Inside the May/June 2024 Issue
The Book Bait
An ongoing dispute between my husband and I: is Mr. Coreander, the bookseller in The Neverending Story, friend or foe?
In recent years I’ve filed him as a villain. He baits Bastian with the book, I’ve argued, and he knows that it will be irresistible to the insatiable young reader. He positions the volume just-so, I imagine, letting the auryn catch the light. Tantalizing. Teasing. He does this knowing the scale of the conflict that he’s thrusting Bastian into—potentially universes-ending. I’ve suggested that there’s a slyness, even a cruelty, to putting so much on such small shoulders.
My husband, to my sometimes frustration, claims that Mr. Coreander is, in fact, heroic. He’s doing what any good bookseller ought to do: filling a need in a young reader’s life.
Don’t tell my husband this, but after this issue’s round of reading, I’m now inclined to agree.
For me, this time, it was To & Fro, the flip-and-read Jewish fairy tale that I didn’t know I needed. But here it was, in my lap at three in the morning, its heroines Annamae and Ani calling to my insides in a Moon Child timbre. There were whispers of memories. There are promises to stars, pennies slipping between waves, snippets of song. It delivers that eternal promise that books that become a part of us do—that all of our tales are, in the end, interconnected.
I was floored. And I suspect your patrons will be as well.
You know your readers best. You know which among them are waiting for each of these titles, ranging from the illuminative novels, memoirs, and histories in our LGBTQ+ section (see The Last Syrian, about defying prejudice even through a civil war) to the empathetic personal tales in our Body, Mind, and Spirit feature—about witchcraft, redefining magic, self-care, and survival. They approach the counters and you know, through intuition or practice, how to salve what ails them or fill their days with pages that are just right for them.
Please take these offerings and select away. Do your discernment. And then leave your chosen titles on the counter and take the call, knowing that they’ll thank you for it, bait or gift as it may be. Because, as you librarians and booksellers on the frontlines know: every story does have its Bastian or its Annamae—that just right reader ready to ignite it, ready to defy nothingness with it, armed with imagination and credulity.
Sincerely,
Michelle Anne Schingler
Editor in Chief
mschingler@forewordreviews.com
Did you know we pick out the most compelling books from every issue of Foreword Reviews for a series of reviewer-author interviews? That’s right, every Thursday, our digital newsletter Foreword This Week spotlights our top reviewers pitching a set of provocative questions to the authors of the books they admire. Sign up here and join the thousands of readers who relish these entertaining conversations between literary hotshots.
Here’s a link to the reviews we’re covering in our May/June 2024 issue.
Michelle Anne Schingler
