* Review by: Matt LaFever, Electronics Supervisor, Bookmans Speedway

I don't want to turn you off right away, but The Sparrow by Mary Doria Russell is not a happy book. It won't make you feel good about yourself or your place in the universe. Immediately the characters are onset by tragedy, but from that tragedy we learn more about them.

A couple of weeks ago Bookmans Flagstaff hosted Wayne Ranney, a Grand Canyon author, expert and geologist to discuss the formation of the canyon. I was captivated all the way through, particularly about the new controversy about whether the canyon is 6 million or 70 million years old. Afterward he handed me a free booklet explaining how different landmasses are formed. I read through it and learned a few things about arches, mesas, etc.

My love of reading goes back as far back as I can remember. Working at Bookmans allows me to indulge in my habit of choice every day of the year. From the first time I read Shakespeare to when I was first entranced by Christopher Moore's Fool, I love discovering new books to love. Book Chat at Bookmans Flagstaff was born from talking about the books Regina and I read each month and trying to get the other to read them too. Book Chat is the last Wednesday evening of every month starting at 5:30 p.m. and all are welcome.

Here are each of our "Top 10" from 2011:

At first glance, fiction and travel guides don't have much in common, however fiction can set a mood where travel guides primarily address logistics. When I travel I always read fiction set in the region I am visiting. When I first read The Witching Hour in 1995 in preparation for a trip to New Orleans. Anne Rice’s descriptions of The Big Easy were so spot-on that I knew the city before I even stepped off the plane.

Some readers seek strong characters through whom they can live vicariously. Some love the denouement when all the complications shake out and the reader can relax. I read to be carried away to story worlds. I lurk in the shadows of a book until that moment hits when I realize I'm completely engaged. I'm angry, worried or transfixed. That one moment for me as a reader is the moment when I am emotionally hooked.

I’m a book nerd. I’m a super huge Mark Danielewski nerd. A squeeling, jumping up and down, flapping my wee little arms T-Rex style, über Mark Danielewski nerd. I’m okay with that. I think we should all be nerds about something. I’m such a Mark Danielewski nerd I traveled ten hours on a train to get to Los Angeles to see him. Ten sleepless hours. I’d say sleeping sitting up on a train is harder than it looks, but it’s probably exactly as hard as I make it look.

Six months have passed since Bella Swan ran off to Italy to rescue her vampire soulmate Edward, forsaking her best friend and newly turned werewolf, Jacob. There she met the Volturi, the governing law of vampire society, who ruled that Bella was to be turned immediately. Eclipse opens in a sunlit field of wildflowers with Bella's voice reciting Robert Frost's Fire and Ice. It's this poem that foreshadows the entire events of the film defining both the love triangle between Bella, Edward, and Jacob and how vampires are dispatched.

Last month Bookmans Mesa was proud to highlight the Twilight series written by Stephanie Meyer. We hosted a remarkable giveaway where customers entered to win an assortment of shwag from the upcoming "Twilight: Eclipse" movie. With over 1,350 total entries (WOW), winners were randomly drawn and notified to come down and sink their teeth into such great prizes as life sized stand ups of the lead cast, a gift basket featuring all three Twilight movie soundtracks, a set of the Twilight saga books, and a chance to win one of 60 IMAX movie posters. Thanks to everyone who entered this amazing contest.

I picked up a messenger-bag-full of Cyberfrog issues from Bookmans recently with the sole intent of lambasting them in this column to further my anti-Ethan-Van-Sciver-agenda.

For those of you who spend your free time talking to girls (or whatever it is people who don’t blast comic-book-centric podcasts on their stereo as loud as they can each night just to drown out the sound of their own sobbing do), Van Sciver is the current illustrator of Green Lantern for DC Comics.

Check out @nyazgirl, awesome Bookmans vlogger and word maven, on her YouTube page for more awesome vlogs.

Every hobby has a pecking order; whether you’re a hardcore gamer who scoffs at the occasional player, or you’re a lover of wine, judged harshly by the bouquet swirling wine connoisseur. As a lover of books, and avid reader since I could decipher the letters as a child, I knew the pecking order existed, but never knew to what extent until I bought a Kindle.

...continued from The Deadly Hands of Kung Fu: Part One

After being called “faggot” for the sixth time in three days as punishment for the horrendous crime of walking on the sidewalk, I took a detour from my usual route home to hit the Bookmans on Speedway and Campbell and pick up some much needed Pop Escapism.

The only thing that makes living in Arizona tolerable is the handful of used bookstores scattered amongst the multitude of meth labs and Sonoran hot dog/ammunition stands that litter the landscape like so many would-be-immigrant bones in the Nogales Desert.

I don’t know how they survive in the state ranked 49th in the union for education and whose border militia dwarfs the Democrat population 6 to 1, but thank Rao that they do, ‘cause I don’t think I could make it through the week without them.

My absolute-hands-down-favorite of the lot is the Bookmans Entertainment Exchange stores, because entering one of their locations is like stepping through a stargate into a parallel world, wherein the concept of pawn shops was pioneered by a gang of good looking hipsters.

It is embarrassing to admit I've spent most of my adult life reading, writing, and publishing poetry. Poets are overly emotional, silly, melodramatic. They are either junk addicts who write about crashing cars, or starry-eyed idealists who spend the day staring at a tree. Ferdinand the Bull was probably a poet. Some male poets I know work hard to make their poetry masculine. They do slam poetry, or they write about guns, whiskey and fist-fights. And poetry has no practical use. It doesn't show you how to use your Tevo, doesn't give life lessons like O Magazine, won't even offer one big universal truth like many classic novels. And poetry certainly won't make you any money. Even a Pulitzer Prize winning poet lives modestly.

I could not let April glide past me without acknowledging National Poetry Month and the poet that changed my life.

I discovered Mary Oliver in the collegiate haze of words every English Lit major must wade through in order to find their own truth. I appreciated Keats, Yates, Donne, and their canonic cadre. And when I settled into my seat in “Literature about Nature” I expected nothing.

Her name appeared on a black and white syllabus.

Her book appeared on the bookstore shelf next to Foucault.

But her words.

Her words appeared in my brain with a slow percolation. A wide-eyed realization that something I had not planned to love, was inching its way into my soul.

Warning: This article contains cussing and book nerds having fun.

An unusual thing happens at our trade counter when a Christopher Moore book deal comes in. An electric current travels through the store, almost like a book pheromone detectible only to the book nerds. Slowly, staff members converge on the front counter, trying to act casual. “Hey, I was just seeing if you needed a break…oh a Christopher Moore deal.” Then several people claim that they have “dibs”. When the deal clears, the “dibs” storm breaks in earnest. Everything is used and seniority has no precedence. “I saw it first!” “Yeah, but I gave my last copy to a customer…” “No way! I gave up the last three. This one is mine!” “I called dibs!” “This one is my favorite and I don’t have a copy in hardback.” On it rumbles until slowly people acquiesce to sob stories with the caveat that THEY have “dibs” on the next one and the storm breaks up. Needless to say, when a Christopher Moore book tour is announced the day gets requested off pretty quickly.

Yes, I work in a bookstore 40 hours a week. Yes, I shop in bookstores when I'm not at work. So, it shouldn't surprise anyone that during a recent trip to Tucson, I made my way into our 3 Tucson locations. Each store is different; offering unique treasures that sing of the individuality each of our stores possess.

I won’t lie: I idolize her. I’ve read every word the woman has ever published. I recently listened to an NPR interview where she explained her writing process, and it was enlightening. I knew her language was as tight as 80’s stretch pants, but I didn’t realize Didion not only sleeps in the same room as a book she’s writing, since she claims “somehow the book doesn't leave you when you're right next to it,” but she also retypes the entirety of what she’s written each morning before continuing. She claims this process helps her maintain the continuity of the work. She’s also much more attentive to craft (putting the “literary” in literary nonfiction) than the majority of memoirists.

During February, we've been having a Love of Reading Contest, where you, our loyal and fabulous customers and readers, tell us what inspired your love of reading for a chance to win a $50 Bookmans gift certificate. Now, we'd love to give everyone who had wonderful, inspiring entries a $50 gift certificate, but we'd go broke... so we'd like to take a few moments to recognize some of our favorite runner-up entries. Thank all of you so much for your wonderful and inspiring entries during our contest. It's been really interesting to see such a variety of books and stories inspiring people to read.

During the month of February all of our stores celebrate Love of Reading Month. When I think about where my love of reading started, I think of my sister Amy. When we were young she spent a lot of her free time teaching me how to read. I fondly remember reading every single Little Golden Book that I could get my hands on. Because of this, when I started going to school I was already ahead of the curve in the reading department! It allowed a smooth transition into school and a whole new chapter into why I loved to read. I was a huge fan of reading incentive programs because what child doesn't love to receive a reward for doing something they already enjoy?

I’ve been a fan of vampires and vampire stories since I was a little kid, from the first time I read Bunnicla. There has been a lot of press lately about some new vampires, the Twilight vampires. To be honest, I’m not a fan. I like my vampires seductively pale bundles of violence, not shiny, cuddly emo friends. So, I feel it’s my civic duty to recommend some vampires that don’t (if you’ll excuse the pun), suck.

Best-selling novelist Gregory Maguire, whose Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West has been adapted into Tony Award-winning Broadway musical, will speak and sign at the Loft Cinema this Wednesday, June 17th, at 7 p.m. This annual GLBT literary event is presented and funded by Friends of the Pima County Library and PCL's GLBT Committee, and is absolutely FREE and open to the public.

I attended the Book Expo of America in New York City again this year and, like previous visits, it was an exciting place to be for a book lover. Most American publishers - and many international ones - come out and show off their latest offerings in their booths, many of them with authors that will sign books for you or just hang out and chat. Deals are made as sales people and buyers and marketing-types walk the halls looking for the next big thing; authors and lawyers and publishers hammer out rights deals and all that other stuff that goes on behind the scenes which ultimately delivers books into readers’ hands. All of it creates a great buzz of activity that is pretty cool to behold.

Follow the Reader, a blog for those who "read and recommend books," held an impromptu discussion on Twitter last Friday about how booksellers viewed Twitter in the workplace. Many members of the Bookmans staff are active on Twitter and a few chimed in on how the service has integrated into our everyday work routine.

Daniel M. Davis is the unique mind behind Steam Crow, "a Phoenix, Arizona company that creates quirky, imaginative characters and strange stories for people with a monster imagination." Davis will bring his cast of colorful robots and monsters to the Bookmans Youth Tent at the Tucson Festival of Books on Sunday, March 15th, from 10-11 a.m. and 1:30-2 p.m. Steam Crow will also take part in the Local Author Event in the Bookmans Main Tent on Sunday from 11 a.m. - 1 p.m.

The world of comics was dealt a heavy blow in June with the loss of one of the most beloved artists in the industry. Michael Turner, the head of Aspen MLT and renowned creator of some of the best art and stories of our time, such as Fathom, Witchblade, and Soulfire, passed away on June 27th after a long battle with cancer. It came as a shock to most fans, considering the amount of shows and work he was still doing, along with his high spirits and sociable energy when you were around him.

As an aspiring romance writer, I'm involved with the RWA (Romance Writers of America), and when I saw that our Phoenix chapter was having their semi-annual conference I quickly jumped on board. After talking with everyone at work - and offering to take along Bookmans gear to help promote us with the Arizona authors - they were happy to jump on board with me. We made a huge raffle basket and gave out 10% off coupons, bookmarks, and pens.

In my own experience, I have picked up books on screenprinting several times, only to quickly put them right down again. Many are text heavy, or several decades old. While they obviously contained the pertinent information, I just wanted to make some t-shirts as fast as possible. Impatience being one of my virtues, I resorted to following the rudimentary instructional pamphlet that came with a kit I bought on the internet.