Today’s paper included a special section all about the San Diego Festival of Books, which returns on Saturday, Aug. 25 after last year’s successful inaugural edition. The Union-Tribune and KPBS are the co-sponsors of this celebration of authors and readers, and I’m excited to be a participant in a panel discussion about “The Dark Side of Business.” Nearly all of the 90 or so authors at this year’s festival have ties to the San Diego area, and the number of local exhibitors and booksellers is up significantly from last year. Should be a great day at Liberty Station! Go here for more.
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On Saturday, Adams Avenue Bookstore, an excellent used bookstore stocked with knowledgeable staffers and a pair of roaming cats, closed its doors for the last time after serving the Normal Heights neighborhood for 53 years. (I visited a week earlier when everything was 75 percent off, and I picked up a signed Philip Roth book for $8, among other gems.) It follows the closure of similar bookish haunts such as Wahrenbrock’s Book House downtown (a space that remains vacant after many years) and Fifth Avenue Books in Hillcrest.
And yet there are green shoots of a bricks-and-mortar literary revival: The Book Catapult in the former West Grove Collective space in South Park, the quirky Verbatim Books in North Park, and La Playa Books in Point Loma. Such places are typically much more willing to champion local authors’ books and host readings and other events than larger stores and certainly chains like Barnes & Noble. As such, they can evolve into important community centers and marketplaces for ideas. Perhaps the future of bookselling is in these small shops that take the time to understand the tastes of the neighborhoods they serve.
Novelist Don Winslow and I discuss my book and his interest in its subject matter of gambling and organized crime. I gave him a copy and he asked me to sign it for him, which was an honor.
New York Times bestselling crime novelist Don Winslow is a strong candidate for the title of the World’s Most Interesting Man. At various points, he has led safaris in Africa, taught Shakespeare in London, and worked as a private investigator in New York City’s bad old days when crack vials on the streets were as plentiful as shells on a beach.
Winslow visited the Union-Tribune this week to discuss his approach to writing to an audience of reporters and editors. His latest novel, “The Force,” is being made into a motion picture with David Mamet writing the screenplay. Winslow has written about 20 novels — all of them informed by his rich life experience and deep research.
For Winslow, his books are character-driven, not plot-driven. (“I hate plot,” he said more than once, distinguishing himself from a mystery writer.) He needs to have the characters talk to him and then he simply jumps in and starts writing. Winslow, a resident of Julian in a remote part of eastern San Diego County, works between 5:30 a.m. to 5:30 p.m. (with a break for a run or walk) and typically takes only Sundays off. He said he “writes fast, rewrites slow” and does up to 14 drafts of a book.
Winslow generously signed my copy of “The Cartel,” which he suggested is probably not the best book to take on my upcoming beach vacation.
Winslow’s books are infused with real-world experience. For “The Force,” he drew on decades of relationships with NYPD officers for insight into their inner lives. As a fiction writer, Winslow is able to guarantee their anonymity and never takes notes during interviews to make sources feel at ease. “Most people want their stories told,” he said.
The novelist is an avid consumer of journalism (he reads the U-T twice a day online because his house is too isolated for print delivery) and has strong feelings about the current political scene. He says the “war on drugs” ignores that the enormous American appetite for drugs is the true source of the problem, not what’s happening in Mexico. As a society, Americans need to examine the reasons behind drug consumption and treat it as a public health problem through education and treatment. Winslow says the “war on drugs” has failed given that narcotics are more plentiful, cheaper and more lethal than ever before, and he added that we’d be better off legalizing all drugs.
Winslow is as good a storyteller in person as on the page, and San Diegans are lucky to count him as one of their own.
I’m happy to say that I received a medal for “Gangsters to Governors” at the Independent Publishers Book Awards, which is open to independent press or university press books or self-published titles. The event was at the Copacabana nightclub in Manhattan (no Barry Manilow sighting!) and there was an open bar, plenty of food and lots of authors with interesting books and backgrounds. My book received the bronze award for Current Events (political/economic/foreign affairs). Publishing a book of any kind is a difficult endeavor, so this sort of recognition is most welcome — especially to a first-time author. Thanks to the event organizers for supporting and encouraging independent presses and authors!
I also learned that “Gangsters to Governors” was chosen as the winner in the Current Events/Social Change category in the Next Generation Indie Book Awards! The awards will be given at a ceremony on June 22 in New Orleans in conjunction with the American Library Association’s annual conference. (Unfortunately, I can’t make that one.) The awards also posted judges’ comments for the winners, and here’s what one of the judges said about the book: “Compulsively readable from its first pages, ‘Gangsters to Governors’ is a compelling look at the past and future of gambling in America. It spans the boardwalk in Atlantic City to the borderless world of online gambling and everything in between.”
Two writers I’ve admired for decades — Tom Wolfe and Philip Roth — died this month. I first came to Wolfe through his first novel, “The Bonfire of the Vanities,” which is a perfect time capsule of the status-obsessed 1980s. Over the years, I’ve dipped into his earlier journalism work and have never failed to be entertained by his energetic writing style and punctuation pyrotechnics. Wolfe was also one of our great literary characters, picking fights with other authors and wearing his flamboyant white suits no matter the situation.
My first Roth novel was “Portnoy’s Complaint,” which I think I picked up in a used bookstore during college and read in one sitting. It’s filthy but hilarious. It was then that Roth was getting his second wind and I picked up “American Pastoral,” one of the best novels I’ve ever read. Roth’s unsparing novels delve into topics like lust and death and also the meaning of Jewishness and America. Wolfe and Roth were distinctive voices who leave behind mountains of books I look forward to exploring for a lifetime.
Monday was a landmark day in U.S. gambling history with the Supreme Court’s 6-3 decision in Murphy v. NCAA to strike down the federal ban on sports gambling, opening the way for states to legalize it. As I read the majority opinion written by Justice Samuel Alito, I was stunned to spot this at the bottom of page 2: “See D. Clary, Gangsters to Governors 152-153 (2017) (Clary).” The context was background about Atlantic City’s history and its pursuit of casino gambling in the 1970s to revitalize the fallen resort town. I turned the page and noticed that my book was directly quoted in the text of the opinion and referenced in three more footnotes. The court then wades deep into case law and constitutional questions and cites my book one more time on page 27 to support the claim that states shied away from legalizing casinos because of organized crime concerns. So in all, my book was cited five times by the U.S. Supreme Court! I’m honored that Justice Alito (or least one of his law clerks) read my book and thought it worthy enough to be used as a reference in this consequential decision. I’m grateful to literally be a footnote to history.
A recent column by The New York Times’ David Leonhardt spells out Barnes & Noble’s all-too-familiar litany of problems: Plummeting Nook and online revenue, declining business at stores, staff layoffs. The death of Barnes & Noble is now plausible, he argues, recalling the implosion of Borders in 2011. Leonhardt says decades of government policy allowing technology giants like to resemble monopolies is to blame here. Amazon is rich enough to deeply discount books to undercut its rivals. It cares about efficiency, not literacy.
It would be a huge blow to book lovers everywhere if Barnes & Noble goes out of business. Like we’ve seen with other big mall chains, I think the most likely outcome is a severe reduction in the number of stores and smaller store footprints. (There’s no need in 2018 to have DVD/CD departments in their stores, for instance. A few tables with vinyl records for the hipsters is fine, though!) It’s heartening that independent bookstores seem to be gaining traction and finding their voice in communities. Here’s hoping Barnes & Noble can find a way to do the same.
This month, the San Diego Central Library is displaying many dozens of books that local authors published in 2017. The downtown library hosted a lovely after-hours party for participating authors featuring live music, catered food and drink, and remarks from the library director and true-crime author (and Union-Tribune alum) Caitlin Rother. The library’s 52nd annual local author showcase welcomed authors who self-published or were published by a small press, university press, or a commercial press. If you visit the cases filled with books, you’ll see a wide range of genres and subjects that feels like a true reflection of our diverse county.
The library will maintain an online exhibit of all the books and authors for the rest of the year, so be sure to check it out!
This advice column in The New York Times by the author Roxane Gay is a fitting way to begin a new year. She addresses letters from two fledgling writers — one 47 and the other 65 — who ask whether it’s too late for them to make their literary dreams come true. Gay dispels the notion that writing success is bound to youth, using her own experience as an example. She endured years of rejection and worry and said she nearly gave up, but she kept writing until she got her chance. Gay, now 43, says she has more to say as she gets older and is better able to express herself.
Gay’s hard-won advice is well worth heeding for anyone who wants to be a writer or artist: “I should have defined artistic success in ways that weren’t shaped by forces beyond my control. … The only thing you can control is how you write and how hard you work.”
But she sternly adds: “No, you are not promised artistic success simply because you want it.” Sometimes, success means just finishing that damn novel, even if it takes years. Sometimes it means you earn a small sum and get your words published. And sometimes, yes, it means a big advance, movie options and laurels from the critics.
Gay makes the important point that “other writers are not your measure.” I think we all fall into the trap of measuring ourselves against others, an all-too-human impulse intensified by social media “where everyone is showing you only what they want you to see.” In the new year, let’s resolve to reach for excellence instead of glory and support others who embark on their own uncertain artistic journeys.
The Union-Tribune’s John Wilkens rounds up five gifts from San Diego’s literary life in 2017, including the inaugural San Diego Festival of Books and the many local authors who made their mark. I’m proud to be a participant in and a consumer of a vibrant literary community.
http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/entertainment/books/sd-et-gifts-books-20171127-story.html