Shelf Life

It's fun to check out what people buy in a grocery store. It's also interesting to see what people watch on TV at the gym. People-watching is an underrated pastime, and for the psychologically minded, a glimpse into the human brain. For Suzanne Strempek Shea, part of her life surrounds her in the bookstore. Among the shelves and bindings is a place rife with colorful characters - and a chance to analyze what they buy. Ironically, authors can find a lot to write about while working in a bookstore.

Shea works at the independent family-owned Edwards Books in Springfield, and she's also an accomplished author with four other novels under her belt.

When her editor at Beacon Press asked her for her next idea, Shea decided to turn what was right under her nose into a book. She had already been jotting down ideas that she was planning on churning into a magazine article.

"When I started at the bookstore," says Shea, "it just occurred to me how odd it was to be writing books and standing behind a counter and selling them. It was wonderful to see what books meant to people. Librarians must have the same experience."

The result is Shelf Life, a wonderful, often-humorous, collection of musings about her experiences in the store. The opening chapter discusses all the types of books people are looking for, what's hot now, and the often-peculiar role Shea has to play in helping shoppers find their books. For instance (and this is something that irritates her a little), in the summertime, she gets a rush of people who are looking for books that "won't make them think" - books that have no value or literary quality whatsoever. This is astonishing to her, but she does the best she can recommending them - and also hopes they don't leave with one of her titles as their mindless summertime pick.

"This is about what it's like to be behind the counter, as opposed to being a shopper," says Shea. "Right now, what's hot are books on the Atkin's or South Beach diets, or celebrity deaths, or the DaVinci Code. It's just stuff people can't get enough of, so I talk about that. I talk about really how the experience has given me a different reverence for the written word and how much it can mean to people."

Shea also reflects on her childhood, which was spent reading a lot (surprise, surprise). Author tours aren't like a rock band tour, and Shea brings us into the experiences of the many she's been on. She also talks about the beauty of the independent store, particularly the one she works at - which is run entirely by women. There's the excitement of opening the new book order boxes. Repeat characters spice up the life of the store, too, such as the man who reads everything out loud, and loudly.

"One day I heard him read my title," she laughs. "I thought, I've finally made it. The title man has read me. Mostly this book is about me working there. It goes through the months. And as each month turns, there's that whole thing of how the store changes - like parents who come in at the end of the summer [to get the books] that their kids should have been reading."

But no matter what Shea surmises about these people she encounters, she's learned it's best to just keep it to herself (or put it in a book).

"At first when I worked there," says Shea, "I'd say, 'Enjoy your Time magazine' or 'Enjoy your Dr. Seuss' or 'Enjoy your Dual Disorders Handbook.' I can't really say that. There's this confidentiality issue. You just don't want to turn to the next person and say, 'can you imagine how screwed up that person is?' "