Ep 16: Julia & Christen, Itinerant Literate

Epigraph

Y'all. It's been a minute (or, ya know, 8 months). But we're back with a brand new episode featuring Julia Turner and Christen Thompson Lain, the founders of Itinerant Literate, a mobile bookstore in Charleston, SC.

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Chapter I

In which a local coffee shop assists in alcohol acquisition, we want more spaceships and dragons, and a book brings Emma to tears.

We’re Drinking

Christen and Julia were given some free beer from their local coffeeshop, Orange Spot Coffee: Stillwater Artisinal's Stateside Saisan and Sake-Style Saison. As our cocktail for the evening, we're drinking the Lime of the Ancient Mariner from Tim Federle's Tequila Mockingbird.

Christen's Reading

• War Storm by Victoria Aveyard

• I’ll Be Gone in the Dark by Michelle McNamara

  • Shout out to Joan Didion's Slouching Towards Bethlehem

Julia's Reading

• Girl in Snow by Danya Kukafka (audiobook via Libro.fm)

• How to Change Your Mind by Michael Pollan

• Monsoon Mansion by Cinelle Barnes

• Daphne by Will Boast

Kim's Reading

• Killers of the Flower Moon by David Grann (audiobook via Libro.fm)
• Amateur by Thomas Page McBee (pubs August 14, 2018)
  
  • McBee's previous book, Man Alive, is also excellent

Emma's Reading

• Circe by Madeline Miller (audiobook via Libro.fm)

• The Great Believers by Rebecca Makkai 

Forthcoming & Newly-New Titles We're Excited About

Julia & Christen are Excited About

• The White Darkness by David Grann (pubs Oct 30, 2018)

• My Sister the Serial Killer by Oyinkan Braithwaite (pubs Nov 20, 2018)
• Cult X by Fuminori Nakamura

Kim's Excited About

• So Lucky by Nicola Griffith (audiobook via Libro.fm)
  • also check out her bestselling historical fantasy novel, Hild
• Any Man by Amber Tamblyn

Emma's Excited About

• There There by Tommy Orange

• Fight No More by Lydia Millet
• Spinning Silver by Naomi Novik (pubs July 10, 2018)
  • her previous book, Uprooted, is one of Emma's faves
• Half-Witch by John Schoffstall (pubs July 17, 2018)

Chapter II [23:30]

In which we discuss how bookstores work (and how you keep books on the shelves in a bookstore that moves), Julia and Christen give advice to future bookmobile owners, and the mobile bookstore finds a forever home!

Customer: So, is this a library?

Interested in breaking into publishing (then abandoning your fancy degree to become a bookseller)? Check out the University of Denver Publishing Institute. Julia and Christen met there, so that bodes well.

Shout out to Blue Bicycle (founder of YALLFest, Charleston's Young Adult Book Festival)

Fun fact: the aunt in Housekeeping by Marilynne Robinson is described as itinerant. Maybe not the best role model, but not the worst!

The bookmobile is so purrrrrrrrrty:

Books that Itinerant Literate must have in stock: