Hospitable books with a strong sense of welcome

[00:00:00] ANNE BOGEL: Hey readers, I'm Anne Bogel and this is What Should I Read Next?. Welcome to the show that's dedicated to answering the question that plagues every reader, what should I read next? We don't get bossy on this show. What we will do here is give you the information you need to choose your next read. Every week we'll talk all things books and reading and do a little literary matchmaking with one guest.

Today's guest is joining me from Texas, where she works as a bookseller and marketing director for a local independent bookstore.

Adrianne Carnes has a long-standing interest in hospitality that took root when she was just a kid, traveling and staying in hotels with her parents. She once thought she'd make that her career, and while that wasn't to be, she never lost her love for hospitality.

[00:01:03] That love has a big impact on her reading life today. She loves creating an inviting space for the readers who frequent her shop, and she appreciates a similar experience in her own reading life.

She enjoys finding books that offer her as a reader a warm welcome. She also enjoys reading about the field, so a book set in a hotel or restaurant always jumps out at her and frequently makes its way onto her TBR.

Adrianne shares something today that I really relate to, and I think many of you will as well. She says sometimes she feels that when it comes to choosing and enjoying her next read, she feels like she's drinking from a fire hose because of the massive availability of interesting books that she would truly like to read.

Today we discuss how we know we've found a title that feels worth spending time on, one that truly invites us to settle in and enjoy. And throughout our conversation, we're sharing and seeking books that both offer a sense of hospitality and welcome and also explore that world. Let's get to it.

Adrianne, welcome to the show.

ADRIANNE CARNES: Thank you.

[00:02:04] ANNE: I'm so excited to talk books with you today. When our team saw your submission, so thanks for responding to the call, when we saw your take on books and hospitality, everyone said, "Anne, you talk about this all the time. Do you want to talk to Adrianne?" And I said, "Yes, I think I do." So thank you so much.

ADRIANNE: Oh, how fun! You're welcome. I'm thrilled.

ANNE: I've been looking forward to this. Adrianne, tell us a little bit about yourself. We want to give the readers a glimpse of who you are when you're not on What Should I Read Next?.

ADRIANNE: Well, I live in Texas with my family. I'm married. My husband and I have three kids. We have a 26-year-old son, a 15-year-old daughter, and a 6-year-old son. So we are doing so many things with the kids. But family is very important to us and our home is very important to us. We spend a lot of time there with everybody.

What I want to tell you about myself regarding what we're doing here is that my very first major in college was hotel and restaurant management, because I was fortunate enough as a young person to travel with my parents and I adore a good hotel.

[00:03:18] When we travel now, my husband wants to go out and do all the things, I want to stay in the hotel and just cover every corner of it. I love traveling. I love hotels. And I think I would actually make an excellent concierge. It's just something fun.

So hospitality is something that I really enjoy and that I have a passion for. I haven't lost that passion, although my career took me in a different direction for about 25 years.

Now, I'm currently a marketing facilitator and bookseller at a local independent bookstore in Birney, Texas. It's so much fun. I feel like, well, it combines my love of reading with my passion for hospitality. Because, you know, while I can recommend books to people and be surrounded by books while I'm at work, I can also offer hospitality to all of our customers as they come in. It's the best of both worlds for me.

ANNE: Ooh, okay. So much to talk about, Adrianne. First, let's go back in time. What is it... Are you even able to say what is it about a good hotel that captures you? Maybe there was a formative experience when you were young and traveling with your parents.

[00:04:32] ADRIANNE: I don't think so. But I think the environment, you know, if it captures all of my senses when I'm walking in, then I'm hooked. If it smells delightful, if it's gorgeous, if I have an exceptional greeting. It's the level of service, I believe, that really makes a good hotel for me, as well as a beautiful setting, of course.

ANNE: Now, as you're talking about hospitality, I have a feeling that when you say level of service that you're not talking about luxury per se.

ADRIANNE: No, not necessarily. But I guess it's the way that the space makes me feel, which is what I want to translate to what we're doing at the bookstore. But the way that the space makes me feel is everything.

ANNE: Something that I don't think I really learned... Now this could be a function of age, but something I don't think I really learned until I went out on book tour for I'd Rather Be Reading in 2018, and it's not something that was unique to the I'd Rather Be Reading tour, I think it was just a function of visiting so many stores in a short period of time. I went to 20 something.

ADRIANNE: Wow.

[00:05:34] ANNE: Which was a joy. But I don't think it was until then that I realized that every bookstore has its own personality. They may have similar merchandise, although some stores differ more than others, and they're generally populated with book lovers, and yet every store feels different. I imagine this is something you understand well.

What kind of personality are you all trying to cultivate in your bookstore?

ADRIANNE: Oh, that's such a great question and I think the answer would differ depending on who you ask in our bookstore.

ANNE: I'm asking you.

ADRIANNE: Well, we want everybody to feel welcome. I believe that what I want to do is have our customers feel like we have curated and presented the most inviting buffet of books, so that when they're selecting what is right for them they feel like we understand them as a reader.

So we have a very wide variety in our store. We have a huge children's section, we've got a lot of nonfiction, lots of fiction, speculative fiction. And I'm just hoping that the readers feel welcome, that we're friendly, we're knowledgeable, and they feel like they're understood as a reader because they're able to find books that they feel like are right for them.

[00:06:50] ANNE: And as someone who can appreciate how a hotel or a business can take a feeling and then engineer how to make that feeling tangible for, in this case, a reader walking through the doors, I'd love to hear a concrete way or two that you all enact this in your space.

ADRIANNE: That's a hard one. I'll try.

ANNE: Also, I think I already have a book for you, but okay, let's see.

ADRIANNE: Oh, yay. So for me, what's really important is what happens when a customer walks into the door immediately. That there's a physical space for them to decompress for just a minute, realize, okay, what's back there is back there, now I'm here.

Everybody comments on the smell which is nothing that we provide but it's just the smell of paper and books. That does something for almost everybody who walks in that everyone says, Oh, I love the smell of a bookstore.

[00:07:50] So as soon as they've walked in, they've already had two sensory experiences as far as the way it smells and a feeling of decompression.

We have classical music that plays in the background, so they're not distracted by a lot of noise. And when you walk in, it's somewhat of a foyer. I mean, it's a commercial space, but we have a big dining room table in front that has the new releases on it. So the visual experience when you walk in is important.

Then the greeting that comes behind the counter I feel like is equally important. So we have, you know, most of the senses covered right when you walk in. And as far as taste, you know, you can grab a chocolate on your way out, and then we've covered all of them.

But I feel like keeping the store tidy, keeping the displays purposeful and easy to navigate is another way that we try to make a tangible, hospitable experience for the customers.

ANNE: Now, Adrianne, tell us about your reading life. What does that look like for you right now?

[00:08:56] ADRIANNE: Well, I spent a lot of time thinking about this question, and what I came up with is that my reading life right now is probably the thing that stimulates my appetite for life. Because it's the one thing with its diverse selection of all the books, it entertains me, it restores me, offers me comfort, and educates me. It just kind of does all the things, like I said, that stimulates my appetite for life.

I feel like when I'm reading a book I want the book to feel like the author has invited me into their space to tell me a story, maybe even offer me a latte, maybe even offer me a cookie. I guess it's a form of social activity for me in a way with an author because when I'm sitting down to read that I literally am picturing myself just listening to what the author has to say.

I read in the morning, throughout the day, before I go to bed, and I actually often feel like I'm drinking from a fire hose because there's so much availability of interesting books that I want to read, and slowing down is a very difficult thing for me to do.

[00:10:11] So I feel like all of these books and I want to read them all and there's so many stories to hear. So it often feels like I'm drinking from a fire hose.

ANNE: I find that relatable. What contributes to the feeling of... I mean, often on the podcast, I find myself using the words of a pleasant abundance versus an oppressive overwhelm.

ADRIANNE: Nice.

ANNE: So where does that sense of excess come from?

ADRIANNE: I think it's a function of everything. I think it is part personality because I can just tend to be in a hurry. That's just the way I am. So I want to know what's next, what's next, what's next.

I do want to read new releases so that I'm able to talk to the customers and let them know what I've read because they all will say, "Have you read this yet? Have you read this yet?" And I want to be knowledgeable and able to discuss the books that are available.

I also have a couple of book clubs that I'm in, so I read books for those. I do have friends that we like to talk about books that aren't necessarily in any of those other categories that I mentioned.

So I want to talk about all the books with all the people, and in order to do that, I have to read all the books. So I do just feel like, okay, I want to get through this one so that I can do the next one so that I can talk about it with the next person, and then this one and talk about it with this person. It's just a social activity.

[00:11:35] ANNE: And yet it's impossible to read all the books. So how do you decide?

ADRIANNE: Impossible. Well, I have to take a minute. I have to be conscious and intentional and realize, Okay, you know, what's coming up next that I want to participate in? I don't participate in things that I don't want to do. But what book organization, what book club, what program am I doing next that I want to read these books for? And then I just lay them out literally like on a calendar, Okay, I need to do this one next this one next this one next.

And I don't get to them all, of course. I don't read all those new releases and I don't read all the books my friends are reading. So I just read what's kind of lined up and scheduled for me next.

Then I think about what I said a minute ago. If I'm imagining an author telling me a story, how rude of me to think, Hurry, hurry, hurry, I want to hear the next guy. So I have to think to myself, "Hey, someone's telling you a story. Settle down, look them in the eye, and listen." And I just sit down and read the books.

ANNE: And how's that going for you?

[00:12:38] ADRIANNE: It's going good. I mean, I get distracted. I just have to remind myself of that often. But when I do that, it goes very well.

ANNE: Okay, I'm just noting that you feel you have an excess already, and yet it's my job today, is it not, to recommend more titles that are not already on your radar?

ADRIANNE: That's so true.

ANNE: I'm looking forward to this, and yet also, should I feel guilty?

ADRIANNE: No, no, because I'm going to plug them in appropriately. And the thing is, when I'm reading the book that works the best for me, it's easier to do. Maybe this is what you're trying to get at. But the thing about historical fiction for me also is sometimes I like historical fiction, but sometimes it is too graphically described. You know, the subject is dark or the people are oppressed or it's just a hard subject.

So I want to rush through that because I'm not enjoying it. So I feel like if I'm enjoying the book, it's a lot easier for me to just settle down. Sure, I want to rush through the pages because I want to know what's going on or I want to just... you know, it enthralls me, but I don't want to move away. So picking the right book is essential to it. So you're going to be perfect at this.

[00:13:49] ANNE: Adrianne, that really resonates with me because also I know that I'm never going to be able to read all the things that I, in theory, wish I could read. And yet, when I'm reading a book and I feel like, Yes, this is a good use of my reading time, I feel like that is what choosing wisely looks like.

ADRIANNE: Exactly.

ANNE: And also, sometimes I chose poorly, and that's very educational. That's not necessarily terrible, unless I persist in doing that over and over and over and over, which means, like, I'm doing something wrong. I'm not accepting the readerly reality I'm living in right now if I keep doing that. But that sense, like, I'm not going to get to it all, but this one I'm glad I got to, that's what I want to find.

ADRIANNE: Yes, that's perfect. And that's why I'm here.

ANNE: Well, I'm so excited to hear the books you chose today. You know how this works. You're going to tell me three books you love, one book you don't, what you've been reading lately, and we are going to recommend three books, I believe, on a theme. So would you tell me how you chose the books you're bringing to the show today?

[00:14:47] ADRIANNE: I have a bookshelf in my house that are, you know, my forever books. If I read something that I just can't imagine parting with, they go there. So I looked at all of those books because I figured, well, if I'm going to talk about the ones that I love, they're going to be on the shelf.

So anyway I went to that shelf and realized there were several on this topic of hospitality and the ones that I often think about and refer to and haven't left my mind yet are the ones that I picked. Or three of the ones that I picked.

ANNE: Okay well I am excited to hear where this takes us today. Adrianne, tell me about the first book you love.

ADRIANNE: The first book that I love was The Maid by Nita Prose. I love this book because it's set in a hotel, which I love most books set in a hotel.

ANNE: We already know that's a strong start.

ADRIANNE: Exactly. But also, it's about a maid named Molly. She's a hotel maid and she's named Molly. She has an obsessive love of cleaning and proper etiquette. And she's so cute.

[00:15:53] One of my favorite quotes from the book is "A tissue for your issue". I say it all the time. It's so funny. Because she's so persnickety and it's set in a hotel, I just couldn't stop reading it. But it has a little bit of mystery to it.

Since she struggles with social skills and she misunderstands other people's intentions, she's caught up in a murder situation that happened at the hotel and becomes the lead suspect in the murder investigation.

ANNE: A murder situation.

ADRIANNE: A murder in a hotel with a maid obsessed with cleaning. It's so cute.

ANNE: Okay, so this was tailor-made for you.

ADRIANNE: Yes, it was.

ANNE: Have you read the second book in the series, Molly the Maid Series?

ADRIANNE: Yes. I enjoyed it equally as much. It wasn't as surprising to me as the first time, so I didn't, you know, laugh as much as I did the first time, but it was equally good. I loved it.

ANNE: Okay, you knew the world you were going into.

ADRIANNE: Right.

ANNE: And you wanted to be there.

ADRIANNE: Right, exactly.

[00:16:52] ANNE: Adrianne, you pay attention to hotels, you know a lot about hotels, you studied hospitality. Do authors get the details wrong sometimes? Do they get them right? Is this something that you pay attention to?

ADRIANNE: I do pay a lot of attention to. I couldn't tell you if they get it wrong or they get it right. But what I'm paying attention to, honestly, is what the space looks like, what the characters are eating, what the characters are wearing. And if I'm lucky, the author will talk about a hotel process, you know, kind of take you through a check-in or take you through a cleaning service. That's just an extra bonus. But if I can imagine myself in the space, then I feel like they've gotten it right.

ANNE: Amazing. Okay, thank you. That helps me know what to keep an eye out for as I'm mentally scanning the horizons for what you may enjoy next.

Adrianne, what's the second book you love?

ADRIANNE: This is a nonfiction title. It's called Unreasonable Hospitality by Will Guidara. I picked it up because it's called Unreasonable Hospitality. I really didn't know much about it. But he started running the Eleven Madison Park restaurant in New York City when he was 26. And within 11 years, it became the best restaurant in the world.

[00:18:09] The book takes you through the process of how that happened, what his setbacks were, and what he overcame. He talks about his leadership style, what he calls unreasonable hospitality.

I feel like what he's teaching goes way beyond the restaurant business and can help with anybody in any industry, honestly, because it's about the extraordinary experiences that anybody can offer to the people that they encounter, especially in either a service industry or a retail industry. I just felt inspired as I was reading it. It was fascinating to me.

ANNE: Could you give us an example of the kinds of stories or insights he shares in the book? Because there's a lot of juicy little nuggets in here.

ADRIANNE: A lot of juicy little nuggets.

ANNE: Also, I was so surprised to get to the end and realize he was married to Christina Tosi. Like I had no idea.

[00:19:05] ADRIANNE: I know. Well, one of the things that's... there's several, but one of the things that stands out kind of the most for me right now is in one of his restaurants, a family had come in and they were on their way to the airport, they were leaving New York City as tourists.

And he came up to them and asked them, "You know, how was your visit to New York City? What did you like?" And the family said that they had a great time and they just wish that they had had a chance to... I think it was go sledding or something of the sort that they didn't have a lot of time to play in the snow.

So while they were eating, he rented them some snow or maybe he bought them some sleds. And quickly finished up their dinner, gave them these sleds, sent them out to the park, had them get to play in the snow on their way to the airport. It was definitely an extraordinary experience for those customers who just came in to grab a bite to eat. Very much above and beyond anything any restaurant would do and certainly nothing that those people expected.

[00:20:07] Also, one of the other stories he said is that when a customer would come into the restaurant, they would often park on the street out front and they would have to feed the meter, obviously, while they're having dinner.

Well, the person at the front of the restaurant would watch those meters and if any of them expired, they would run out and put more money in there so that people didn't have to worry about it and they could enjoy their experience in the restaurant. Those little tiny moments, I think, are so special, and I just love them. The book is filled with those. It's really fun.

ANNE: I remember the story about the hot dog, how Will Guidara runs a fine dining restaurant, and one table was lamenting how they just never got to eat hot dogs on the street like they wanted. But soon enough, they were plated up hot dogs that some staff person had, you know, run out to buy from a cart and made them all fancy, but not too fancy because that would defeat the whole point of the thing.

[00:21:03] I listened to the audio and I thought it was great in that format. Just tossing that in there for readers who want to know about such things. I can absolutely see how this ended up on your radar and it sounds like it really fulfilled what you were looking for.

What called to you about this one? What were your favorite moments?

ADRIANNE: I enjoyed the stories because I feel like when I'm reading the stories, I think, how could we do something like that at the bookstore? What could we do? But I also liked how it talked about what he ran up against. Because obviously, not everybody has this passion and desire to create extraordinary experiences.

There are accountants who think otherwise, there are attorneys who think otherwise, chefs, and just business folks that might not want to spend money in that same way. So I really liked how he talked about what he did to overcome those situations.

ANNE: All right, thank you. Adrianne, tell me about the third book you love.

ADRIANNE: The third book I love is called Love & Saffron by Kim Fay. It's a rather short book, but I picked it up primarily because it's epistolary, which is a style I usually enjoy.

[00:22:09] This book is about a 27-year-old woman who writes a fan letter to a 59-year-old magazine columnist. And in the letter she includes a little bit of saffron. They develop a friendship over several years through the exchange of letters about food and good life. It was so sweet. I adored the structure, the food descriptions, and the relationships in the book. Again, it's rather short. So, it's a quick read, but immensely satisfying.

ANNE: You picked it up primarily because it was epistolary, but I imagine also the food had a strong pull for you.

ADRIANNE: You're right. But I will read almost any epistolary. But when I saw epistolary plus saffron, I was excited.

ANNE: Okay. Tell me about your relationship with restaurant books, because it feels like we have a little bit of an overlap going here.

ADRIANNE: Yes. Well, to me, I feel like it's still the same industry, right? I mean, I love a good restaurant experience as much as I love a good hotel experience. I love food, and so reading about it excites me.

[00:23:14] Again, when you're reading a book, when I'm reading a book about a restaurant, I can just feel the service somebody is providing, the comfort that comes with the food that's plated, and it's just especially enjoyable to me.

ANNE: So as we're thinking hospitality, we don't necessarily have to think of hotel as a synonym for that?

ADRIANNE: Well, honestly, when I'm thinking about hospitality, of course I'm thinking about hotels and restaurants, but I'm also thinking about any environment that feels comfortable, that the people are intentionally working at creating extraordinary experiences.

So I'll read mysteries, I'll read historical fiction, I'll read memoirs, and non-fiction that aren't specifically related to a hotel or a restaurant as long as that feeling is there that the author probably unknowingly created of hospitality throughout the book. Does that make sense?

ANNE: It does. It does. Now Adrianne, tell me about a book that was not right for you.

[00:24:21] ADRIANNE: Well, I read The Housemaid by Frieda McFadden because it's called The Housemaid. It's about a maid. Surely she's going to create a beautiful environment for the people that she works for. Well, I was absolutely wrong. That's not what it's about.

I knew it was a thriller, and I know that when you read a thriller, these are the things that happen. But I felt manipulated. And I felt tortured because the characters behave so stinking badly. The description of the bad behavior, explicit, and they were vivid, and it just made me cringe. I appreciate Freda McFadden for what she does, but I didn't feel like there was any redeeming quality to this story. Sorry.

ANNE: It was not for you.

ADRIANNE: It wasn't for me, even if it's about a maid.

ANNE: Adrianne, what have you been reading lately?

ADRIANNE: Lately, I read Family Family by Laurie Frankel. I am almost obsessed with this book, which is not set in a hotel. Not set in a hotel and not set in a restaurant. However, what it's about is an actress who publicly says, and I'm going to read this short quote, "Now all stories of adoption are stories of pain and regret, not even most of them. Why don't we ever get that movie?"

[00:25:42] So, India, the actress, ends up saying that to the paparazzi or some form of press. She creates a media storm and draws out all types of opinions that she's not interested in. India is an adoptive mom, and she wants everyone to know that there is more to an adoptive family than pain and regret.

What I loved about this book mostly was that the author was able to describe almost all forms of adoption. She talked about teen pregnancy, same-sex marriage, single motherhood, rights being removed, and all of it, she had a positive spin on it and a hopeful spin on it and there wasn't pain in lifelong trauma that led to drugs and other bad behavior. It was beautiful. Absolutely beautiful.

Another book that I read recently is a middle grade because I really do enjoy a lot of middle-grade books as well. It's called The World-Famous Nine by Ben Guterson. I thought it was super cute because it's set in a department store, but a real wonder, a world of wonder kind of department store filled with amusement parks and museums and of course restaurants and stores, and it's super cute.

[00:27:01] But my grandmother worked in a department store all of my life and so the idea of this set inside of a store I just fell in love with.

But it's about two teens on a mission to solve a puzzling mystery in order to save the department store. So it had a little bit of puzzle work to it and I just thought it was really cute.

ANNE: My grandmother worked in a department store.

ADRIANNE: Aw.

ANNE: She had stories.

ADRIANNE: Yeah, I bet.

ANNE: Okay. Adrianne, what are you looking for in your reading life right now? So I know that we are looking for recommendations about books either set in a hotel or restaurant or books that feel especially hospitable. But what else would you like to put into that stew pot?

ADRIANNE: I think what I'm looking for, as you said, it doesn't have to be set in a hotel or a restaurant, but books for you that you felt like felt hospitable, felt like the author was inviting you into a world very graciously with open arms and a glass of tea in order to tell you a story that you completely enjoyed. Just books that feel hospitable, whether set in a hotel or not.

[00:28:09] ANNE: Adrianne. I have ideas for you. Are you ready?

ADRIANNE: Yes.

ANNE: We are gonna take a quick look back. You loved The Maid by Nita Prose, Unreasonable Hospitality, a nonfiction work by Will Guidara, and Love & Saffron by Kim Fay.

Not for you was The Housemaid by Frieda McFadden. Just because a book is about a maid doesn't mean that's the only element that will make you feel like your reading time was well spent.

And lately, you've been reading Family Family by Laurie Frankel, that you are almost obsessed with, and The World-Famous Nine by Ben Guterson.

And we're looking for books that are about or convey a deep sense of hospitality. How to choose, Adrianne? Let's start with one that I think you are uniquely positioned to appreciate. It doesn't represent the genre we've heard about today, but it is a hotel book. And this is the Beth O'Leary 2023 released The Wake Up Call. Is this a book you're familiar with?

ADRIANNE: No.

[00:29:16] ANNE: Okay. I think all I need to do is tell you about the setting and we could stop there. So this book takes place in contemporary times. It's set at the Forest Manor Hotel, which is a cozy boutique hotel and spa in the south of England.

This is a family-run business that feels more like a family, except this family is broke and the hotel is literally falling apart. So everybody loves their little world and their jobs and being in this... It feels like a world removed.

It's not like in the hustle and bustle of a city. I imagine the characters taking a long scenic drive to get there. But they don't have any money because not as many people are visiting this hotel as would be necessary, and the hotel is in great need of repair and even though the services they're putting out are top-notch, the spa is amazing, you get to know the chef, Arjun, and he talks about his dishes. And we have the staff who's so devoted to the restaurant, and at the same time, they're wondering, are we going to have a job here in a couple months?

[00:30:14] I think this is romance with a bit of women's fiction element to it. But this is an enemies-to-lover setup about two front desk workers who despise each other. Well, she despises him. It's not mutual. There's been a misunderstanding, and Beth O'Leary explains it to you in the beginning of the book. But they are forced to work the front desk together and spend a lot of time together, and she's just human sunshine and he's a little bit gruff-er, but they both really want to wow both their regular guests and newcomers.

And then we've got a little bit of a mystery plot going on with this novel because everyone in the hotel is always trying to wow their guests. And you get the impression that it's because it's their nature and also they really want the world at large to see how great their hotel is so that word will get out and people will come visit and then they will all still have jobs and have the money to fix the plaster that's like falling down from the ceiling because it needs to be repaired.

[00:31:23] So one of the front desk clerks helps reunite a guest with a wedding ring after he loses it behind, and he is so incredibly grateful. And it gets the staff thinking, well, what else could we do to engender that kind of appreciation on the part of our guests? Because we want people to feel seen as guests, but also as people, and cared for, and that we care about their whole selves, and we're looking out for everything they need.

So they hit up the Lost and Found box, and they find four more wedding rings. And Izzy is like, "Okay, here's what we're going to do. We are going to reunite these people with their lost wedding rings." And it becomes a whole thing, and it takes off on social media, and there's a lot of attention to the hotel.

You know, meanwhile, we have these two front desk characters who may not want to, but are definitely, well, engaging in tons of witty banter, and also maybe falling in love just a little bit. How does that sound to you?

ADRIANNE: Anne, not to give you any pressure, but it sounds like perfection. Absolute perfection.

[00:32:25] ANNE: I'm glad to hear it. Beth O'Leary said that this story wasn't originally in her publication calendar with her publisher, but it came to her and she wrote it because it brought her so much joy. And it came out in 2023. It was the book that wasn't meant to be that she was really excited to put out into the world.

ADRIANNE: I love it.

ANNE: I'm glad to hear it. Now, I really want to take you in a direction that we're not expecting to go.

ADRIANNE: Okay.

ANNE: I keep thinking of a memoir by Ann Hood called Fly Girl. Have you read this? Do you know this?

ADRIANNE: I know it, but I haven't read it.

ANNE: Okay, well this is a story about people at work. She's a flight attendant. Ann Hood is also a novelist. She has a book that came out in May called The Stolen Child that I've heard good things about but haven't read yet.

Ann Hood knew from a young age that she wanted to be a writer. And she knew that writers needed material and she was like, Well, what am I going to do? I'm just a girl from Rhode Island. I don't know anything interesting. Nothing interesting happens here."

[00:33:22] So she decided she was going to get that material by getting a cool job that would take her around the world. She wanted to be a flight attendant. Then she was called a stewardess because she worked between 1978 and 1986. These jobs were hard to get at the time.

I don't believe it's easy to be a flight attendant now, but at the time she was hired, the interview process was rigorous. There were a lot of antiquated physical requirements as well. Statistically speaking, it was harder to get into the flight attendant career path than it was to secure admission to Harvard back then.

So, she crisscrossed the country and the world and she took care of planes and especially their passengers. So, in this book, she shares all these anecdotes and she says, like, Hey, I go to cocktail parties and people say, what do you do? And she'll say, I'm a novelist. And they have no idea what to say next to her.

But if she tosses out, like, "Oh, I was a stewardess back in the day," like, oh, people have questions. They want to know which works because she has stories. And these pages are filled with her stories. And she is telling a bit of a history as she outlines really massive changes that happened in the industry during that crucial eight-year period between '78 and '86. But mostly she's telling stories about what she saw in the air.

[00:34:42] And it's not non-stop hospitality. Sometimes it's about staying safe and staying well, but also she's talking about creating the passenger experience and managing people's comfort and their perception of what's happening on the plane, which might be different from what's happening on the plane.

And you see how she's caring for people when they're, you know, really anticipating something great, like people on their honeymoons and going on vacation and traveling to weddings, but also how she sees people often at their most vulnerable. And she shares some really touching stories about that as well. How does this sound to you?

ADRIANNE: Oh, it sounds wonderful. I can't wait.

ANNE: We have to talk about Babette's Feast, but then I need to tell you about more of a shop book as well. Have you read Babette's Feast? Have you seen the movie?

ADRIANNE: No, I don't know this.

ANNE: This is a Danish novella that is perhaps also known as one of those literary works for which the movie upon which it is based outshines the original source material. I'm just saying this is true that it's commonly discussed that way. Readers, you don't have to fight me in comments, but I'm interested in your perception.

[00:35:51] But this is a Danish novella, it was published in 1958, and there is a very well-known and highly regarded movie based on this source material. It's by Isak Dinesen, that is the pen name for a Dane named Karen Blixen, and it's about a woman named Babette.

And what we know is that many years ago, well I believe it's something like 15 in the book's timeline, she traveled from Paris to seek refuge for unnamed reasons with two sisters in a tiny Norwegian village.

The sisters are part of a religious order, they are very strict, they live a very puritanical life, they teach her to make very austere food. And they live a very structured life that doesn't exactly reek of sensuality and pleasure. It's a good life. It's a strict life.

So, 15 years into this life that has largely been the same year after year, Babette wins 10,000 francs in the French lottery. She gets a letter and she finds out she has all this money. And we find out that she used to be a chef in Paris, and now she has 10,000 francs. They think, they fear, the townspeople, that she may use the money to return to Paris. But instead, she begins ordering food and wine. And she hosts this, lavish does not begin to cover it, dinner for 12 of the local villagers.

[00:37:26] She's recreating, though they don't know this until the end, the sort of meal, perhaps the exact meal that she used to serve at her esteemed restaurant in Paris. So these Norwegian villagers have been eating fish and soup and gruel, and suddenly they are feasting on the finest food that a city like Paris could offer.

At the end of the evening... Well, let's talk about the middle of the evening, the experience of being served this lovingly prepared food by Babette and enjoying it together transforms everyone at the table. Rifts and feuds that have been going on for as long as Babette has been there are suddenly overridden with love and warmth and just a totally different atmosphere. It is a magical meal.

And at the end, they say, "What are you going to do with the rest of the money?" And she says, "What rest of the money? I spent it. I spent it. This was it." It's a really beautiful novella. And it is a novella. You could be done with this by lunchtime. How does that sound to you?

ADRIANNE: It sounds like I'll be done with it by lunchtime. I can't wait.

ANNE: I'm not sad about that. Please see the movie after you read the novella.

ADRIANNE: Okay.

[00:38:38] ANNE: Finally, I need to tell you about a new book that, as someone who works in a bookstore, this may already be on your radar. Friends, it was in the Summer Reading Guide that came out in May. It is Shopkeeping by Peter Miller. Do you know this one yet, Adrianne?

ADRIANNE: No. Well, I saw it in your Reading Guide, but I don't know it.

ANNE: Well, I want to highlight it for you. So Peter Miller is a shopkeeper. He owns the architectural bookstore Peter Miller Books in Seattle. And of course, now I want to go having read about it. But he says, Nobody ever hears from a shopkeeper. You know, we talk about all kinds of experiences and we have all sorts of, you know, tales of people at work and instruction manuals. Think of this as my instruction manual of sorts as a shopkeeper.

And I'm sure that his bookstore is not like your bookstore. He sells radios and $300 lamps for once, timepieces, and he's really into Danish housewares. But oh... I kind of like that through line to Babette's Feast. But I love to understand how things work. I think you do, too, as someone who says like, okay, this is the experience I want to create or this is the experience I'm having, how did we get there?

[00:39:45] He talks about his experience of creating a shop and creating the shop experience for his guests and what he notices when he visits shops. And something he says in the beginning is like, "Hey, you probably haven't been to my store, but you've been in a shop? I bet you've been in a shop. Let me tell you some things that you might not have thought to articulate, but you will recognize." And it's so interesting.

He talks, for example, about how if you walk into a shop and it's not ready, you feel it, and it feels weird, and how that's very, very different than a shot feeling perfect. You don't need it to feel perfect. You don't maybe even want it to feel perfect, but you know when something is ready and when something is not. So what makes it feel ready? What is it that draws people in?

He's been doing what he's been doing for 45 years, and he's sharing insights from his own business, but also things he has developed a whole philosophy on by virtue of thinking about his work, learning from others, visiting lots of shops around the entire world.

[00:40:46] This is also very much a book about curation, choosing what to gather, choosing what to present to people when there are so many options. How do you decide what to feature to your guests?

It's also about why public spaces like shops matter. And he has some observations about what makes a shop a shop, how his shop interacts with not just their clientele, but also the people who walk down the street and don't necessarily come in, but who still value the shop for things it offers them.

Like he talks about how for many, many years, they had a clock on the wall inside the shop and they took it down for a time for some reason and people would come in and say, "Where's the clock? I relied on your clock. What happened to your clock? Do you not want me to know what's up? What are you doing? Do you not care about being a good neighbor?" But he shares all these reflections on public spaces.

And something I said in unboxing is I'm a big urban planning nerd. I love to read about sidewalks and intersections and how the invisible to us often way our public spaces are designed impact our experience.

[00:41:51] I really love it when a talented writer like Jeff Speck we hosted on the podcast can describe sidewalks to me in such a way that makes the invisible, untangible aspects of my experience visible and tangible. And I feel like Peter Miller's doing the same thing with shops with this book. How does that sound?

ADRIANNE: That sounds great. I read recently Reading the Room: A Bookseller's Tale by Paul Yamazaki.

ANNE: I don't know this, but I'm going to jot it down.

ADRIANNE: What you just described sounds like what I was hoping Reading the Room would be. It's quite different, but I'm excited about what you described.

ANNE: Interesting. Well, this is a very short book. You can read it very quickly. It's a beautiful little small format hardcover. Also, some of you are going to want to know that there are lots of books mentioned that you will probably want to read next, especially some little Japanese volume that he says he sells to everybody and recommends all the time.

He tells a great story about selling someone who cares about such things very expensive books. But they want the best ones too, and this inexpensive little Japanese novel makes its way into the stack. And the guy says, You can sell me anything. You can make all this money. And this is what you want." And Peter Miller's like, "It's the best. What do you want me to do? It's the best."

[00:43:00] So you're going to want to read that one when you're done. But there's a nice little index with lots of further reading as well.

Adrianne, I hope those were some books that were very much what you were hoping for and some that maybe you were not expecting to go in that direction. But of those books, what do you think? So we have The Wake Up Call by Beth O'Leary, Fly Girl by Ann Hood, Babette's Feast by Isak Dinesen, and Shopkeeping by Peter Miller. Of those books, what do you think you'll pick up next?

ADRIANNE: I'm excited about all the books, honestly. But I think I'm going to read Shopkeeping. I think I'm going to read that next.

ANNE: I'm excited to hear it. I can't wait to hear what you think.

ADRIANNE: Yeah, me too.

ANNE: Thanks so much for talking books with me today.

ADRIANNE: Thank you, Anne. It's been a lot of fun.

[00:43:44] ANNE: Hey readers, I hope you enjoyed my conversation with Adrianne, and I'd love to hear what you think she should read next. We share her social media link and the full list of titles we talked about today at WhatShouldIReadNextPodcast.com.

Follow our show on Instagram @WhatShouldIReadNext, and be sure to tag your favorite summer reads with MMDSummerReading so we can see what you are loving lately.

You'll find me on Instagram and my personal account, that's @AnneBogel.

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Thanks to the people who make this show happen. What Should I Read Next? is created each week by Will Bogel, Holly Wielkoszewski, and Studio D Podcast Production. Readers, that's it for this episode. Thanks so much for listening. And as Rainer Maria Rilke said, "Ah, how good it is to be among people who are reading." Happy reading, everyone.