WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.100 --> 00:00:14.780 [upbeat music] Welcome back to Taste Land. I am Francis Zehrer. And I'm Daisy Alioto. Daisy, who are we speaking with today? Today we're speaking with James Webster. 2 00:00:14.900 --> 00:00:21.800 He's the co-owner of Recluse Books in Dallas/Fort Worth, which is an indie bookstore that he started with his wife, Josie. 3 00:00:22.520 --> 00:00:31.040 And he previously worked in book marketing for Deep Vellum, Dalkey Archive, Seven Stories, and other presses that you might have heard of. 4 00:00:31.800 --> 00:00:41.580 I have actually been wanting to learn a bit about the, what it takes to run a bookstore recently. I think we talked about this a couple weeks ago. 5 00:00:41.610 --> 00:00:52.820 I brought it up, and we're gonna probably talk about it in the episode too, but my favorite local bookstore in my hometown burned down. And so the economics of running a bookstore have been weighing on my mind recently. 6 00:00:52.980 --> 00:01:00.360 I think it's a dream for a lot of people, but the reality is, uh, quite difficult. Mm-hmm. And I'm sure that we'll get into that. 7 00:01:00.720 --> 00:01:11.200 And [laughs] I- before we jumped on, I asked you if you'd done anything Italian lately, and you said you're watching the Olympics, which are in Milan. Uh, I- And Cortina. Don't forget Cortina. Sorry. My... How could I? 8 00:01:11.759 --> 00:01:21.580 [laughs] Um, I, [laughs] Ben and I started rewatching Sorrentino films, some of which- Mm... I'd seen, some of which I had not seen, and that was really fun. 9 00:01:21.720 --> 00:01:31.400 And that kind of put me, uh, it reminded me that there was a book that I wanted to read called Gomorrah, which is about- Mm. Um, it's not about the Sicilian mob. 10 00:01:31.430 --> 00:01:40.740 It's actually about mafia activity in and around Naples, and it came out a while ago, like early 2000s, I think. But- I've read... I've, I've not read the book. 11 00:01:40.780 --> 00:01:51.660 I didn't know there was a book, but I've seen the movie a few times. Yeah, and then the, the show Gomorrah that was on Netflix was, like, very, very, very loosely based on it. Um- There's a show of it too. Yeah. 12 00:01:52.420 --> 00:02:07.720 So I was like, "Let's keep this party going." Um, and 'cause we'd watched some of the more historical Sorrentino films that are based on, like, actual Italian politicians, um, Il Divo was what kind of kicked it off. 13 00:02:08.460 --> 00:02:21.560 And yeah, I've been enjoying that. And then we went out to a kind of Italian steakhouse in our area for Valentine's Day, and Ben looked around and remarked that he wished it was more Italian. 14 00:02:21.740 --> 00:02:29.950 I was like, [laughs] "I don't know. I don't know what that means or if, whether either of us is qualified to make that-" [laughs] "... um, proclamation," but that seems to be where our heads are at. 15 00:02:29.960 --> 00:02:39.240 Is he, is he at all Italian himself? [lips smack] No, he's only Italian by marriage. Mm. [laughs] Oh, man. And I remind him that all the time. Mm-hmm. 16 00:02:39.640 --> 00:02:49.740 I had a lovely Italian meal, um, last weekend, week, week and a half ago, Il Gigante here- Okay... in beautiful Ridgewood, and they... 17 00:02:49.980 --> 00:02:59.780 There's one dish on the menu that is my favorite dish, but, like, every other time I go, I get something else. I'm like, "Oh, I should try this new thing," you know? I'm sure you do this as well. 18 00:02:59.800 --> 00:03:06.880 There's, like, the one thing you like, "I should try this new thing." And I got a, you know, good mushroom lasagna. 19 00:03:06.900 --> 00:03:21.500 It was good, but I was with my sister, and she got the gramigna, which is this dish that's so good, and it's, like, these small curly noodles in this, like, sweet sagey sausage sauce. Um, and I had a bite of hers, and- 20 00:03:22.580 --> 00:03:29.820 Yeah... I felt like a fool. You engaged in the illusion of choice. I engaged in the illusion of choice. E- all paths lead back to gramigna. Yeah. 21 00:03:29.920 --> 00:03:37.860 You keep going out and trying other stuff to see if it's better than the gramigna, but it's like- [laughs]... you have gramigna at home. You know what I mean? We have gramigna at home. People could learn a lot from that. 22 00:03:38.440 --> 00:03:55.670 And we have James in the lobby, so let's talk to him. Let's let him in. [upbeat music] What are your best sellers right now? What's selling best at the bookstore? Mm. Pick a special one. 23 00:03:55.670 --> 00:04:11.200 Um, so our, like, overall best-selling book, uh, is a, like, a Two Dollar Radio, who are a small press based in Columbus, Ohio. Um, it's one of their books. It's called The Deeper the Water, The Uglier the Fish. Um, 24 00:04:12.320 --> 00:04:27.270 and it is a debut novel. Uh, it's one of my wife's staff picks. Mm. Um, she's the one, Josie's the one with taste, uh, not me. So The Deeper the Water, The Uglier the Fish is about a 16-year-old, uh, 25 00:04:28.780 --> 00:04:46.440 who finds their mother, uh, at the, like, scene of, uh, an attempt on her own life. And, uh, it's basically, like, an exploration of family dynamics and, and grief, and it has a very, like, sinister sense of humor. 26 00:04:47.060 --> 00:05:02.380 We w- we're big fans of, uh, of, of Black comedy here, um, at Recluse Books LLC. So that's our, that's our overall bestseller. Um- Wait, did you say it was $2 also? Two Dollar Radio is the name of the publisher. 27 00:05:02.960 --> 00:05:14.760 Oh, okay. [laughs] Um, they're, they're based in Columbus, Ohio. Uh, they're, they do a lot of, like, uh, a lot of cool translation stuff. Uh, they do a lot of, like, local Ohio stuff too. 28 00:05:15.320 --> 00:05:27.570 Probably best known for launching the career of Hanif Abdurraqib- Mm... um, who is, like, basically inescapable at this point, a rather genius. I did read There's Always This Year- Mm-hmm... 29 00:05:27.570 --> 00:05:40.080 which was really good, his memoir. Yeah. I've, I've heard him read from that, um, twice now, and both times I'm just like, "God, what..." You can tell he was a poet, you know? Mm-hmm. 30 00:05:40.480 --> 00:05:52.310 Sometimes somebody will be a really good reader, and it's like, uh, at events and things, and you're just like, "I wish I could listen to you do this whole book, uh, right now." I don't care about audiobooks. 31 00:05:52.420 --> 00:06:02.860 I'm not an audiobook guy. But yeah. Anyway, that's our overall best seller. Our second best seller is Frog and Toad. Um- Oh... Frog and Toad Are Friends. Yeah, classic. 32 00:06:02.900 --> 00:06:04.230 How are people finding out- And, yeah, it's great... 33 00:06:04.230 --> 00:06:27.588 about the Two Dollar Radio book other than Josie highlighting it in her staff picks?The thing that we really love about book-selling is that you can, like, do sort of a speed dating thing almost where you, you ask somebody what they're looking for, what types of things that they like, and you try to get to know them in two to three minutes. 34 00:06:27.848 --> 00:06:44.028 Hmm. And then you say, "Okay, you're looking for a book about a complicated family with a strong voice, uh, maybe, you know, a precocious teenage narrator. Uh, you're gonna love this book," um, and we hand it to them. 35 00:06:45.148 --> 00:06:57.988 [smacks lips] Uh, but you know, I just... It... You make yourself into a human algorithm, I guess. [laughs] Um, and, and so that... And a lot of it is just foisting your own tastes upon people. 36 00:06:58.208 --> 00:07:09.648 Uh, and I don't know if I should be giving that away or if the, like, bookseller, uh, council is going to come after me. Um, but it really is a lot of just, "I liked this and now you're going to as well." 37 00:07:10.168 --> 00:07:15.318 Well, no, that's your job as somebody who's, like, collecting all these books in one place. Like, you're filtering- Mm-hmm... 38 00:07:15.318 --> 00:07:23.398 a certain selection of books that, you know, part of it, there's some market considerations I'm sure of, like, what's actually gonna sell to the people in our community. Yeah. But then that's... 39 00:07:23.428 --> 00:07:34.618 The rest of it is, what do we think people should be reading, and how can we convince them to read it? I, I read that you have around 6,000 books in the store. Is, is that correct? Yes. That is correct. 40 00:07:34.848 --> 00:07:43.418 I've always wondered, I've always wondered how, like, when you're opening a bookstore, how you pick those, how you stock those. What's the process? Um, so 41 00:07:44.928 --> 00:07:53.618 the, the opening was a lot of, um, a lot of agonizing, [laughs] honestly. [laughs] Um, a lot of spreadsheets. 42 00:07:53.928 --> 00:08:11.208 It was really just, um, going through, uh, our own bookshelves and bookstores that we had worked at in the past and knowing, you know... reading a lot of reviews of stuff that had recently come out or was on the horizon. 43 00:08:12.128 --> 00:08:20.348 Some of the publishers will provide, like, a sort of an essentials catalog that you can draw off of. 44 00:08:20.988 --> 00:08:26.948 Um, so we were able to go through, like, all of the Penguin Classics and decide which ones we wanted and which ones we didn't. 45 00:08:26.958 --> 00:08:39.368 [smacks lips] But that was really the first big exercise in the, the curation of the store, 'cause we knew going into it that we wanted everything in the store to feel sort of hand-selected. 46 00:08:40.008 --> 00:08:55.108 So there was, uh, a little bit of conscious resisting of some of the essentials catalogs as well because, um, we didn't want to just have whatever the best sellers from any publisher or in any given category or anything like that. 47 00:08:55.388 --> 00:08:59.998 Um, [smacks lips] we wanted everything to feel intentional. Mm-hmm. 48 00:09:00.048 --> 00:09:14.298 So it was, it was a lot of, uh, just the two of us sitting next to each other on our respective computers, editing over the same Google Doc and deleting each other's work by accident. [laughs] And, uh, [sighs] 49 00:09:14.688 --> 00:09:16.808 it was a pr- It's, it's an ordeal, honestly. 50 00:09:17.228 --> 00:09:29.798 Um, and but once you get everything sort of into the store, [smacks lips] then you can do the finer tuning of, okay, well, people are enjoying this or that or not enjoying this or... 51 00:09:30.478 --> 00:09:41.848 [smacks lips] Uh, there have been some surprises on stuff that we, like, brought a lot of copies in and- Mm... sold none. [laughs] Whereas, like, our friends in our- I guess you're not allowed to say what those are... 52 00:09:42.157 --> 00:09:52.358 short list cities have sold. [laughs] Uh, I, I, I don't know. Uh, let's, let's see. Let me think about, uh, how- Poles by Louis Sacher [laughs] Um, yeah. Catching Fire. 53 00:09:52.368 --> 00:10:02.988 We, we brought in a million copies of that, and everybody was like, "Ugh, Shia LaBeouf has been canceled." Well, wait, actually- So-... so I mean, 6,000 books, that's 6,000, 6,000 titles, right? And then, like- Yes... 54 00:10:03.028 --> 00:10:11.748 what, the, the numbers of each, uh, the numbers of book of each title you have, what's, what, which, like... I, I imagine there's some that are just one. 55 00:10:11.768 --> 00:10:21.548 What's, like, the most stocked book, and then what's more of the average stocking across those titles? Um, so we normally have one or two copies of everything. 56 00:10:21.808 --> 00:10:34.888 Um, if there's something we're, like, really excited about or something that we know we can really reliably sell to people, then we'll bring in, you know, five, six copies of things. Mm. Um, 57 00:10:36.368 --> 00:10:47.898 to sort of go back to Daisy's question, um, we brought in way too many copies of, uh, Shadow Ticket, honestly. [laughs] Mm. 58 00:10:47.898 --> 00:11:01.228 Um, for whatever reason, people just did not go for that the way that I thought they would, whereas, like, my friends in New York or Chicago, uh, moved a ton of copies of that [laughs] right out the bat. I bought one. 59 00:11:02.008 --> 00:11:13.448 Yeah. So my apologies to Mr. Pinchin if you're out there listening. Um- [laughs]... um, I'm sure you are. Our most famous listener, actually. Yeah, of course. Um, [laughs] so it's, it's been, 60 00:11:14.488 --> 00:11:22.328 it's been interesting, like, learning the sort of the tastes of the community and figuring out how to do our ordering based on that. 61 00:11:22.448 --> 00:11:39.928 Um, but for the most part, I think the m- we average one or two copies, sometimes up to five or six. Um, events or r- readings are a whole other can of worms, um, whole other box of books. 62 00:11:41.168 --> 00:11:52.278 The, uh, the culture of, of Fort Worth, I read in your earlier interview in Dirt that, uh, that there wasn't much of a bookstore community. You said there was just two other indies and a Barnes & Noble, which I, I... 63 00:11:52.728 --> 00:12:04.168 And, like, it has to be more than that, right? It's... This is the 11th most populous city in the country with one million people as of 2024. Were there really so few bookstores before you opened? Within Fort Worth, yes. 64 00:12:04.408 --> 00:12:17.996 Um, there are a couple others when you get out into sort of the more suburban areas. Mm.But there wasn't one that sort of had the selection and the vibe that we wanted. 65 00:12:18.556 --> 00:12:30.896 We basically opened this to be the sort of bookstore that we like to shop at, and so we, we figured, okay, if we want this to exist, it looks like we're gonna have to be the ones to create it, and so that's, uh, that's what we did. 66 00:12:30.996 --> 00:12:42.336 There- there's another one, um, that does m- it's like a bakery/bookstore. Mm. Uh, a- and they have sort of a limited selection of cookbooks and things. 67 00:12:42.876 --> 00:12:55.146 There's another one that is, uh, run out of, like, I don't think it's a house that somebody actually lives in, but it's clearly, like, the bookstore was a house at one point. Mm-hmm. 68 00:12:55.146 --> 00:13:02.236 Um, and so they do a lot of, like, design books, um, and, like, architecture, coffee table sorts of things. 69 00:13:03.096 --> 00:13:22.216 And so we, we really were trying to fill a need for sort of a, a well-curated general interest thing, because the other indies had their specific niches, and so we decided we were gonna try to fill, uh, ours. 70 00:13:22.676 --> 00:13:30.076 And, you know, so far so good. [laughs] Mm-hmm. How quickly... Like, was it hard to get the word out? Like, from open to, 71 00:13:30.996 --> 00:13:37.556 I don't know, w- like, some milestone where you, you'd sold a certain amount of books or made a mo- a certain amount of money. What was, like, the... What was that path? 72 00:13:37.596 --> 00:13:50.646 How long did that take to get to the first whatever the milestone is, where you're like, "All right, this is working"? Um, y- yes and no. It was, like, hard to get the word out. Uh, it's, it's one of those things where 73 00:13:51.756 --> 00:14:03.786 I think we made a decent splash when we first opened, and people were, like, excited about it, but then it's always the question of, like, how do you get people to keep coming back to your thing? Mm. 74 00:14:03.856 --> 00:14:16.516 Um, I did a lot of interviews when the store first opened to try to, you know, get the word out there. Um, Daisy was very kind to, to give us a, like, a Dirt feature. 75 00:14:17.176 --> 00:14:31.916 The day the store opened was on Independent Bookstore Day last year, and I, like... I'd worked in, in book publishing as well, so I know a decent number of, like, quote, unquote, "media people." Um, so, like, I had... 76 00:14:31.976 --> 00:14:40.996 I was interviewed in Vulture, like, the day the store opened about Indie Bookstore Day and about- Mm... Amazon and all of that kinda stuff. 77 00:14:41.076 --> 00:14:48.946 So we had people showing up who were like, "Oh, I saw your interview this morning, and I decided to come check out the store this afternoon." Um- That's awesome... 78 00:14:49.036 --> 00:15:02.876 so that was cool, and, like, it do- You know, you try not to take it personally if somebody comes in, looks around, and then, like, you never see them again. Um, which, whatever. Uh [laughs] whatever. It's fine. 79 00:15:02.996 --> 00:15:19.036 Um- [laughs] I, uh, I do maintain- Well, how often... What percent of people that you recommend a book to, James, actually come back and give you feedback on how good your algorithm was? Um, honestly, a, a decent... 80 00:15:19.096 --> 00:15:33.516 Like, the people who, who become regulars. Uh, so I would say it's 15, 20% of our customers are people that, like, now we know by name, um, by... 81 00:15:33.576 --> 00:15:47.076 or at least by, like, recognition, um, who we've hand sold stuff to before who have come back to, to say, like, "Okay, this one worked for me," or, "This one didn't, uh, but let's try something else." 82 00:15:47.476 --> 00:15:56.356 Um, it's cool to watch people sort of get invested in us, in the store, in the things that we're doing. I've only... 83 00:15:56.396 --> 00:16:12.396 I, I told this story on, um, online the other day, but, uh, like, every time I sell a copy of Giovanni's Room by James Baldwin, um, every time I sell a copy of that to somebody, I look them in the eye and I say, uh, "Come back if you need to talk about it." 84 00:16:12.696 --> 00:16:24.276 [laughs] Um, and for the first time, somebody actually did, um, which was great. That's awesome. Uh, it was... They happened to come back and be like, "I cried so much." 85 00:16:24.296 --> 00:16:41.036 [laughs] Uh, and, and, you know, that's the kind of thing I think you, you don't get with a corporate bookstore of, like, a Barnes & Noble or with Amazon or anything like that, is I, I now have this, like, one-on-one relationship with this person. 86 00:16:41.516 --> 00:16:51.016 Mm-hmm. Um, I've only had one person come back and be like, "So you recommended this to me, and it was... I hated it." [laughs] What? Yeah. What was the book? 87 00:16:51.736 --> 00:17:09.016 Uh, it was, uh, The Bee Sting by Paul Murray, uh, which they, they thought it was weird and depressing, and I was like, "Well, you might be in the wrong store." [laughs] But yeah, that's a good book. 88 00:17:09.196 --> 00:17:12.676 I like that book. It's, it's a heartbreaker. What are you reading right now? 89 00:17:13.216 --> 00:17:30.226 I am, uh, just now digging into The School of Night by Karl Ove Knausgaard, um, the newest in his Morning Star saga, uh, and I am really enjoying it so far. I love a Faust retelling. Mm-hmm. 90 00:17:30.276 --> 00:17:44.516 And I think I'm becoming a Knausgaard person. Um, I've read this series so far, and I've read- Of which this is the fourth... Yes. I've read the first three. This is the fourth. 91 00:17:44.896 --> 00:17:56.146 I read his Seasonal Quartet, um, as well, because I was, uh, I was gonna become a father, and I was like, "You know, I'll read some dad books," but, like- Yeah... 92 00:17:56.146 --> 00:18:00.596 not- Which, for listeners who don't know, these are, like... It's a series of very short essays about, like... 93 00:18:00.896 --> 00:18:18.016 Like, each one is, like, a couple pages about some thing in the world, whether it's teeth or trees or sunsets, and it's framed as, like, letters to his kids, to this specific unborn daughter at the time, I think, about what these things are and how, how he sees the world.Yeah, it's, it's sort of a beautiful project. 94 00:18:18.156 --> 00:18:29.156 And then abruptly about three books into it, it becomes more of a traditional Knausgaard style, um- Oh, I wonder the first one. Yes. 95 00:18:29.256 --> 00:18:46.216 Um, so, so in book three it suddenly becomes a very like diaristic, um, first person. It has like a narrative arc to it. Uh, and then, and then book four, it like goes back to being the sort of es- the short essays. 96 00:18:46.336 --> 00:18:53.656 It's, it's- Hmm... a weird structure that he pulls off, but I, I have not yet gotten into the big- Struggled. Yeah. 97 00:18:53.716 --> 00:19:07.856 I have not yet gotten into the big one, and I'm sure I will like it, uh, whenever I do get there, but like I, I'm never beating the performative male allegations as it is. Um, so, uh, I don't need to. 98 00:19:07.876 --> 00:19:15.346 All gender is a performance, baby. Um- Yeah. Oh, for sure. [laughs] Uh, the, uh... I, I'm a big fan of the, of, of the My Struggle series. 99 00:19:15.396 --> 00:19:22.776 That's how I got into it, though I should admit, I don't know if I've ever admitted this publicly on the pod, maybe I have, I've never actually finished the sixth one. 100 00:19:22.996 --> 00:19:28.456 Um, the sixth one's like 900 pages, and about 300 pages in, you... He starts... 101 00:19:29.386 --> 00:19:40.056 Uh, sometimes he does this thing where he, he starts essaying within one of his novels, uh, which doesn't always work because what I tend to love most about reading him is how, how, how you kind of glide through his world. 102 00:19:40.136 --> 00:19:43.936 These aren't complex sentences. It's more like y- you, you, you... It... 103 00:19:44.116 --> 00:19:51.576 They're long books, but you read them so quickly, um, because of the simplicity of the language and how emotive and evocative it is of his inner life. 104 00:19:51.996 --> 00:20:05.016 But when he starts to essay, and in this one he's writing about like Nazism and this poem about Hitler, I k- I kind of forget. I'm like, I'm, I'm reading like 50 pages into this section and I'm kinda like, "Oh my God. 105 00:20:05.056 --> 00:20:15.716 Like, how long is this gonna go on?" I skip 300 pages in like just to see, he's talking about the same poem. Um, so I, I got discouraged. I s- I can't work through this right now, and I put it down. 106 00:20:15.816 --> 00:20:27.136 Um, but I gotta get back to it someday. I think you have made it further into the series than most people. Um- Yeah. Just before the finish line... but yeah. And it does... 107 00:20:27.656 --> 00:20:41.656 It is kind of funny that it like takes all the way until the last book for him to finally be like, "So about, uh, about that title." [laughs] Yeah. Yeah. Uh, [laughs] um, what a, what a guy. Um, so I'm really... 108 00:20:41.696 --> 00:20:53.856 I'm enjoying School of Night so far, uh, like you said, because of the sort of the simplicity of the language, but the depth of the ideas. Um, I also, um, 109 00:20:55.016 --> 00:21:09.616 moved to the big city to pursue a doomed dream of being a photographer when I was like 18 years old, so I can relate to it, uh, in that regard. Whether or not I sold my soul, uh, to the devil remains to be seen. 110 00:21:10.056 --> 00:21:18.296 I don't think you- But we'll, uh, [laughs] who knows. Um, we'll get to the consequences eventually, I'm sure. You'd be up on the stage at MoMA right now if you had. 111 00:21:18.446 --> 00:21:30.016 I don't know if that's a spoiler or not, but, uh- [laughs]... anyways. Um, but wait, so one thing I'm reading right now is Dahlgren by Samuel Delany. Have y'all ever read Samuel Delany? I have not. 112 00:21:30.096 --> 00:21:36.895 It's, it's one that I see people talk about all the time- Mm-hmm... um, but have never actually gotten to. 113 00:21:37.236 --> 00:21:48.656 I, so I won't then spend too much time on this, but I like w- this is the third or fourth kind of beefy build a sci-fi book that I've read over the last four years or so, kind of been reading like one a year. 114 00:21:49.116 --> 00:21:51.036 But I'm, I'm struck by with sci-fi 115 00:21:52.636 --> 00:22:04.656 readers in particular, it seems that there is such a sci-fi reader who reads so much sci-fi and doesn't seem to step outside of that, and, uh, which always is a little interesting to me. 116 00:22:04.696 --> 00:22:08.056 But it's interesting reading this too and reading all of the... 117 00:22:08.076 --> 00:22:18.476 The other ones I've read recently were Book of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe, which is really good, and then before that, Time Enough for Love by Robert Heinlein, you know, famously of, uh, writing Star Troopers. 118 00:22:19.236 --> 00:22:31.136 But one observation about all these sci-fi guys, they are all huge perverts. [laughs] There's a lot of sex in all their books, and, and like weird incest stuff. 119 00:22:31.536 --> 00:22:43.216 I don't know if that's just these like three beefy, um, novels that I, that I've read over the past few years, but, uh, yeah, what's up with that? Well, I don't know, I don't know, uh, 120 00:22:44.136 --> 00:22:58.685 if you've, if, if this has ever crossed your path, but people, uh, like to have sex. [laughs] Ouch. And so, um, [laughs] sorry. Oh my God. Um, so I think that might explain why it's- But, but, but more than like your-... 121 00:22:58.685 --> 00:23:08.316 it comes up so often. Yeah. More than like other novels, though. Like e- like, I don't know, Knausgaard has like seven kids. He doesn't talk about- Yeah... sex this much. Yeah, that's true. Um, I don't know. 122 00:23:08.376 --> 00:23:22.996 Maybe it's like a way to try to, if you're telling a sort of outlandish, uh, sci-fi-ish story, you're on other planets in, you know, hyperspace- Sci-fi and fantasy, it puts the fantasy in fantasy. Yeah. 123 00:23:23.116 --> 00:23:35.576 Uh, but for sci-fi it might actually ground it in something more human. Um- Hmm... if you're getting into sort of the technology and the, the singularity or whatever, uh- Yeah... 124 00:23:35.616 --> 00:23:44.456 maybe it, that's how you can bring it all back to- This one's really interesting 'cause it's like there's not so much of that like extra, like extraterrestrial or, or anything like that. 125 00:23:44.536 --> 00:23:50.836 It's, it's like, I think it's written in the '70s and it just takes place in some city in the middle of America where something has happened. 126 00:23:51.296 --> 00:23:57.916 Everything is normal outside, but there's some like, the city was on fire or something. Everybody... It- it's a large city, everybody has left. 127 00:23:57.936 --> 00:24:06.856 There's only 1,000 people left, and it's kinda just this, this guy who's forgotten his name and has come to this city wandering through it. Um, 128 00:24:07.816 --> 00:24:19.356 it, I'm not really sure what, where it's going or what the point is, but it's a, it's a beautiful world. Samuel Delany a great writer. Um, okay, you throw events at the shop, right?We do, yes. 129 00:24:19.396 --> 00:24:34.276 We've, we recently started to get into, like, author events, um, readings, conversations, et cetera. Uh, we do a lot of- Do community events help sell books? Like, do people come for the events and browse? Um, they do. 130 00:24:34.496 --> 00:24:49.636 So yeah, we do a lot of, like, community-focused stuff. Uh, we, we have a biweekly thing where, like, we, we have people come in, and they make zines, and it's like everybody comes in, and they draw. 131 00:24:50.016 --> 00:25:09.956 One week they draw, uh, or write or do something like that along a theme, and then the next time they come in, and everybody helps put together the little, the booklet, um, which is, like, a really fun sort of arts and crafts project, and it's just a good excuse for people, like, to come into the store. 132 00:25:10.606 --> 00:25:20.496 And some, yeah, sometimes they browse, sometimes they buy stuff, but we, we wanted to do things that didn't have the pressure of having to pay money. 133 00:25:21.176 --> 00:25:37.636 I think Josie and I both remember being, like, young people and, and not... having to pay to exist, basically. Yeah. Um, where, like, everything had a cover charge, or you had to buy a ticket or whatever. 134 00:25:37.816 --> 00:25:50.956 And so the, the... I don't wanna, you know, get into all of the kind of third place stuff 'cause I think most people are familiar with that and feel like we need to spend too much time rehashing that idea. 135 00:25:50.996 --> 00:26:03.576 But i- it's nice to have somewhere to go that you can just go and do a thing and, uh, not necessarily have to pay money. Mm-hmm. So you and Josie actually met- On the, on the... Oh, go ahead. You were... 136 00:26:03.616 --> 00:26:10.616 Like, Josie and James were working at a bookstore when they met. So I'm curious, is there th- other things that you both, 137 00:26:11.656 --> 00:26:23.036 um, agreed, having had that experience of like, "Okay, we're never gonna do it this way," or like, "We're gonna start our own bookstore. We're never gonna do this and that"? Um, some of it is... 138 00:26:23.616 --> 00:26:29.496 I mean, yes, there are things that we have the, have the experience of saying, "We're never gonna do it that way." 139 00:26:30.156 --> 00:26:39.036 Part, part of it comes down to, like, the curation, uh, where we're not doing a whole ton of, like, the romantasy stuff. 140 00:26:39.656 --> 00:26:56.896 Um, we, we did cave on heated rivalry, um, just because, like, that's genuinely, I don't wanna say weird, but, like, it, it has a very specific niche. Hmm. Um, and we, we, we respect that about it. 141 00:26:56.976 --> 00:27:08.706 We love a good niche. Um, and, and so part of it does come down to, like, we don't wanna just bring in the bestsellers, the airport fiction, you know? Hmm. 142 00:27:08.796 --> 00:27:21.476 Uh, so no offense to James Patterson or Danielle Steel, uh, but you can buy those books anywhere. So we, we knew we didn't wanna do that. Uh, we knew we did not... We... 143 00:27:21.616 --> 00:27:46.046 It took us forever to start getting the events stuff done because, like, Josie has a lot of experience booking authors and, uh, doing that kind of stuff at other stores, and she is a very, uh, a wonderful, sensitive human being, and she can't stand the idea that, uh, you might book a, book something and nobody shows up, um, for one reason or another. 144 00:27:46.406 --> 00:27:57.176 [laughs] But it's, sometimes it's just raining, and it's Wednesday, and nobody wants to go out. Um, and it's, uh, it has no reflection on the author or the book or anything like that. 145 00:27:57.516 --> 00:28:08.626 There are factors outside of your control. So we, uh, we had a lot of conversations about whether or not we even wanted to do that kind of thing- Hmm... because we, we've done it before. 146 00:28:08.676 --> 00:28:12.566 We know it can be stressful, but- You guys need to have-... at the same time-... 147 00:28:12.566 --> 00:28:23.856 like, 10 people on a contract that says, "You might need to contact them at the last minute to show up at a reading, and you'll pay them $50 an hour." Yeah, that. [laughs] I think that would solve your problem. 148 00:28:24.166 --> 00:28:36.935 [laughs] Give them a copy of the book. Yeah. Uh, let's... I'll put out a, like, casting call. We'll do it like extras. Um, it'll be... I think that's a great idea. You've solved it. 149 00:28:37.356 --> 00:28:50.736 Every publicist needs to be taking notes right now. You need to have a roster of this in every city in America. Uh- You know what it reminds me of? [laughs] My, um, my friend's father was a public defender. 150 00:28:50.816 --> 00:28:59.896 He was incredible at his work, and he passed away, and his funeral was, like, full of people who, you know, he had defended, whatever. 151 00:28:59.996 --> 00:29:11.596 Um, he, like, one time went up to, like, a random family in downtown Brooklyn and was like, "I will buy you lunch if you come and sit in court and pretend to be this guy's family." [laughs] And they did it. Wow, wild. 152 00:29:11.656 --> 00:29:19.146 But I just think there could be- That's so sweet... maybe there could be a literary reading equivalent of that. Yeah. Yeah, I think there could, honestly. Um, and 153 00:29:20.236 --> 00:29:34.216 authors are, you know, they're a sensitive bunch, so I do feel like this is a life or death sort of thing to them. Poets you don't have to worry about, honestly. Uh, you would think that you've gotta, you know, use... 154 00:29:34.236 --> 00:29:47.656 you gotta be real gentle with the poets, but poets bring their friends. Um- Mm-hmm... I don't know why that is. Every, like, the best attended, uh, readings or anything I've ever been to, always poets. [laughs] Huh. 155 00:29:47.936 --> 00:29:56.136 Yeah. The, um... So talking about, like, will people show up or will they not, uh, makes me think of, like, where... Okay, where is the bookstore within the city? 156 00:29:56.176 --> 00:30:04.516 Which, bear with me a second, uh, my, my childhood bookstore where I used to love going burned down at the beginning of the year. It was, like, a, a... So I'm from a small town. It's, like, 14,000 people. 157 00:30:04.936 --> 00:30:12.756 This whole block burned down. Um, like, a, a... which is itself literally a block from, like, the plaza in the center of town. Uh, it's tragedy, right? 158 00:30:12.836 --> 00:30:23.576 This bookstore has been around in some way since I think the '60s, and it's, it's, like, every time I go back and visit my family, I'll end up, like, sitting there for a while if I'm just, like, walking around town, and it's like-It's in the middle. 159 00:30:23.616 --> 00:30:31.576 In high school, I would meet friends there. It's like such a, it was such a community pillar. It's so sad. They're, they're, like, trying to get insurance. Um, we'll see if that happens. 160 00:30:31.596 --> 00:30:38.696 It's gonna be a pain because it was multiple buildings. I understand they're trying to figure out which one started it, so they need to, like, assign blame before they can pay out any money. 161 00:30:38.736 --> 00:30:47.236 They raised $135,000 on GoFundMe or one of those platforms. That's awesome. Um, but there's all this talk about, okay, they have to rebuild. Will they rebuild? 162 00:30:47.256 --> 00:30:52.096 And the guy who runs it, his name is Dante, a fitting name, says he's going to rebuild it. Uh, 163 00:30:53.036 --> 00:31:06.436 w- where is the question, but for me, it's like it has to be in that place which is right in the center of town, and is so important, and, like, made it, for me, such a part of, like, the fabric of my life and for certainly so many others. 164 00:31:06.516 --> 00:31:27.676 So, like, I'm wondering, obviously Recluse is still quite new and, and you're building this culture, but when you brought up, you know, like, getting people to come out for it, I'm wondering, like, where it is in the city, and what's around it, and, like, how the bookstore, how you see it fitting into the fabric of the city, and how it's already being woven in. 165 00:31:28.496 --> 00:31:43.376 So we are, uh, in a neighborhood called the Near Southside, um, which is just south of downtown. Um, it is right off of Interstate 30, and believe it or not, just south of the train station. 166 00:31:43.776 --> 00:31:59.616 Um, we do, in fact, have, uh, public transport here, although you would not, uh... you wouldn't really know it. News to me. Um, the train, the train basically, like, runs to the airport, uh, and back. 167 00:31:59.916 --> 00:32:07.456 Uh- Which is famously between Dallas and Fort Worth, right? Yes. Right in the middle? Yeah. Yes. Um, it's right in the middle, and so there's, like... 168 00:32:07.496 --> 00:32:17.066 yeah, there's trains that go from Dallas and Fort Worth to the airport, but that's really, uh- So you're kind of an airport bookstore is what you're saying. Yeah, basically. 100%. Um- [laughs]... 169 00:32:17.076 --> 00:32:29.596 we are located way off of Terminal C. [laughs] Um, but [laughs] we are there. Um, uh, [laughs] um, I... 170 00:32:29.716 --> 00:32:42.536 and I see us fitting into the fabric of the city because we are part of this, this neighborhood of sort of, uh, closely knit businesses and apartment buildings. It's one of the more walkable areas of the city. 171 00:32:43.196 --> 00:32:52.836 Um, there's even, like, a... right now, it is a patch of, like, dead grass and garbage that will allegedly be a park. 172 00:32:52.956 --> 00:33:00.836 [laughs] Um, they're gonna, like, landscape, uh, right across the street and turn this into, like, a nicer looking patch of dead grass and garbage. 173 00:33:01.436 --> 00:33:19.236 Um, but, uh, it's, it's cool to, like, be a part of this, this area that, uh, you know, 10 years ago was, was warehouses and vacant lots, and now there's a bookstore and a thousand coffee shops. 174 00:33:19.356 --> 00:33:31.816 Um, which is part of why we don't do coffee is because we wanted to, like, make it known that we're, we're not a threat [laughs] to what anybody else is doing. That was my next question. I live in Ridgewood. 175 00:33:31.836 --> 00:33:38.456 We were just talking about this before we started recording, and there are, to my knowledge, uh, there's three bookstores in the neighborhood here. They're all bookstore coffee shops. 176 00:33:38.896 --> 00:33:54.396 One of them, Topos, there's two Toposes now in the same neighborhood, but one of them was one of the first, like, new wave businesses in this, um, neighborhood whose property value has gone up a lot in the past, you know, in the time since that bookstore opened. 177 00:33:54.476 --> 00:34:02.076 Um, shades of that, you know, hopefully the, uh, as the, [laughs] as longer your bookstore's around, that park will get nicer, th- you know, multiple renovations. 178 00:34:02.176 --> 00:34:07.736 Um, anyways, long way of saying, yeah, I was really interested in your decision to not make it a coffee shop. 179 00:34:07.766 --> 00:34:13.736 'Cause my understanding of why so many new bookstores is coffee shops is that it is expensive to run a bookstore, and it's hard. 180 00:34:13.796 --> 00:34:23.476 And so coffee, having a coffee shop provides more stability and allows you to run this business without, like, you know, tearing out your hair every night. Yeah. 181 00:34:23.596 --> 00:34:37.966 So part of the decision to not be a coffee shop was based on the, the landscape of the neighborhood, all of these other small businesses, and these people we got to know, and respect, and work, and wanted to work with in the future. 182 00:34:38.635 --> 00:34:53.456 And part of the other consideration was, uh, we... when we signed the lease, um, on the space that would become our bookstore, it was just a, like, empty room. We... and we got to do- Mm-hmm... 183 00:34:53.486 --> 00:34:56.256 like, whatever we wanted with the, the construction. 184 00:34:56.856 --> 00:35:09.996 And so part of it was thinking about construction costs and all of the stuff that you have to do to get your, like, food handling license, and having to deal with, like, he- the health department. 185 00:35:10.576 --> 00:35:21.456 And whatever, you know, hair pulling we do at any, uh, on any given night is probably less than having to also juggle that. 186 00:35:21.876 --> 00:35:30.176 We figured that, you know, we could either do one thing and do it well, or we could try to do two things and maybe do both of them badly. [laughs] Um, 187 00:35:31.216 --> 00:35:46.836 and so we, we were banking on the idea that, like, people would get interested in the books, and the curation, and that kind of stuff, that we could make a successful business just on that. 188 00:35:47.516 --> 00:36:01.896 I don't know if you've heard of, uh, the taste economy, um, but having vision and curation, uh, can, can really go a long way for a business. Feel like I read at least one article about that in Dirt. 189 00:36:01.906 --> 00:36:12.876 Speaking of the taste economy, um, so we haven't gotten into this yet, but you've worked for different publishers like Seven Stories Press, um, which is famously the publisher of Annie Ernaux. 190 00:36:13.536 --> 00:36:24.416 She famously won the Nobel Prize, and which is a big accolade for somebody who was putting out their work with a smaller publisher, although I think Seven Stories Press is better known in Europe. 191 00:36:24.576 --> 00:36:38.660 And then, um, Dalkey and Deep Vellum, where you were marketing books that some people might consider unmarketable, like the book Schattenfrau, which has come in, come up on thisPodcast before, Francis and I, I think, both have a copy. 192 00:36:39.069 --> 00:36:49.840 It's a rather large book by an author named Michael Lentz, who's very big in Germany, but maybe not as much known here, um, sold very well. So 193 00:36:50.800 --> 00:37:20.240 I guess my question is, like, being on the bookseller side and seeing the dynamics of people coming into a bookstore looking for a book, and then also having been on the marketing side for books that are a little bit more complex, complicated, not exactly heated rivalry, like, what has that taught you about who buys books and why, and, like, why books sell, uh, beyond the sort of, like, hand-wavy thing in publishing which drives me crazy, which is where people will say nobody buys books, which obviously isn't true. 194 00:37:20.340 --> 00:37:33.360 Some people do, and they have good reasons for it. Um, but if you could, like, break down that statement into what, what people are attempting to encapsulate or refute it, like, how does your experience stack up? 195 00:37:34.280 --> 00:37:49.160 Well, my experience with that, uh, is that you, uh, just tell everybody that there's a lot of gay hockey players in Schottenfroh. [laughs] Not true. Uh, but, um, uh... So 196 00:37:50.320 --> 00:37:57.650 really what it comes down to is, uh, making something feel approachable. Mm-hmm. 197 00:37:57.760 --> 00:38:14.700 Uh, if you're trying to sell somebody on something complicated or whatever, you, you want people to know that they, they have the tools required to read the thing or to, uh, enjoy the thing. 198 00:38:14.940 --> 00:38:28.070 Because when you're selling a book to somebody, what you're... The, sort of the transaction is you're gonna give me $20, and you're gonna spend hours of your life on this thing. Mm-hmm. 199 00:38:28.070 --> 00:38:38.220 Um, it's not the same as recommending a movie or an album or, you know, something that somebody can consume in 45 minutes to... Movies are all too long now. 200 00:38:38.820 --> 00:38:47.640 But, uh, recommending a book to somebody is like, "Yeah, this is gonna be a commitment," so you wanna make sure they're gonna have the best experience with it. 201 00:38:47.980 --> 00:39:02.120 Part of what that means is, I talked about this upfront, you do this sort of speed dating of getting to know somebody. Or from the publisher side, you, you say to somebody, "Okay, this is, like, this... 202 00:39:03.280 --> 00:39:19.680 It's gonna look on the surface like this is a 1,001-page experimental novel, uh, translated from German, but it's actually a very, very quiet story about, like, the main character and his dead dad." 203 00:39:20.640 --> 00:39:33.240 Uh, and it's... I, I tell everybody it's a daddy issues book, um, which is much more approachable than, uh, you're gonna, like, need all of these understandings of, you know, 204 00:39:34.220 --> 00:39:47.500 German idealism or Hegel or, you know, whatever philosopher. That does not feel approachable to people. Hmm. Uh, a lot of people understand hating their dads. Um, [laughs] but, uh, it, it- But the, but the... 205 00:39:47.820 --> 00:39:55.380 This, sorry to interrupt for a second, but this goes back, yeah, to what you were saying about the, the speed dating or about, like, imposing your taste on, on the shoppers at your bookstore, right? 206 00:39:55.440 --> 00:40:07.560 Where it's like it's your job to, to package it in this way, in a way that's really relatable and understandable, and then that makes them a better reader by then they learn a bit about Hegel or whatever, w- everything else that's in Schottenfroh, right? 207 00:40:08.080 --> 00:40:20.600 With any given book, it's like what's the in that makes people curious enough to get 50 pages into this book, which I feel like for me in, you know, a 300-page novel is typically when I start to really get going and then I'm, like, blazing through it. 208 00:40:20.700 --> 00:40:33.860 You just have to convince them to read the first 50 pages, and then the rest should, like, after that, the, like, they should buy into these ideas and learn new things about the world and themselves and ideas. Yeah. 209 00:40:33.920 --> 00:40:50.100 And, like, often a, a, an easy way to do that is through comparison. Y- you can say to somebody, you know, "Oh, you like David Lynch? You're gonna like the, the weird, off-kilter atmosphere of, you know, X, Y, Z book. 210 00:40:50.760 --> 00:41:06.200 You like Annie Ernaux, who writes these very, very sparse, intense diaries? Uh, you're also gonna like Danish poet Tove Ditlevsen." Um, you're, like, the... 211 00:41:07.300 --> 00:41:16.480 You take the thing that people, uh, have heard of, and you use that to, like, redirect them to something that they, uh, haven't heard of yet. 212 00:41:16.730 --> 00:41:26.280 It, there's also, you know, all kinds of conceptual nonsense I can get into about, like, you're selling the idea of the book more than you're actually selling the book. 213 00:41:27.040 --> 00:41:39.320 You're selling the idea of the book, or are you selling the idea of being somebody who reads the book more? Both, honestly. Yeah, because you can, you can sell the idea of, uh, like... 214 00:41:40.040 --> 00:41:47.580 You can sell the idea of being the kind of person who reads these difficult books, but you can also- Yeah... sell the f- i- the, the notion that, uh, 215 00:41:48.500 --> 00:41:59.330 something is gonna be more approachable or it's gonna be le- uh, less work than you might otherwise think it's going to be. Basically- What about the subset of people-... marketing is, uh-... 216 00:41:59.330 --> 00:42:01.840 that will buy a book because it's marketed as difficult? 217 00:42:01.980 --> 00:42:14.580 I mean, this is a thesis of something Greta wrote, that there's a certain type of person that wants to think of themselves as a serious reader, and so the, you know, the actual, the idea of a book being kinda hard to get through is appealing to them. 218 00:42:14.700 --> 00:42:29.580 I would assume that's, like, fewer people than would like a book to be accessible, but maybe it is an important type of patron. I, I think a lot of people like the idea of being a serious reader. 219 00:42:30.180 --> 00:42:48.084 Um, so you can sort of invert this idea and say, "This is a long and difficult book, but it's not actually."As long and difficult as you, as you think it's going to be, or you can say you are a, a, like, a better reader than you expect. 220 00:42:48.704 --> 00:43:04.944 Mm. Uh, the, I- I've found that there's diminishing returns on marketing something as, like, this is a, this is a challenge. Mm. This is, like, a line in the sand, a sink or swim kind of thing. 221 00:43:05.444 --> 00:43:21.704 The customer who buys that m- might buy it, and then maybe it sits and gathers dust on their shelf, and then maybe they buy the next one that's marketed like that, and then after that they say, "Man, I'm not reading these, and now there's, like, a foot of shelf space that's just covered in dust, and I just can't buy any more things that I'm not gonna read." 222 00:43:22.344 --> 00:43:35.944 Yeah. 'Cause, like, I come, I come at it from the, the idea that you do want people to actually read and engage with the thing. [laughs] Um, I'm not, I'm not, like, a numbers guy. I'm, like, a, a, an art guy. 223 00:43:35.994 --> 00:43:48.234 [laughs] Um, I would like people to, to read books rather than just buy them. I would like there to be less, you know, literary Funko Pops in the world. 224 00:43:48.264 --> 00:44:00.564 [laughs] Uh, that, like, people are just collecting because it's the newest one. I think it's- I just got the Karl Ove Knausgaard one. It actually has a set, a pack of cigarettes and a bag of prawns, so. Oh, nice. 225 00:44:00.604 --> 00:44:06.404 Be careful who you're talking to. That's very cool. [laughs] I can, like, kinda actually see it in my mind. 226 00:44:06.443 --> 00:44:14.154 [laughs] Uh, the, like, the, the sort of stubbly, like, I don't know how they- He's got, he's got, like, the, the, the mug for it... yeah. 227 00:44:14.484 --> 00:44:26.464 [laughs] I don't know how they captured that mournful look in his eyes, like, in plastic, um, but they did it. Uh- Well, the Funko Pop's eyes are already beady black, so. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Sorry I had to. [laughs] Stop. 228 00:44:26.904 --> 00:44:40.334 [laughs] Um, yeah, so I guess that's, that's what it comes down to, is that, uh, you c- you can say, "This is, this is an incredibly difficult thing. Uh, this is not gonna be for everybody," but 229 00:44:41.644 --> 00:44:48.764 I would always, I would rather invite people in rather than try to use that sort of gatekeeping as a tactic. 230 00:44:49.684 --> 00:44:59.904 I'm trying to think of, I'm trying to name names, basically, uh, of, of, like, examples of where that's been done correctly or done poorly. 231 00:45:00.344 --> 00:45:12.904 Ooh, an example of where it's been done correctly, I think, is actually the v- uh, if you go back about 10 years, the video game Death Stranding had a really fascinating marketing pitch because that, 232 00:45:14.204 --> 00:45:29.204 that game was, like, it, it, it took many millions of dollars and many years in development to create. Uh, and the marketing pitch was basically this is going to be incomprehensibly experimental. Mm. 233 00:45:29.214 --> 00:45:34.953 Um, this is the game that nobody else would let Hideo Kojima make, and we're gonna do it. 234 00:45:35.644 --> 00:45:45.584 Um, and, and that is, when there's actually that much money on the line, is a, a really wild way to do it, and it does seem to have paid off for them. 235 00:45:46.204 --> 00:45:56.084 But when you, I think when you go about marketing that way, you do a little bit run the risk of it's insubstantial, you know? 236 00:45:56.244 --> 00:46:06.894 When you, when you try to say, "This is going to be extremely weird, extreme," like, uh, you're- Then it better truly be really weird. With, like, with Kojima- Yes. [laughs]... 237 00:46:06.904 --> 00:46:15.354 like, I, I've, I've played, I have Death Stranding. I haven't finished it. Um, it was, like, one of the last video games I played before I stopped playing as much video games. But, uh, it's, it's- Same... 238 00:46:15.364 --> 00:46:26.654 I mean, it's, it's amazing. It's such, like, this, it, he's an auteur, right? And he comes to it having done, it was, like, five Metal Gear Solid games, right? Over, like, 15, 20 years, if not a little longer. Mm-hmm. 239 00:46:26.674 --> 00:46:33.984 So he had, like, built up this credibility and this massive international fan base for his video games, for his name, right? 240 00:46:34.064 --> 00:46:47.064 So, like, with that, there's this, these, like, two decades of trust and belief built that, like, oh, this will be this complex piece of work, and this will be so detailed because I've played these other games, and I, and I know this to be true. 241 00:46:47.424 --> 00:47:02.144 So I think it's, like, maybe the only way to really successfully pull off that marketing, like, to bring it back to books, is the author has to have already a proven track record of pulling off this sort of complexity and, um, y- entertainment value as well, right? 242 00:47:02.544 --> 00:47:12.564 In one. Or maybe it's their debut and they have some other name, or maybe they don't have a name yet, but, like, they have people doing the marketing for them who are able to spin the story. 243 00:47:12.844 --> 00:47:23.843 But you need to either be at the beginning of, of building yourself as a character, author as a character, or you need to be far enough into the career where there's this track record that then people will believe you. 244 00:47:24.364 --> 00:47:38.964 Um, but maybe you can't really do it in the middle for a, a more mid-career, uh, author or writer who has not really written anything that truly feels complex and challenging in the way we're talking about. Yeah. 245 00:47:39.084 --> 00:47:53.944 Um, that, I think, is, those are two of the, uh, the real approaches for when this type of thing works. Um, the other way that you can make that kind of thing work is to, um, lie. 246 00:47:55.004 --> 00:48:05.604 [laughs] Uh, [laughs] is to, to, uh, you can, you can get people excited. This is actually something that I tell, uh, anytime I've, like, had interns or whatever. 247 00:48:06.204 --> 00:48:12.784 Um, uh, I tell them one of the easiest ways to get people, uh, excited about something is to tell them that they already are. 248 00:48:13.524 --> 00:48:29.584 Uh, that you, you just tell people that, like, there are conversations going on and now is your chance to be a part of it. Um, you can get in on this international thing or, you know, the hype or the buzz or whatever. 249 00:48:29.704 --> 00:48:43.874 Uh, nobody wants to be left out. It's that, it, it's that simple. Um, the, the problem with doing these sorts of, like, hype driven, buzzy campaigns is that I'm always personally worried that, uh, 250 00:48:44.864 --> 00:48:55.092 you're, like-It's gonna seem like you're trying to get people to buy the thing before it comes out, and then, like, it's gonna be bad. 251 00:48:55.792 --> 00:49:10.572 Uh, if you say this is a difficult experimental book, uh, all of, and, like, all of the reviews are gonna be negative, and, uh, but you've already gotten people's money because you did such a good job with the, like, hype-based marketing. 252 00:49:11.272 --> 00:49:23.252 Um, that's always the kinda thing that I want to avoid. Um, I wanna position people to enjoy the thing rather than just try to get their money, and then whatever experience they have with it 253 00:49:24.252 --> 00:49:36.872 is the experience they have with it. I would much rather people enjoy the thing. Well, we love to enjoy things here on Tasteland, and I think that's a perfect place to stop. So thank you so much for coming on, James. 254 00:49:37.112 --> 00:49:47.402 [laughs] Yeah, thanks for having me. Uh, I worried that, you know, this was a little dry. Uh, I had so many, I had so many bits that I was gonna do, and I- [laughs]... 255 00:49:47.402 --> 00:49:56.572 just never had the opportunity, but- I loved the bet cy-... that is what it is... the bet on Coca bit was great, and that will probably get clipped. [laughs] Um, I don't think... 256 00:49:56.632 --> 00:50:05.132 I think what seems dry to you is not dry 'cause it's not obvious to people who don't sell books, you know? That's true. Yeah. That's, you know, that's fair. 257 00:50:06.072 --> 00:50:20.632 Uh, li- listener, thank you for listening, and you should go to reclusebooks.com. They have a wonderful e-com site. Be one of those weird names where the order comes in, and James says, "Who the hell is this person?" 258 00:50:20.952 --> 00:50:31.992 in, in, uh- And I do. I say that out loud- [laughs] Grand Rapids... every time. Yeah. [laughs] Um, sometimes I say it even for names that I do know. Hm. Well, this has been Tasteland. [laughs] We'll see you next week. 259 00:50:34.272 --> 00:50:46.792 [outro music]