Book Life

Tonight a bookstore hosting six writers at once brought out an aisle-busting, chair-exhausting fervency of fans. There were revelations throughout the evening—of voice, of diction, of storytelling purpose. There were stories, snatches and fragments, that I'll be thinking on for a long time now—the lyric Sri Lanka of Ru Freeman; the caretaking of Lise Funderberg; the terrible and lovely grab at connection in a Josh Weil novella; the searching for Christ in a Jim Zervanos church; the disconnections of Rachel Pastan's wearied women; the high suspense of Elizabeth Mosier. But what I suspect will remain longest with me is the resounding and wonderful crowdedness of this suburban bookstore on a Tuesday night at the height of vacation season—the idea (simple, complicated) that writers did this, writers were show, entertainment, stars.

We hear too much about the death of things—of books, of readers, of intellectual life. Tonight was tonic and proof that those who love books still rally on behalf of books, and that those who can write very much do.