We hosted a book launch last night, and nobody showed up.
It honestly felt like I was living through a short story. From the subtle melancholy of the weather—the first real snowfall of the season—to the awkward tragedy of the distributor failing to get the books to the shop on time, to the stupid irony of me telling the author, “It’s probably because of the snow. People don’t like trudging out in the first snowfall,” mere minutes before a troop of eight women showed up for their pre-scheduled book club meeting, skipping past the whole launch set-up into the Rookery, where they would chat about whatever book they had been reading.
The whole thing felt a little like a farce. I don’t know if I’ve ever felt more embarrassed professionally. The author, Don Macdonald, is from Montreal, and he has organized a near country-wide tour for this, his second novel. A drive across Canada from Montreal, through Ontario and Manitoba before ending in Calgary, where he attended Bouchercon, one of the world’s largest mystery fan conventions, before heading back, stopping in Regina specifically to read from his work at—you guessed it—the Black Bird Commons. He scheduled one night for Regina, driving straight through from Calgary to get here in time for the launch before sleeping in a Super 8 then moving on through Winnipeg—where he grew up, and thus has plenty of family and friends—and onward back to Montreal.
It would be fun to write, this story, if I were writing it. Probably third person, a bit removed from the character, a worn-out old—but not too old—writer, racing carefully down highway one toward Regina. Would I have started in the car on the highway? I doubt it, but we will for now. Maybe a zoomed out look at the tired Buick, a small but burgeoning crack in the windshield—I should have known, driving across the entire damn country. I might have attempted a new and fresh way of describing snow falling in the night, or I might have just had him shut the radio off, somewhere around Pence, to watch sleepily the flakes, silver and dark, falling obliquely against the headlights. Would I bring a master storyteller (J. Joyce) into the first paragraph of a story? I doubt this as well, but you never know what writer Tim is going to get up to. Anyway, the point is: it could be a good story. Even if I made it first person—though I am finally growing tired of writing stories about writers—it would be fun, the writer wondering to himself why he still does it, writes these stories nobody will read, slogging cross-country to hawk his wares to six people here, nine people there, no people here in fucking Regina, he might say, for all I know. The merge onto Ring Road might jog his memory. Do I know anyone from here? He might think, distracting himself as he typed The Black Bird Commons’ address into his Google Maps, Was that girl—woman now, of course—from uni from here? Or was it Swift Current? Somewhere in Saskatchewan anyway. He might hit some ice—we can exaggerate the weather for a story—and scare himself into slowing down. He might take a deep breath, try to spot the beauty of an unfamiliar city, the surprises a prairie town has to offer. He might lift his spirits enough so that as he walks through the doors, only a few minutes late, and greets the shopkeeps, he feels invigorated, emboldened even, ready to perform his work in a new and moving and poignant rendition.
Then he walks into an empty bookshop, save for the gaggle of ladies chattering in the other room, discussing the real work of a real writer.
How would this story end, though? I don’t know that either. To end a story is the hardest bit, after all.
* * *
In reality, it was nothing like that. I mean he was slightly late. It was snowing. There were, in fact, no books to sell. And there was, in fact, a bookclub going on. But he walked in with a smile on his face, wine in hand. He shook our hands warmly, had nary a sore word to say about the weather, about the books, about the turnout.
We sat in the living room and chatted about his books—two mystery novels set in Winnipeg, the same detective as the main character, one about the Murdered and Missing Indigenous women of Winnipeg, about the research and readers he used to do it properly, about the second book (the one he had come to launch) which begins with the leader of a nearby Hutterite colony showing up dead in a luxurious Airbnb. We talked about his frustrations with delays at the printer, or his publisher’s reluctance to print more copies. We talked about his epic road trip, how there’s something sweet about driving, alone, for hours on end. We talked about my own book, a bit, about his time as a journalist, reporting on “white-collar crimes” for the Montreal Gazette, his retirement, his coverage of the Quebec referendum in ’95, and this month’s farce of a referendum in Alberta. We cheersed each other with our plastic cups, to his book, to our shop, to the pleasures and struggles of publishing small books with small presses. And we ended the evening smiling for a selfie, Don’s long arm outstretched to fit all three of us—him, myself and Chantelle—into frame. Then I ushered him into my dungeon closet where I have had every author who has a launched a book at the shop sign a large plaque. He left as he came in: with a smile on his face, seemingly in much higher spirits than I would have been. Indeed, in higher spirits than I actually felt just then.
This is not how a good short story ends—show me a good short story that isn’t at least a little bit melancholy in its ending.
* * *
Of course, we aren’t living in a short story, and real people are different than fictional characters, and it’s a rare thing, indeed, when a real-life story transfers one-to-one into a good short story. Don Macdonald would make a terrible protagonist for a short story, at least for any of my short stories, with his perpetual smile and unfettered geniality. And a snowy book launch with no attendees is hardly fodder for a riveting plot.
I do believe we were living through a different kind of story, though. And here lies the point of this post. I think.
I’m pretty sure this is a story I will tell, years from now, when we’re stable and established and we’ve been on our lot for ten years, fifteen, twenty, when The Black Bird Commons really is a must-stop on any Canadian author’s tour, when that ginormous plaque in the dark closet is a palimpsest of signatures, each with it’s own, unique Black Bird story. I’m gonna tell this story as an wisened old shopkeep: Believe it or not, when we first started this thing we had book launches where nobody showed up. Literally nobody. We just sat here and drank wine in an empty bookshop (I sincerely doubt the book club will make it into the twenty-year-old version of the story).
One of the hardest part of this gig has been, in fact, the idea that the way it all looks in my head is not quite the way it looks in reality. In opening a bookshop, I/we have had so many ideas or plans that we couldn’t possibly do all of them. At least not right now. But we’re trying our best to do as many cool things as we can.
Growing up here in Regina, a young writer (until, all of a sudden, I wasn’t young) trying to find his way, I was often so very frustrated with our lack of literary events. You watch movies of young people in New York, or LA, or even places like friggen Portland, Oregon, or Vancouver, Montreal, all the places, and you see them going to poetry readings or gallery openings and yes, book launches, and I, at least, thought—over and over again: Why can’t we have these things here?
Of course it’s not true that we never have these things here, and the more I’ve gotten involved with other writers (The Writers’ Guild, for instance) and creative people, the more I’ve been able to attend such things, but still: they seem fewer and farther between than they ought to be.
And in opening a bookshop, I’ve hoped to add to the list of such events. In my head, people will eventually be jealous of all the things Regina has to offer, not just at our shop but here there and every where, as it has already started to do. In my head, Reginians will eventually bore of all the literary and cultural events Regina is holding. They’ll be arguing with their friends about what to do on a Friday, or a Saturday, or a Wednesday, Tuesday, etc, and someone will say, But we always go to those stupid poetry nights—or—Didn’t we see a book launch last week?—or someone’ll say, There’s nothing to do, and someone else will say, There’s always The Black Bird, and they’ll shrug their shoulders, and they’ll gather their coats and wonder off.
Right now, though, three months into this wonderful project, it isn’t going quite as I see it in my head. Yes, I recognize the silliness, even the foolishness, of thinking everything would come to fruition immediately, and of course I knew going into this that there would be days—even weeks—where the shop would be slow. We are booksellers, after all. We didn’t actually believe we’d be rolling in the Bordens after three months, or that we’d be hosting a packed house for every event, but it is hard—I’ll admit it—when events we’re excited about end up bringing three - eight people, and it is especially hard—I found out last night—when those events feature artists who I don’t know personally or have no idea how they’ll feel or react, even if they end up being, somehow, unfazed by a launch with zero attendees.
* * *
I said there was a point to this post, and there is. Certainly it’s not to complain; I hope that’s not how it’s come across. The point is: I’m looking forward to the day when I tell these stories as funny little anecdotes of the struggles of a new shopkeep. The point is: I’m looking forward to the day we’re laughing about these things over glasses of wine, rather than lamenting them. The point is: I can’t wait for the next book launch (November 24th, by the way), nor for the rest of our upcoming events. The point is: I’m looking forward to being stable and established and considered a staple in the cultural landscape of Regina and the prairies. The point is: as hard as it feels some days, neither Chantelle nor I has considered that it’s too hard, that maybe we’ve made a mistake or we need to shift gears, or, I dunno, give up. The point is: we’re here; we’re looking forward; we’re more determined than ever; we’re dreaming big; and we can’t wait to see all of you take part in the dream along with us.
We’ll see you at the shop.
CaCaw!
