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Aspiring For a Hopeful Future
By Tony Weller
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Each year we use the phrase Happy New Year. I wish I could will it on all of us! With so many unhappy circumstances on our planet, the expression feels aspirational though, I suppose, it may have always been. But wouldn’t it be nice if flipping a calendar page could affect helpful change?
Many situations challenge our planet and sane forbearance may require wisdom, remember wisdom? It is not the same as emotion, information, knowledge, or power. Some of us have mistaken personal passion for wisdom or truth and our differences are leading to some very bad behavior. If passion were enough, we could elect toddlers to run our world. So what? Truly, we must come to terms with our differences in order to address the climate problem among other daunting things. Climate change is a main driver of emigration. Every bit of energy spent on conflict, is energy not spent on progress. No-one gets to live in a world of their own design and the only practical perspective must include all persons and creatures. No preceding generations or cultures faced the worries we endure presently. It’s a hopeful fairy tale to believe we can go back to anywhere, that time can be reversed.
So my wish for you, for me, and our whole planet, is a sober reassessment of what exactly we clever fools expect from life. Will we destroy ourselves with stubborn hubris or can we adapt? Must confidence be built on the oppression of others? We must embrace a gentle ethos. Narrow paradigms of fear and privilege cannot be sustained. I wish for peace and love, sustainable economies, liberty respecting laws, fair distribution of wealth and emancipated freedom for all. Let us adopt the mindset of the Wyandot people. I understand they believe the simple desire to control others is evil.
And please vote. It will take many ordinary votes to overwhelm the noisy minority. Our nation is at a perilous juncture. Ask your children how to vote.
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RECEIVE 20% OFF WHEN YOU PURCHASE DURING NOVEMBER & DECEMBER | |
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By Danny Caine
Microcosm Publishing
Paperback $15.95
Best Wellers' Price $13.75
Reviewed by Apollo Frenzel
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I remember the first time I stepped into the bookstore I currently work at right now. My friends were talking about a cool bookstore downtown and I thought it would be just like a Barnes & Noble so I tagged along. That first step opened an entire world of possibility. It was magical. I see the same reaction I had when people step past our front counter and see just how tall our bookcases reach, all full of books. There is no place like Weller Book Works.
Working here brings so many new perspectives of the world to me – from silly little picture books to full length multi-volume sets – and nourishes a space of free thought and speech. That's what we do, we sell perspectives of the world. From whimsical fantasy to a harsh reality, we are in the business of free thought.
How to Protect Bookstores and Why is a guide to support not only us, but bookstores in general. Bookstores and libraries are under attack by a group who wants to manipulate fact, history, thought, etc. Just last month of writing this, The King’s English Bookshop was the target of a bomb threat because of a drag story hour. Under the Umbrella across town has been the subject of multiple online threats, harassment, and property damage throughout their operation. These acts intend to silence us, both as minorities and free thinkers. It is more important than ever to protect bookstores.
Danny Caine shares his experience interviewing and understanding twelve independent bookstores across the globe. Each one faces both similar and unique problems. The main antagonist in this book is, you guessed it, Amazon. Amazon is possibly the worst enemy to bookstores, authors, publishers, and readers. Because they are an online store, there is no physical store to shop in, no booksellers, no magic. Also, because they are a multi-billion dollar company, they can afford to create dangerous warehouses and working conditions to get your book as fast as possible. This creates an impossible expectation for bookstores, which causes business to slow and even close.
This includes libraries. The extreme right has made a mission of silencing anybody and anything that disagrees with them or makes them “uncomfortable.” Libraries are currently a main target with the banning of books. According to the Every Library Institute, a total of 816 books were decidedly banned from school and public libraries in 2022. Sixty-eight of those were from Utah school districts, the main ones being Washington and Alpine School District. Many of these books highlight experiences of queer and POC discrimination. We, as booksellers, have a duty to make these books accessible to those who need them.
All twelve of the bookstores in this book have amazing histories that show we aren’t going down without a fight. One I would like to highlight would be Moon Palace Books, in Minneapolis. It had a rough start with a lot of unknowns, much like most bookstores in this book, but Moon Palace is unique. They temporarily closed down in late May of 2020 due to the protest and ensuing riot, caused by the murder of George Floyd. In the book, the owner is said to have hung up on a Penguin Random House representative quoting “I’m sorry. I'm gonna have to go, they’re tear-gassing again.” This shows the commitment this bookstore has to their community, especially in times of pain.
This year, Weller’s will turn 95 years old. Ninety-five years of regulars, store events, recommendations, and Best Wellers such as this one. We still exist, even if we aren't on Main St. anymore. Generations have kept this store open as well as a devoted community. We ask you to not only support us, but find a local shop near where you live and support them. A small misconception is that our neighboring bookstores are enemies. We are the opposite, King's English calls us to see if we have a book in stock and we do the same. We hold each other up and stand together as a local economy. Take action. Support your local businesses.
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We recently acquired a large collection of Maya and Aztec books. Within it are some facsimiles of pictographs discovered in archeological investigations. Housed in burlap covered boxes, come accordion fold panoramas showing photographs of the pictographs in situ and paperbound explanatory volumes. Here are four: | |
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Codice Azoyu 1. El reino de Tlachinollan by Constanza Vega Sosa. 2,000 sets of this 1993 book were made. 46 folios in 38 paneled accordion folded facsimile of pictographs with explanatory text volume, housed in a decorative, not burlap, box. $175 | |
The Arion Press of San Francisco is renowned for the beauty of the hand printed works they make. In 2005, 400 copies of Albert Einstein’s Theory of Relativity were printed in black and blue ink and bound in blue linen quartos. This lovely and important book could be yours for $400 | |
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Lehrbuch der Harmonik book blows my mind. It is a Swiss publication in German from 1950, musical in general but the abundant and elaborate graphics it contains demonstrate a vast, metaphysical, relationship with harmonics. It’s thickly illustrated with detailed charts, diagrams of mind-boggling complexity. It is written by German landscape architect Hans Kayser and is a marvel of beautiful printing and brilliant design. Comes with a stiff-boarded chemise that likely fit into a slipcase. Wow! You must see it. $1000 | |
The January 28, 1850 House of Representatives Miscellaneous document No. 18 from the 31st Congress contains The Constitution of the State of Deseret from the February 1849 territorial convention. The 12 page pamphlet has been removed from a bound volume with associated rough left edge. Otherwise it is very clean. Flake 459. Scarce. $1500 | |
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I love the scarce 1936 book, Flower Folk by Anne Guthrie Bicknell, a lovely and delicately colored collection of flowers and magical beings. Facing pages contain a naturalistic image and then one including fairies, cherubs, sprites, animals and unique flower creatures. I am charmed and delighted! Without dust jacket and front endsheet (why, oh why?) $175 | |
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By Seth Dickinson
Tordotcom
Hardcover $29.99
Review by José Knighton
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Move over, Neal Stephenson, Seth Dickinson just stole your thunder with his new novel, Exordia. And when the ultimate EMP burst turns out all the lights on planet Earth, it's truly a nuclear thunder in this epic science-fiction apocalypse.
Kurdish refugee and genocide survivor, Anna Sinjari, accidentally witnesses a shapeshifing, serpentine, hydralike alien in its undisguised, natural form in Central Park. This simple observation triggers a domino-spill of cataclysmic events. Ssrin, it turns out, is an alien dissident, rebel, fleeing capture by a galaxy-spanning dominion of her own kind. And Ssrin has a secret weapon that the alien overlords will gladly exterminate all life on Earth to possess.
Being a native of the serially betrayed and dismembered nation of Kurdistan, Anna has no illusions about the reliability of representatives of the American government. She knows she's on her own. Eventually, a multinational contest of wills converges on the mountains of Kurdistan, where Canadian, Ugandan, Russian, Chinese, Iranian, and (of course) American scientists and commandos compete in suicidally failed attempts to possess and comprehend an object identified as "Blackbird." The incomprehensible Blackbird seems to have given Heisenberg's uncertainty principle a lethal ambiguity; just attempting to observe the thing generates deadly mutations. And Ssrin makes sure Anna is in the thick of it all. The only thing she dreads more than space aliens is a reunion with her mother in her home village.
Anna's dreaded reunion with her mother and the ghosts of her past ramify into a struggle for survival, not just for her and her Kurdish village, but the planet itself. In this intergalactic free-for-all, with a tale as captivating and the stakes as high as any quantum-entangled saga created by the apocalypse master himself, Seth Dickinson drops Exordia to obliterate Neal Stephenson's slack.
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By Dan Abnett
Games Workshop
Paperback $9.99
Reviewed by Thomas Moore
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After nearly twenty years, the Horus Heresy series is drawing to a close. This long-running book series serves as the backstory for the dark and somewhat ridiculous world of fiction that is the Warhammer 40,000 universe. In the heresy era, readers are presented with an age of dying hope as humanity expands into the stars, about to be irrevocably divided by treachery. The final book in the Siege of Terra set, The End and the Death: Part III, will be released later this month, completing this epic saga. Recognizing this, I wanted to write about the series as a whole, discussing each book in turn. So with that, let us both turn back time and travel far into the future to the series' inception.
Horus Rising by Dan Abnett stands as compelling science fiction in and of itself, even disregarding the goliath continuity that follows. Motivated characters, many of which are superhuman yet fittingly flawed, persist in a galaxy of undiscovered horrors. The protagonist is Garviel Loken, a space marine of the genetically enhanced legions, who speculates at truth and purpose once the wars for mankind's realm have ended, but remains a rule-follower in his service to humanity's figurehead, the Emperor ("beloved by all"). He is tested in skill on the battlefield, and tested in spirit when closely guarded secrets are brought to light. These secrets regard both the inner activities of his legion and the nature of the galaxy itself, shrouded in mystery even to those on its frontiers. Loken will be forced to reconcile his pursuit of truth with these deceptions, as will his commanding officer, Horus Lupercal.
I have now read eleven Horus Heresy books and the characterful moments within this first one remain some of my favorites in the series so far. Abnett gives us the best insight into Horus' frustrations before his fall from grace as well as the essence of his ambition, communicated masterfully in brief moments and asides. Loken and his comrades translate well as altered yet perceivably human personalities, equally presented as weaponized killers and remarkably boyish teammates. Other characters are unaugmented humans that offer relatable and much less obedient perspectives, each capturing a snippet of the human condition in a world larger than comprehension. Overall, this is the fine-tuned tale of an accomplished author determined to write a story driven by believable characters in an unbelievable setting.
Resoundingly, this is the perfect starting place for the series, whether you intend to read them all, the first three, or just a few that look interesting. Were you to only read one, this would not be the wrong choice.
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Click here for our January events newsletter.
And, as always, view our events calendar to see all of our upcoming events.
We host both virtual and in-person events, and we look forward to seeing you soon.
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Come visit us!
SUNDAY 12-5
MONDAY-THURSDAY 10-8
FRIDAY & SATURDAY 10-9
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