WEIRD THINGS CUSTOMERS SAY IN BOOKSTORES

Booksellers, bookstore groupies: Rejoice! The U.K.’s bestselling Weird Things Customers Say in Bookshops by Jen Campbell has crossed the pond and will be available for purchase on September 13. This collection of outrageous conversations showcasing the most unusual and uproarious comments overheard by booksellers now includes a miscellany of hilarious additions from some of the best North American bookstores. 

We would like to thank the courageous and good-humored bookish staffers that came out in droves to make submissions at our BEA booth and for those that flooded our inboxes with the most entertaining reading material. 

Inspired more than three years ago by a patron who asked whether Holocaust victim Anne Frank had ever written a sequel, Jen Campbell began taking note of the strange and wonderful questions she received as a bookseller in North London’s Ripping Yarns and Scotland’s Edinburgh Bookshop, sharing the stories she heard through a series of popular posts on her blog. Campbell decided to write a book when actor and comedian John Cleese tweeted the simple question, “What is your pet peeve,” to which she immediately knew her response, “The weird things people say in bookshops.”  Such as…

  

“Do you have any pop-up books on sex education?"

“Do you have this children’s book I’ve heard about? It’s supposed to be very good. It’s called Lionel Richie and the Wardrobe.”

“Do you have a copy of Tequila Mockingbird?”

In celebration of the upcoming publication, we’d like input from you all—bookseller, librarian, bibliophile—no matter!  We hope you will share any delightfully despicable comments you've overheard in bookstores by tweeting at us @overlookpress with the hashtag, #weirdthingsbook. Every week, we will highlight the best quotes you send in!

You can also follow author Jen Campbell on twitter at @aeroplanegirl.

 

Video Chatting with R.J. Ellory

With the degree of media frenzy that has accompanied the arrival of England’s Downton Abbey to American television viewers this winter, it can be easy to forget that England has a long history of cultural exports to this country that long predate the critically acclaimed Edwardian drama. From Shakespeare to Chaucer, the Beatles to the Stones, to Jeeves and Wooster, many of England’s most beloved native stars have received equal if not greater fanfare from audiences abroad as they have from supporters at home.

At Overlook we’re no strangers to the alluring charm of British culture. Looking at the list of English authors we’ve published over the years, including such luminaries as Dickens, Wodehouse, and Fry, it should be no shock to learn that we are devoted Anglophiles ourselves. Among our favorite contemporary English writers is R.J. Ellory, the man behind such gripping thrillers as A Quiet Belief in Angels, The Anniversary Man and A Simple Act of Violence. This winter we released his latest novel, A Quiet Vendetta—an epic history of the Italian Mafia in America told through the story of one assassin’s life. To promote the new book Ellory travelled to the United States last month, making stops in cities including Brooklyn, Charlotte, Houston, Austin, and Scottsdale. Along the way he found the time to stop by the Overlook offices to discuss his latest book, chat about his favorite bookstores in the United States, and brief us on the upcoming US release of his debut novel, Candlemoth. Check out the videos, below.

As a professional writer, R.J. Ellory has visited countless bookstores on author tours across Europe and the United States for readings, signings, and Q&A sessions. Here, he explains why he shares a passionate love of bookstores with book buyers and readers everywhere.

A Quiet Vendetta is the latest thriller in a long line of critically acclaimed and award-winning crime novels from Ellory. In this video he explains the background of a book that traces the influence and origin of organized crime in America across five decades, and talks about what it takes to write a likeable villain.

This summer we’ll be releasing R.J. Ellory’s debut novel Candlemoth for the first time in the United States. Here, Ellory gives a sneak peek at the book that started it all.