Vanessa here. If you read the other New Arrivals email, you’ll know why I’m the one writing this letter today. Disgusting, truly horrifying behaviour from my partner. Really, you should chide him next time you’re in.
I’ve been at home the last two weeks working on my new book. That sounds great, doesn’t it? Well, let me tell you, this is not as blissful as it seems. Jason has been here at the store and lots of great books have come in. He gets to play with them. I was mournfully left out. Everyday he comes home from work, we sit down to dinner, and he tells me about all the gorgeous books he got to go through. He’s been going through them at a manic pace, too, because he’s doing the work of two people, cataloguing furiously. He’s been digging through trunks. He’s been helping haul in boxes from the back seats of cars. He’ll tell me, “You should see the amazing books so-and-so brought in today,” and I scream internally SHUT UP SHUT UP IT ISN’T FAIR. You can’t have it all, can you?
Tucking my characters away, I made it into the store today because of the aforementioned disgusting behaviour of my husband, and I finally get to rifle through all the books and make sure none of you are stealing out from under me books that I want to read. Why should you get all the fun? Not that I need more books. Like so many of you say, my night stand and shelves are cluttered with books I have yet to read. This week I acquired a copy of Red Dragon by Thomas Harris, which is on a whole bunch of lists as a perfectly constructed masterpiece of thriller excitement. I’m hoping to absorb some of its brilliance. Still, I’ve already made a stack of five books from the pre-cataloguing pile that I’m going to try to smuggle home under Jason’s nose while he protests that we have to buy groceries. You can pull this book out of my cold dead hands!
I’m also working at the shop tomorrow because Jason won’t be here. He’ll be at Museum London for his panel Monsters, Demons & Stories of Place with Jenna Rose Sands and Tom Cull. I’ll be here behind the counter listening to it via Zoom like a sad little fangirl. I won’t be able to attend and ask obnoxious questions from the audience. (Teenage me would have asked: Are you married? Do you have a girlfriend? Jason is so handsome!!!!) For this, I must rely on you, so please go and cause as much trouble as you can by asking Jason why he’s such a meany and won’t let his wife have any books. He is so mean to me!
Yours truly,
Vanessa (and Jason)
