A Mighty Rain Dampens the 2014 Brattleboro Book Fair

A jewel box location, glittering book offerings, autumn leaves nearly at peak and a tie-in with a four-day literary festival were a powerful combination, but not enough to overcome torrential rains at the Vermont Fall Book Fair this past Saturday at the Brattleboro Museum and Art Center.

Jeff Bergman was there with a stellar selection of modern firsts, signed books and photographs and a great collection of books about books and bookseller memoirs, (though he told me the "really great stuff" doesn't go on the road with him. Can only imagine those biblio treasures.) I couldn't resist a shot of "The Bankrupt Bookseller" (the orange jacketed book) and the troika of the Lone Ranger, Roger Maris and Hillary Clinton.

My fellow 2014 Colorado Antiquarian Book Seminar buddy Charles Schmieg of Black Paw Books came to Fair. He ended up with an interesting inscribed chess book and since we were both still buzzing with book energy from our CABS experience, we talked about the book business and our plans for quite some time. Charles is the taller one.

Patricia McWilliams of Hermit Hill Books in Poultney, Vermont had a terrific display of fine bindings and interesting titles. Her shop is just across the New York border from Granville, the "Slate Capital of the World" and is worth a trip if you are in our neck of the woods. Patricia reported great sales this summer and let's hope the trend continues.  That's Patricia on the right mulling over her final display, with Lizz Young on the left. Lizz is a specialist bookseller who sells books about food, drink and the domestic arts, and her stylish display is shown below. She really utilizes height and unusual shelving accents to punch up her book displays and I will be trying to incorporate these aspects in my own configurations for future book fairs. Lizz also has one of the most interesting and erudite book blogs, so be sure to check that out.

On the subject of effective book fair displays, my book booth neighbor John Hess of Catamount Books in East Arlington, VT, has had great success with his self-constructed shelves that allow for the more attractive bindings and jacket art to be faced out. John reports that since he started using these shelves, he brings fewer boxes of books but sells more! Now that's something any bookseller's back and shoulders can appreciate. I forgot to capture an image of the shelves in all their book-loaded glory during the Fair (and you would have seen the spaces where books had been sold), but here's a fuzzy photo of them just before John packed them up.

New Hampshire bookseller Michael Daum was busy pricing up some of his stock when I strolled by his booth, so I didn't disturb him, but he is one of the most approachable bookseller colleagues I have met at the Vermont and Albany book fairs. Michael also has one of the best bookseller voices in the business: a rumbling, smoky-toned baritone with lots of New England Yankee inflections. And then there's his beautiful books...

My own book wares, a colorful mix of colorful older children's books, New England history, art, antiques and a few of my better books, were designed to appeal more to the walk-in crowd than my fellow book dealers. Unfortunately, the unzippering of the clouds with two months of long overdue rain timed to drench the world directly after the Brattleboro Fair opened took care of those crowds and the book fair attendance was quite thin. I still consider the Fair a success, because I did buy and sell from some of my colleagues, and I learned quite a bit from chatting with them and observing what kinds of books they brought, but here's hoping the Albany Antiquarian Book Fair on Sunday, October 19th at the Albany Institute of History and Art will be a less soggy af-FAIR.

Seen at the August 12, 2012 Brattleboro Book Fair

The Book Trout was on the road at the as a first time exhibitor at the Brattleboro Book Fair, the summer show for the Vermont Antiquarian Booksellers Association. I had previously had a good experience at the Spring Book Fair in Burlington, and since Brattleboro is even closer to home, it was easy to pack the old Chevy Blazer up with some folding shelves and boxes of books (this time only seven boxes, which seemed a little skimpy after setting up).

We set up on Saturday during extremely unsettled weather conditions. My hair-o-meter told me it would rain imminently and it did, very hard, on the last trip back out to the car, with all my windows and back hood up. The temperature wasn't too bad inside the venue, but you can see that all those damp booksellers and their soggy boxes raised the humidity to rain forest levels and when we came back the next day to start the show, lots of softcover and paper items were curled up or droopy, causing some rearrangement of book displays.

I brought my mom, Carol Marie Davis, a Vermont author, to help me out with my booth. She has written two books thus far, The Adventures of Moonspirit: A Girl from Florida's Past and Anna: Heart of a Peasant and is researching on a third book, tentatively to be about some handmade dolls that travel up the Underground Railroad during the Civil War era.

Mom seemed to enjoy minding our booth at the Book Fair. Unfortunately my free labor situation may be in jeopardy as I was ratted out by my colleague, Richard Mori, who informed her that I was not only supposed to pay her for helping me out, but I was to throw in a free lunch! I'll find a way to fix his wagon at the next book fair.

My tables adjoined a space with Mary Faneuil Hill of Old & New England Books, who had a lovely display of Tasha Tudor books and history volumes, spiced up with a couple of Punch and Judy puppets. Mary has a seasonal shop in Newfane (open May through October) and regaled us with stories about having Tasha Tudor come to her shop many times for signings and visits.

Mom really was excited to meet Donald H. Cresswell of The Philadelphia Print Shop, who appears often as an appraiser on the Antiques Road Show. He was very generous with his time with Mom and other fairgoers and she was thrilled to pose with him and an Audubon print of an osprey. Cresswell was one of several exhibitors who offered ten minute symposia throughout the Fair on various bookish topics such as prints, Theodore Roosevelt, and folk music. This continuing education idea is the brainchild of the gregarious Book Fair impresario Gary Austin of Austin's Antiquarian Books in Wilmington, VT.

(Intriguingly, right after the Fair I read The Island of Lost Maps, by Miles Harvey, which is all about the world of antique maps, and it turns out that Cresswell used to work for Graham Arader, who features prominently in the book. It's a fascinating read. And Mom recommended it to me, so you can see why I want to keep her on as an adjunct employee).


It was nice to see some familiar bookseller colleagues at the Fair. Donna Howard of The Eloquent Page in St. Albans, VT was there with an eye-catching booth, and I was pleased to see John and Carol Hess from Arlington, Vermont's Catamount Books. They are a delightful pair and I have to say that they won the Biblio-Synchronicity Award from my perspective with their side-by-side display of a copy of The Sucking Lice of North America next to a photo-essay entitled "Asses".

The most luscious eye-candy that I saw at the Fair was at the nearby display of Susan Krinsky, of Brandywine Antiques and Books of Amherst, New Hampshire. She had so many lovely antique children's books and other lovely titles, and I couldn't resist a few snaps.

That's Susan above proudly offering a first edition of Wanda Gag's wonderful book "Millions of Cats" and Robert Heinlein's "Red Planet".

All in all, a great day at the Brattleboro Book Fair. The venue was well-lit and there was plenty of space for the crowds and exhibitors to spread out. We sold some books (mostly Vermont history, vintage paperbacks and children's books), gawked at many others and had some illuminating conversations about authors, illustrators, book history and other bibliophilic topics, so I will be sure to be back next year.