It's official!

We will be opening as Inklings - Books and Things no later than November 1st! We hope to open the weekend before, on Oct 29th if we can get everything together by then.


Stop by the new blog at:
www.inklingsbooks.blogspot.com

Update on "Project Mittens*"

So, some of you may be aware that we are trying to save the place we love (and our jobs...) by attempting to open an independent bookstore...

To keep you abreast of the situation, we've created another blog to track our progress. Please visit us at:
http://dorothysbookportal.blogspot.com/

We look forward to your input and support!


*The name "Project Mittens**" came about when first discussing the idea of opening a new bookstore. When asked whether she'd thought of names, Dorothy responded that it was a little like finding a stray kitten -- if you named it, then you became attached, and then if anything untoward were to happen, you would become immeasurably distraught. With this metaphor in mind, Aimee and Dorothy returned to the front of the store, where Aimee jokingly asked Jay, "So, what should we name the kitten?" He responded, "Mittens," paused, and said to Dorothy, "What kitten?" "The theoretical store." "Oh," he emphatically replied, "Mittens!"
And thus, more nonsense was born.

**We need a new name. Please visit http://dorothysbookportal.blogspot.com/ to voice your opinions.

-Aimee

Things you should probably see (that may or may not actually have to do with books...)

http://www.ew.com/ew/gallery/0,,20419951_20513357,00.html

http://www.buzzfeed.com/daves4/a-basset-hound-dressed-as-sherlock-holmes-running

http://www.buzzfeed.com/daves4/basset-hounds-running

You're welcome.

Some Thoughts on Closing

I am numb.

I am sure the tears will come later.

Denial is a state I’ve been living in ever since the Downtown Santa Cruz store closed in April. I was nearly convinced that if I just ignored the possibility, it wouldn’t happen. In reality, I think we all knew this was coming. We’ve known the state of things for quite a while now, and though we all hoped Direct Brands would be able to purchase the company and give us another shot at being successful, there was a distinct feeling of dreadful anticipation.

I am now angry. Why couldn’t DB save us? Why did publishers upturn the tentative purchase agreement when they knew over 11,000 jobs were at stake? Why, on God’s green earth, don’t people care enough about reading to realize that this is just another step in the process of losing yet another precious resource?

I realize I am preaching to the choir.

There will be no bargaining. I know there is absolutely nothing to be done when it is a large corporate company that is breathing its last. Although, I suppose, if you count throwing out the suggestion to open our own bookstore, then yes, some of us have already tried to bargain with fate… But we know this is also not practical.

Depression may come, particularly because we at Borders Express Capitola are a family. We have become so through our mutual love of books, stories, and just about all things nerdy. In my nearly five years here, I have formed lasting friendships with my coworkers and several regulars. I may be bordering on the melodramatic when I say so, but I feel as if we are a group of foster children being put up for separate adoptions. Who knows when we will see each other again? We will never be in the same place at the same time like this ever again, and it makes me sick. This store is my second home.

Someday, I will accept what has happened here. I will know that the five years I have spent here have set me up with some of the greatest workplace experience and a genuine love of customer service. This has been the best environment in which a person could ask to work -- so much so that it has never really felt like work, but more like being in a club dedicated to all my favorite things and people.

I would like to thank all of our customers, regulars and infrequent visitors, for their love, support, and genuine book-centric conversations over the years. I will miss you.

To my coworkers,

I won’t miss you.  Because we’re gonna make the book-club happen.

And that’s my final answer.

~Aimee

The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo

Another book review by Jax!

Title: The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo
Author: Stieg Larsson
Genre: Mystery Thriller
Overall Rating: 3.5 I want you all to know, that I struggled long and hard with what to rate this one.
The story is really about two extremely dissimilar people that (WHAT A CRAZY RANDOM HAPPENSTANCE) meet and work together to try to bring a murdering rapist to justice. One is Blomkivist, a somewhat nerdy but mostly good looking financial journalist. He's brave and loyal and true, and is based loosely on a kid's detective character. He's like Robert Langdon, but on his home turf (kinda) with various lovers wandering around.

The other is Lisbeth, who is, to paraphrase the book itself "a modern Pippi Longstocking". Now, you might read that and think, "That sounds cool, Pippi Longstocking was a annoyingly cheerful, but kinda cool. She had all that money and pigtails that stood up on their own."

Wrong. I mean, she is cool, but when I say modern, I mean Fouled Up Beyond All Recognition (and yes, that did warrant spelling out). As in, Lisbeth is punk-ish, anti-social and most likely has some sort of disorder that makes it nearly impossible for her to "normally" interact with people/the world around her. She's a hacker (the cool kind, not the Neo kind), and comes from a poor background but don't take no crap from nobody. No, really, one guy that tried got a car full of fire. While he was in it. Yep, she got a hint of the pyscho in her.

The thing is, you REALLY get into this girl's head. However hard it is for her to talk to the people in the book, you are TOTALLY there with her, every step of the way. She's an awesome character, and I think that Larsson does her justice. The action bits of the writing are spot on, and there is a point in the book where you just can't put it down.

But, and we all knew there was a but coming, you notice I don't talk much about the plot. That's because, for the life of me, I can't really remember what it entailed. And in the end, those two characters are far more important than any random plot. And that's what gives this book a less than 5 rating, is it's slow start (SO MUCH FINANCIAL JOURNALISM) and the way the plot gets kind of...lost. I think the main problem is the fact that Larsson got so very little edit time before he died. Yep, he died more or less right after the first "draft", and his books could have been near perfect with some time spent with someone who could have helped him edit. No disrespect to the man, he wrote a heck of a book, I'm just sad we never got to see his style refined and finished.

So the moral of the story is, you should read the book because the character is cool, but no one will judge you for skimming the first hundred pages or so. When I see the movie I'll you let you know how that goes, I have high hopes for it being all the best bits of the book.

Fated

S.G. Browne is a local author, and a really nice guy. You may have even seen him in Borders Capitola and not have noticed. (He'll sometimes come in, take all his books off our shelves, sign them, and put them back.) Perhaps you've seen his other book, Breathers, on Natalie's Staff Pick display. However, we are here to talk about his latest creation, Fated...

With the same wry, black humor as his first novel, S.G. Browne takes us on a crazy journey with the immortal entity known as 'Fabio' (aka Fate himself) - from complaining about the lows of his job in comparison to that of Destiny's, to actually falling in love with a human (a big no-no), and all the consequences of his actions in between. Fated came with a rather bizarre ending I did not really see coming, and to be honest, it still boggles my mind that the story wrapped up in that particular way.

I hope you enjoy this book and its author's strange, but awesome, sense of humor.
~Aimee

Staff Member of the Week! ~*Leigh*~

Leigh is a bookseller who just recently started at Borders Capitola a few months ago. She is a self-proclaimed Nerd Extraordinaire(TM) and will consume anything of vaguely geeky nature. She graduated from college with a History major and then went on to do a Theater graduate program, and loves to do any backstage work she can. Some of her favorite TV shows include anything and everything created by Joss Whedon (Buffy and Firefly tying for first place, naturally), Doctor Who, and Castle. She has been reading since before she could hold a book in her hands, and was known early on as that weird kid who would sit in the library during recess absorbing as much knowledge as she could, instead of playing kickball with the other kids. She loves reading sci-fi and fantasy, as was into vampires way before all this crazy Twilight nonsense (you want a great vampire book? Read Anno Dracula, by Kim Newman...amazing twist on the myth!). While sci-fi, fantasy, and graphic novels have a special place in her heart, Leigh loves to read from many different genres, whether beautifully written coming of age/self-realization stories like The Perks of Being a Wallflower (Stephen Chbosky) and Middlesex (Jeffrey Euginides), or history books like The Good War by Studs Terkel.  Any time Leigh has that isn't spent working or reading is usually spent playing some sort of video game or good card game with friends. If you see her around the store, say hi! She'd love to talk to you about some of her favorite reads, and help you find yours!