8th Annual New Orleans (NOLA) Bookfair: We were there.
The 8th Annual New Orleans (NOLA) Bookfair took place on Saturday November 7th from 10AM till 6PM on Frenchmen Street in the Marigny. For those unfamiliar with New Orleans, “Frenchmen Street” is a two-block stretch just downriver from the French Quarter with some of the best music clubs and bars in the city. The bars opened their doors to booksellers and other literary types for this bustling daytime celebration of books. Many bars cleared their dance floors to make way for tables full of books! Some nightclubs hosted readings. There were drink specials! There was even a puppet show! AK’s tables were set up outside on the corner of Chartres and Frenchmen, right next to Microcosm and PM Press, and across the street from the kid’s area with the four-headed giraffe bouncy-castle:
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Here’s the view to the left, around the corner to Microcosm’s table (they sold the shit out of those patches):
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As an exhibitor I got a free bookfair go-cup. You could bring it into any of the participating bars for various drink specials all day long! Unfortunately, or luckily depending on your point of view, I guess, I was not able to leave my station to partake of any of the drink specials—all of them helpfully listed in the nifty bookfair program booklet put together by the NOLA Bookfair organizer, Robin Stricklin. (Yay! Robin. Thanks for letting AK ship all of our books to your house and then you bringing them to the event for us. That was awesome.)
I sold two copies of I Want To Punch Your Face. Everybody loved it:
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There was a brass band and a confrontation with the police. Overall, it was a very enjoyable day. Being outside in nice weather with a bunch of even nicer people. With books. What more could you ask for?
Well… I had half a muffaletta!
Which reminds me.
There is another sandwich that is ubiquitous in New Orleans, the poboy. The New York Times just ran an article about the Poboy Preservation Festival. My favorite quote from that, and one that underscores part of my love and longing for New Orleans:
“I can’t imagine there’s another American food item that owes its birth to labor violence,” Dr. Mizell-Nelson said. “That’s the forgotten story.”