The are many reasons I love books: for the worlds they show me, for the things they teach me, for the way they feel in my hands or in my satchel, for the way they look decorating my house, for the questions they arouse from my children, for their mystery, for their cold or warm truths, for their lies, for their promise. But mostly I just love being transported to some place outside of my everyday life.
Edith Pearlman pg267
Diversity is not the Booksmith's mission; it just happens - the town is home to people of all ages, ethnic groups, skin colors, degrees of education, degrees of craziness. All are welcome here, as long as they keep their voices reasonably low and
their clothing mostly on.
Les Standiford pg313
It was close to five, and time for a drink, I thought. Another sultry summer afternoon in Miami, circa 1981. Thunderheads boiled over the Everglades a few miles west, promising a downpour any minute. No point in hanging around the office any longer. Business was lousy. Who needed a private eye in a town where everything is public?
And that is when she came in.
"I'm sorry," she said as she appeared in the doorway. She was a trim brunette with curls and the kind of figure that makes men want to write sonnets. "I knocked," she said, "but it looks like your girl is gone for the day."
Gone for the year. I wanted to tell her, and still wanting her last two weeks' pay, but why shake a client's confidence? I pointed to a chair.
She sat down and crossed her legs. I admired the process. "How can I hep you?"
She dabbed at her eyes with a tissue. "It's my boyfriend," she began,
"There's always a boyfriend," I muttered.
She looked at me plaintively. "His affection have been alienated."
I nodded. "So he's fooling around, and you want me to find out who with?"
She shook her head, "It's worse than that," she said, "He wants to open up a bookstore. It's all he thinks about."
I leaned back absorbing it all. "So you want to have him Baker Acted. Why didn't you just say so?"
She dropped her gaze. "It's all so shameful," she said. Out on the street a klaxon sounded.
What's a Klaxon? I wondered.
"He'd been going to law school," she was saying, "And then, when that didn't work out, he started teaching high school English. But I know that was only because he got to read books and talk about them." She looked up, shaking her head. "Now he wants to sell them. He's in love with books." Tears were running down her cheeks. "Books and books," she said helplessly.
I came around my desk and put a hand on her shoulder. "Listen," I said. "I'm just a fictional character, so I'm prejudiced, But your boyfriend....what's his name?"
"Kaplan," she said, "Mitchell Kaplan."
"Right," I told her. "What this Kaplan's doing is important, Books are important."
"But this is Miami," she said. "People fish. They drive fast boats. They commit fantastical crimes. They don't
read."
"That could change," I said. "This Kaplan's a smart guy."
"How would you know that?" she said.
"Well, he picked you, didn't he?"
(Interesting way to introduce the bookseller Mitchell Kaplan of Books & Books through a fictional character Exley from one of his Miami crime novels)
