Barbara’s Bookstore

Reason number 48 for Sparkle Hayter’s magnificence? A veteran of a dozen book tours, in Europe and North America on the way down to Boston she counselled me on the pitfalls ahead. Don’t worry if nobody shows up, she said, it happens and when it does just smile and retire to a bar for drink.

So, indeed, it does happen and thankfully I was well warned. I blame the Chicago weather of course. Scalpel winds, burning snow flurries, temperatures near zero and not in a happy Celsius kind of way. I sure the hell wouldn’t have left my apartment to go to a bookstore reading so I am pleased to report that my readers are wise people too.



But you know what? Things turned out. I got to spend some good time with some good people. Kevin was there because he is the manager type at Barabara’s Bookstore. Incredible guy who organizes circus parties and keeps this intriguing blog about is material purchases and his attempts to have a weekly ‘Buy Nothing Day. It’s at: www.consumatron.com. Give it an eye.

Then there was Mike, a writer with ‘Stop Smiling (The Magazine for High-Minded Lowlifes)’. He came to do an interview, which we happily conducted at the Skylark, an authentic Chicago bar recommended by Bookstore Kevin which served collard greens and artichoke-spinach dip and, clearly, beer. Hunter S. Thompson once said that the key to interviewing was to get your subject drunk and record everything he says. I am pleased to report Mike seems to be in the Thompson school of journalism.