I’ll tell you about my next adventure at Eat My Words.

Traveling the good road.

The good Minnesota road

Minnesota is a big state, 5th in the lower 48 if I remember my elementary geography.  It takes time and petrol to traverse.  Luckily there are plenty of interesting sights and stops to make, especially if one is on a book tour.

 

I wanted to post a pic of Subtext books building which I had not photographed.  That was one stop.

Subtext is in the basement

Next, following a recommendation from David Unowsky at Subtext, I visited the Minnesota History Center and its Museum Store.  Mary, the assistant manager there, delighted me with her suggestion that LISTENER would look great as the centerpiece of a Christmas exhibit. Wow.  I’d like to see that.  The Museum Store already looks rich and festive.

 

 

 

 

North.  I posed the question on facebook, “Do you know where this is?” (Fish).  Here is the answer: on the western shore of Mille Lacs at Garrison, Minnesota.

Pescado Grande

Go see it and send me a picture.

 

I loved the placement of Listener in the Snow at Book World in Baxter (Brainerd).  Liz the manager placed it with Garrison Keillor’s and other regional books.  I think it stands out, glistening in the snow.  Lannell, clerking at the desk, and I discussed the various snowstorms-of-the-century.  The local favorite seems to be the Halloween storm of 1990 (91 some say), but Lannell recounted on in 1940 that hit so fast and hard that duck hunters on the river were stranded and, alas, lost their lives.  I’m afraid the storm in LISTENER is no more kind.

 

A great bookstore east of the Mississippi

Welcome to sTb, Subtext Books.  At the foundation of Blair Arcade on Western Avenue North and Selby, the store is neighborly, learned, and comfortable – decidedly homey and UN-corporate.  Book lovers outside Saint Paul pine for such a place.

In the hands of a pro

I met David Unowsky at the desk. His experience and history in the book business shows clearly, deeply, and immediately. I was in great hands.

Writers

We had a visitor from Winnipeg, a returnee from Burning Man, faithful friends, an author, a lawyer,

and book lovers from the neighborhood.

Listening to LISTENER

Wednesday night light, I call it.

To celebrate, I wore my Jerry Garcia tie with Italian colors (not the flag, the fashion).

This is a bookstore to visit, to browse, to hang-‘n-read in, and to support.

Here I felt more strongly than ever the symbiosis of writer and book-monger. It’s a great partnership.

LISTENER chosen PICK OF THE WEEK

Pick of the week: “Listener in the Snow”
Pioneer Press

Posted:   09/14/2014 12:01:00 AM CDT

Pick of the Week Tim Jollymore

Tatty Langille is a Finnish-Mi’kmaq storyteller (the Mi’kmaq are First People inhabiting the Maritime Provinces of Canada) whose adventures make up Tim Jollymore’s debut novel “Listener in the Snow.”

On a mission to save his marriage, Tatty follows his estranged Ojibwe wife, Mary, from Florida to Minnesota where she is going to be midwife when her counsin delivers twins. His experiences include a windigo vision during a blizzard and surreal events that weave Native culture with Scandinavian characters. Tatty has lived a lie and doesn’t know if he can out-distance his buried past. And is Mary, given to wild rages, the wife he believed her to be? The story’s twists and turns include family secrets, Ojibwe myth, hidden identity and murder.

Jollymore, who holds degrees in English and American History from the University of Minnesota, grew up among swamps, forests and Indian reservations of northern Minnesota. He has been an insurance agent, worked in marketing for Honeywell, Inc., and operated his own firm, Finnish Design, before he joined the teaching staff at an Oakland, Calif., high school in 1997.

Jollymore says that his fiction “explores struggles of identity in multicultural and multiracial society from the viewpoint of the under and working classes. “

He will introduce “Listener in the Snow” at 7 p.m. Wednesday at SubText bookstore, Selby and Western avenues, St. Paul, and 2 p.m. Sept. 21 at Barnes & Noble, Har Mar Mall, 2100 N. Snelling Ave., Roseville.

– Mary Ann Grossmann

 

Saturday Double-Header

Leaving Duluth, as I have so many times, always tugs at my sinews and thoughts. The ascent of Thompson Hill lifts before your vision for a last minute the wonder of the scene on arrival: Duluth and the Lake Superior basin expanding to the northeast horizon’s magnificence.

From Thompson Hill

Farewell, Duluth, and on to the prairies and rivers of the plains.

THE DOUBLE HEADER – Buffalo / Stillwater

If this were a contest it would be a tie. Both stores are wonderful and come December, they will look like versions of the bookstore in heaven. The towns have history, water, a tight community, and the best bookstore for miles around.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

At Buffalo (note the & Coffee which is important as you’ll see) I was greeted by Macy who offered my COFFEE LATTE and later by Loren an up and coming actor. The coffee bar at the rear “brings ‘em in” and the bookstore “keep ‘em busy.”Look through the bar and see the lake. Now who wouldn’t want their bookstore/coffee bar combo to have a view of a Minnesota lake (different from CA / Nevada lakes in that all are bounded by trees)

At Buffalo Books & Coffee the patrons are amazingly forward – several just bustled right to my table to demand LISTENER.  Deb Lefevre, Susi and staff must have done their promotion. 

We sold LISTENER to dairy farmers, mystery readers, friends-without-money who had willing friends-with-money.  And there were lots and lots of them. Thanks to Deb, Susi, Macy and Loren.  What a bookstore Buffalo Books and Coffee is.

The Valley Bookseller is no rival – the stores bound either side of the Twin Cities (Minneapolis and Saint Paul) along the north – and is equally skilled and friendly.  Here locals are fewer though I heard quite a few claim to be a member of their reader’s club. Tourist jammed the sidewalks and the riverfront enjoying the sunny Saturday, but they also mixed with Stillwater-ites and books inside. Right now the focus of the space is the wonderful bird cage:

When remodeling starts – adding The Daily Grind, a coffee company from down the street – the birds, sadly, will have to leave, so browsers will check out scones instead of nuthatches.  GO IN NOW to see the birds and pick up LISTENER while there.

At The Valley Bookseller I met Jill Bisker, FINDING THE WAY BACK, my double header partner:

And dozens of enthusiastic readers, Mare and Quentin, the Dr. Gabor family, and author-professor-Icelander Bjork Nordfjord (not pictured) who is teaching “hard-boiled-detective” literature at St. Olaf.

Two last notes on The Valley Bookseller the staff, particularly Kathy who first greeted customers then led them directly to me, is wonderful, and, second, the view out the rear windows is of the St. Croix river. Come December two notable Minnesota bookstores will boast (and roast) coffee behind books.

Stop in and see for yourselves.

 

 

Nothing to do with dear old dad!

All the excitement my visit to the Bookstore at Fitger’s generated was to do with location. It had nothing to do with my father’s Fitger’s beer truck that appears in so many family photos usually with John’s foot on a fender (they had them then) his hat raked to one side, and sometimes an arm wrapped around a young lady.  The brand brewed in my childhood’s raising , I admit.

In 1957 we loaded our furnishings in a refrigerated Fitger’s delivery wagon (lined and insulated inside like a metal cooler) and hauled them from Proctor all of 17 miles to Cloquet. At 8 years old what boy wouldn’t be excited?

A Thursday night in the bowels of the former brewery was not  quiet at all. A delegation from the class of ’66 arrived, and a steady stream of book buyers from California; Albany, New York; and nearby points in Duluth kept me hopping.

 

Emily Ryme, my helpful liaison and a poet in fact and heart introduced me to my audience (most already knew my story), and I did a wonderful reading – discovering things about LISTENER IN THE SNOW that even I did not know. The text sounds good aloud.  Bruce, Mike and spouses lingered before dinner chatting about the marriage of their children to each other. Some how I guessed the ceremony had been at Lake Tahoe and to their amazement wrote that into my dedication. That started a discussion of the cover, which looks like snow in a Minnesota forest, but could it be Lake Tahoe in late May? Perhaps.

The night was productive and wonderfully exciting. Who could ask for more?

Thanks to the whole staff, Emily, Page, and Manager Sally Anderson. See you next year with OBSERVATION HILL.

Author’s day off

Face it.  Even the best need a rest. Booking it is not play.  So, what to do? Review pictures, for one. Here is the “send off,” the Sugo Night

Farewell Dinner

with family enjoying Carol’s wonderful pasta sauce and

Best-Ever Chocolate Cake

the best chocolate cake ever (mine).

The very next day dawned with a beautiful morning in Lake Elmo.

Lake Elmo entry

The English cottage look fits the Elmoesque motif.

Staying in Duluth one can watch it rain (no pics), brace against the wind (impossible to capture), and wait for tomorrow (The Bookstore at Fitgers, 6pm signing, 7pm reading).

Also, I took an hour or two to glean photos from Kivi’s postcard collection of Duluth for the up coming book OBSERVATION HILL (2015) which is (the Point of Rocks above is part of the hill) set entirely within the city and features, at times, the sound of the Central High School clock (below). When it rained, I cleaned the basement at Big Sur, my “hobby” apartment building in Duluth,

October, 2005
Prior to Purchase

arranged tree estimates, trimmed those nasty box elders (the one reaching over from the left and the hedges are GONE), and bought a storm door replacement latch I’ll install (I hope) tomorrow [UPDATE: latch-job went well]

Big Sur Yesterday

Thursday, I’ll turn into the author again. Sometimes it feels like I’ve been transformed as Tatty was by Roscoe’s windigo.

 

Rapids is Grand

After locating the Central Square Mall and Village Bookstore, I stopped a young lady to inquire about coffee.  Had not had my latte yet.  Later, we found out she was Holly, my Sunday hostess at

It was Holly who rang up the sales.  As the best summer day of the month burned on outside, I worked the desk, the families, and, especially, the Kisses (lower right).

The mall seemed an oasis against the short but brutal Minnesota summer.  I admit that at times I wondered if I should be in the Chinese restaurant business across the hall rather than the book business. But then lunch was over.

I signed half the books Holly provided. My favorite was signed to a family from Washington, D.C. which has been summering in Grand Rapids for 50 years. Listener will be at the cabin waiting for the next Burse to read it, who knows next year or next generation.

 

Author talks about LISTENER

CLICK the video to watch! (Make the author dance).