{"id":6100,"date":"2011-09-20T06:00:47","date_gmt":"2011-09-20T10:00:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/?p=6100"},"modified":"2011-09-20T06:00:47","modified_gmt":"2011-09-20T10:00:47","slug":"what-a-bookseller-dreams-about","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/?p=6100","title":{"rendered":"What a Bookseller Dreams About"},"content":{"rendered":"

Everyone dreams about their job. I know Elizabeth had a wonderful post<\/a> about this very subject two years ago. My dream life this week has been entirely event-specific.
\nThis week is the start of a really crazy event schedule with events Wednesday through Saturday, and this is just the beginning. Between now and November 19th we have more than 20 events. Sure, to some stores this is par for the course. But for our store, staffed by five part-timers, this is really quite a schedule. One way I deal with event anxiety is by dreaming about events that go horribly, horribly wrong. I feel like this approach allows me to have the bad events in my sleep, thereby freeing my waking self to enjoy the actual events that may or may not be stellar.
\nTake last night’s dream. Lois Lowry is coming to the store on Wednesday. I sort of keep telling myself, *the* Lois Lowry is coming. The Giver<\/em> is one of my all-time favorite books and the author is coming to my store. I feel pressure to make this a really great event. Elizabeth and I are doing everything we can to make this event worthy of its guest.
\nMost all event dreams begin with the panic that there are absolutely no books. None. And there are lots of people who want them. In this dream there were no books and no attendees at first. I think every bookseller worries about having an event and no one showing up for it. There is nothing you can do about it but make the author comfortable and hang out. But still, it’s a nightmare in real life.
\nSo, in this dream, finally, some stragglers come to the event. We’re all ready for the event except that all the chairs are facing the wrong way. I ask everyone to turn their chairs around, and now, inexplicably, the room is too small for everyone. Poor Lois can barely sit at the author desk. There are only six people and now they’re mad. I’ve disappointed one of my favorite authors, there are no books, and the event space is still shrinking.
\nI wake up nervous. Then I realize that I do have books, many folks have already RSVP’ed, and to the best of my knowledge the event space has never once changed its size. Elizabeth’s email blast went out this morning and in the span of less than half an hour, more than 30 people called to reserve space for Lois Lowry, and the numbers kept rising all day.
\nSo, tonight I can go to sleep knowing I’ve got enough books (I counted), we already have a great crowd that will only grow for Lois Lowry and the other events this week. But I’m a planner, even in my sleep, so it wouldn’t be out of the question to start dreaming about not having any books for the holiday season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Between now and November 19th we have more than 20 events. Sure, to some stores this is par for the course. But for our store, staffed by five part-timers, this is really quite a schedule. One way I deal with event anxiety is by dreaming about events that go horribly, horribly wrong. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6100","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6100","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=6100"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6100\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=6100"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=6100"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.publishersweekly.com\/blogs\/shelftalker\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=6100"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}