by MainStreetBooks | Nov 6, 2015 | Bookstore Lady, Mansfield
Thanks to the modern majesty that is Facebook, I was reminded yesterday that five years ago, I was laid off from my job at the PowerHouse Arena bookstore in Brooklyn. I had worked there for two months. The manager told me, in her clipped German accent, that because I was the last full-timer to be hired, I was the first to go. I nodded politely until I thought my head might fall off, saying “yes, I understand,” again and again as she repeated the same bad news several times over, just worded differently. I went through the rest of the day feeling slightly detached from anything going on around me, telling myself this wasn’t the beginning of the end. When I got home I called my dad and cried. Then I went to a Guy Fawkes party in Crown Heights at the house of someone whose name I’ve forgotten, though I do remember they had a chicken coop in the front yard. I stalked around the bonfire all night, angry, drinking straight from a wine bottle. The next afternoon I posted on Facebook: “Sleeping the till-noon sleep of the unemployed.” Not long after, I came home. It is fitting then, that on the anniversary of the day my brief tenure in New York began to collapse, I am featured in a short film about my hometown’s downtown revival. Six months after I moved home from New York, I got a job here, at Main Street Books. Once I was ready to take over as manager, I had another interview with the shop’s owner, John Fernyak. At the end of...
by MainStreetBooks | Jun 30, 2015 | Bookstore Lady, Mansfield
A good number of people come in the store and wonder aloud how great a job it must be to run a bookstore. The answer, in short: it’s a dream job. From here many of these same book-lovers ask how I got into the business, so here’s the history of The Bookstore Lady. When it first occurred to me that being a bookseller would be a pretty rad way to earn a living, I was a high schooler, and I was in the very bookstore I now run. I was sitting by the window in the book loft on a rainy Saturday, looking down at the alley below. Yeah, I could do this, I thought to myself. And let’s be honest, with multiple-librarian family who dressed their only daughter as a bookworm for her first Halloween, what choice did I have? My first bookstore gig was at Second Story Books in Dupont Circle, Washington DC. It carried only used books that were shelved and stacked in every available space and with questionable logic. We had first editions and rare copies that were locked in a series of glass cases, and each had its own set of keys, identical to all the others on one comically large key ring. I never guessed right one on the first try. I was always put on the weeknight closing shift with G–, because no one else could stand him, but I would listen to him talk about his cats. A few years later I got a job at The Globe Corner Bookstore in Cambridge, Mass, which carried travel guides, travel literature, and maps...
by MainStreetBooks | Jun 19, 2015 | Events, Mansfield
The Downtown Mansfield Scavenger Hunt is back in July 2015! For the entire month of July, kids can search for the image of one of the Carrousel animals in businesses around the downtown area. Prizes can be claimed after finding certain a certain number of them. On Saturday, August 1 we’ll have a party at the Carrousel for everyone who found the animal 20 or more times with carrousel rides, cookies, and prizes. Main Street Books is again teaming up with The Richland Carrousel Park and Richland Source. The event runs July 1- July 31, is FREE, and open to all. Now, allow us to introduce Bananas the Monkey, Mansfield’s Pioneering Primate! You’ll recognize Bananas from the Richland Carrousel Park where she hides beneath the giraffe’s leaf saddle. There’s only so much you can see from under there! Bananas is a curious little monkey and wants to see the sights, but she would like some friends to go with her. She needs an intrepid group of explorers to help her discover our city. We have hidden Banana’s picture all around downtown — find as many as you can in the month of July to prove your adventurous spirit. On August 1st at the Carrousel, Bananas will pick her exploration team. Welcome to the jungle! How to participate: Check out the Richland Source interactive exploration map of downtown Mansfield showing all the stores hiding a picture of Bananas. Pick up the paper map and checklist of businesses at Main Street Books or the Richland Carrousel Park. Find Bananas in the participating businesses and get your map stamped or signed. When you...
