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Ninety-five years ago Gus Weller picked up some used books with a lot of second-hand furniture he purchased for resale. At that moment one August afternoon, Gus decided selling books would be better than selling second-hand furniture or radios and Zion’s Bookstore was born. In that period of time the bookstore now known as Weller Book Works has gone through 4 locations – Trolley Square is our 5th – and nearly as many names. What hasn’t changed during those 95 years is a dedication to the book, our community, and a fierce independence.
It is the readers’ commitment to us that has kept Weller Book Works in business for more years than most people live. Our customers helped move the store out of its smoke and water damaged Main Street location after a catastrophic fire. They stayed with us during two lengthy and extensive street reconstructions. And they’ve stuck with us throughout the devastation caused by the chain store expansion that was quickly followed by the entry of Amazon into book sales. Nearly 2/3 of our colleagues across the nation weren’t so lucky. Now we are fortunate to witness another change, the regrowth of locally owned independent businesses and bookstores in particular. If you’re reading this newsletter, you’re a customer. You are one of the “they” I’ve been praising. YOU are the reason Weller Book Works is still selling books.
Thank you. We couldn’t have done it without you. We can’t do it without you.
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Another reason Weller Book Works survives – thrives even – is our extraordinary staff. We employ readers of diverse backgrounds and tastes. Their dedication to our customers and to reading broadly is evident as soon as you walk in our doors. For that reason we want to highlight our staff in the rest of this newsletter. You shop their recommended books shelves up front and look for their staff recommendation slips throughout the store. You’ve chatted with them and purchased the books they tell you about. You know book people are the best. And you know our booksellers are the best of the best.
Thank you to our booksellers past and present. We couldn’t have done it, and can’t do it without you.
Finally, to kick off our staff feature, I’ll answer the questions this newsletter’s editor, the marvelous Claire, has posed.
- What's on your nightstand now?: Advance copies of Horse by Willy Vlautin and Suggested in the Stars by Yoko Tawada. Also a copy of S.P.Q.R. by Mary Beard that I want to reread, and a manuscript a writer has asked me to read. My nightstand audiobook is Erik Larson’s latest, The Demon of Unrest.
- 5 books you will never part with: My childhood copy of A Child’s Garden of Verses by Robert Louis Stevenson. National Geographic’s The Soviet Union Today: A Journey Across Russia. Sexual Politics by Kate Millett (signed to me). Emily Wilson’s translation of The Odyssey. Fire Season by Phil Connors.
Enough about me! On to the booksellers.
--Catherine
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We cannot make any of this possible without the hard work of our dedicated booksellers. We all share a love of reading, though our choices couldn't be more diverse! Enjoy a snapshot of our recent reads and lingering favorites. | |
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Apollo -
What's on your nightstand now?
A humidifier while I duke it out with the dry Utah air. Along with a small lamp so I can read before I sleep.
5 books you will never part with:
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(Technically a duo set) My Franklin Library editions of The liad and The Odyssey. They’re so pretty and cool!
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Wall and Piece by Banksy. I will forever recognize graffiti as the language of oppressed artists. They’re also creative in their use of stencils and the environment where the piece is painted. A true art activist.
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Salamander by Linda Sillitoe. This one’s on my rec shelf as well. It was the book that solidified my beliefs as an ex-Mormon. Not to brag but, mine is a first edition with newspaper clippings in it.
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Hayao Miyazaki. The giant artbook that I have full of writings and illustrations by the one and only. Me and my family love Studio Ghibli, we watch all the films every year in theaters for Ghibli Fest. I love the details in his works and how he visualizes nature.
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The Hero with a Thousand Faces by Joseph Campbell: With all the controversy aside, Joseph Campbell was amazing at writing about culture, mythology, and the monomyth. It’s a great starting point for those who wonder how and why we believe in things. It’s also the book that my favorite teacher recommends highly. It sitting on my shelf reminds me of him and what he taught me.
A book that changed your life:
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Orwell’s Ghosts by Laura Beers: This book changed both my life and perspective of George Orwell. It makes you consider both the good and bad in an author and how to think more gray rather than black and white. It made me understand that we must look at a person's/author’s ideas and consider them as people with philosophies and flaws. Then we mustn't weaponize them into our own narratives.
A book you're an evangelist for:
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It’s a tie between Wynd by James Tynion IV and Eighty Days by A.C. Esguerra. For a while, I have appreciated graphic novels, comics, and manga. The ability to create something that incorporates art and prose is a lot more challenging than you think. These two do it in the best way. Wynd incorporates the edgy, sharp artwork from DC and comedic breaks from both James Tynin and Miachael Dialynas. It’s also the only series I’ve seen to have merchandise that’s stylish. I will die on this hill.
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Aura -
What's on your nightstand now?
5 books you will never part with:
A book that changed your life:
A book you're an evangelist for:
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Bella -
What's on your nightstand now?
- I have a lamp, some crystals that help with sleep, the book I’m reading (Cosmicomics By Italo Calvino), my journal, and a pen.
5 books you will never part with:
A book that changed your life:
A book you're an evangelist for:
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Ceci -
What's on your nightstand now?
- I recently returned from a trip to Ireland and have fallen deeper into my pre-existing obsession with the country and its history, particularly regarding The Troubles. I started reading The Milkman by Anna Burns while in Belfast and am still making my way through it. It's a weird one--the story follows a young woman coming-of-age in an unnamed city, during an unnamed conflict, who is plagued by a stalker. This already scary scenario reaches new heights of fear when set against the backdrop of an anxious, distrustful community.
5 books you will never part with:
A book that changed your life:
A book you're an evangelist for:
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I Love Dick by Chris Kraus. Are you a heterosexual woman? I'm so sorry! You should read this semi-autobiographical, epistolary novel, that follows the trials and tribulations of her experiences with a man named Richard, to try and grapple with that.
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Claire -
What's on your nightstand now?
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The Book of Elsewhere by Keanu Reeves. An immortal man has a bit of an existential crisis pondering on life, death, fate, and so much more. What do you hold close if you have already seen and done it all?
5 books you will never part with:
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The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins
- My 2 copies of Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? - because a single book packed with annotations isn’t quite enough. Ask me about the book, I dare you. I'll talk your ear off.
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The Milagro Beanfield War by David Nichols. These characters live rent-free in my head, and teach me something new with every reread.
- My painstakingly preserved copy of Animalia by Barbara Helen Berger. This is among the most luminous and beautiful books I’ve ever seen. Her art twines with her prose in a perfect tapestry.
- My 1st edition hardcover of Mort(e) by Robert Repino. Say what you will, but this bonkers cat book rips.
A book that changed your life:
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An Immense World by Ed Yong. This book is dazzling in the way that it makes you rethink the animal kingdom, your brain, and how you interpret the world around you. There is so much in the world that is impossible to comprehend, and this book delights in the unknowable.
A book you're an evangelist for:
- It’s a series of 4, but its praises cannot be sang loud enough: The Books of Babel by Josiah Bancroft. Jump into one of the most unusual, intricate, memorable, and funny worlds put to paper!
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Dylan -
What's on your nightstand now?
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Running Through Beijing by Zechen, Xu. An excellent little novella, showing life on the periphery of contemporary Chinese society.
5 books you will never part with:
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All About H. Hatterr by G. V. Desani. If there is a “Great American Novel,” then this is the “Great Indian Novel.” Nothing compares before or since.
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Cities of the Red Night by William S. Burroughs. Far easier to read than his other works, this book is nothing if not a rip roaring good time.
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Out of the Night by Jan Valtin is a long forgotten, yet excellent tale of adventure in the Comintern and the early days of Nazi Germany.
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Factotum by Charles Bukowski still holds up as a window into the tragedy of work then as it does now.
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Delta of Venus by Anaïs Nin is the only erotic collection worth reading. No others compare. And I will die on this hill.
A book that changed your life:
South of No North by Charles Bukowski, is what made me fall in love with reading.
A book you're an evangelist for:
A Hedonist Manifesto by Michel Onfray. “Enjoy and have others enjoy, without doing harm to yourself or anyone else; that is all there is to morality.” - Chamfort maxim.
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Frank -
What's on your nightstand now?
These are on the top of my stack by my bed:
5 books you will never part with:
A book that changed your life:
- There are two: Pilgrim's Progress, which lead me to my Salvation; and Refuge by Terry Tempest Williams, which I read in California and made me decide to move back to Utah.
A book you're an evangelist for:
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Jami -
What's on your nightstand now?
- Chaos. At least 3 jars of dusty water, various crystals and trinkets, a hazardous amount of candles, my tarot deck, my poetry/songwriting/rot journal, and the two books I’m currently reading; The Passion by Jeannete Winterson and The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath.
5 books you will never part with:
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Letters to a Young Poet by Rainer Maria Rilke / THE BIBLE! I have the stunning M. D. Herter Norton translation which is my personal favorite. She gives Rilke the gentle voice I imagine him having.
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Winnie the Pooh by A. A. Milne. Because how can I live without these silly little guys? Don’t even get me started on the philosophy of Pooh!
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Orlando by Virginia Woolf. I will never shut up about this book! Never!
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The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams. I love that grumpy little British man and his alien comrades.
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Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer. I cried through the entire book.
A book that changed your life:
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The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chobsky. I clung to this book as an unhappy introverted teen, and I treasure it for being there for teenage-me when she felt so hopeless and alone. I still find myself thinking about this book today, and it will always hold a tender place in my heart.
A book you're an evangelist for:
- I will scream it from the rooftops! Orlando by Virginia Woolf! Woolf was aggressively ahead of her time. This story effortlessly exhibits such valuable messages on the politics of gender and sexuality. I throw this book at every person I know in hopes that it will bring them the euphoria it brought me!
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Kelly -
What's on your nightstand now?
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The Savage Detectives by Roberto Bolaño. It is sometimes on my nightstand and it is amazing, as expected.
5 books you will never part with:
- Roberto Bolaño’s By Night in Chile. I haven’t read much Bolaño, but he is my current fixation. I’m obsessed with the style and content of Bolaño’s books. It all feels so real and special. He writes something magnetic into the air of his universes. I fall into painstaking love every time.
- Junot Díaz’s The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao. A longer time ago this felt like the first “big” book I ever read. It made me realize the power of a big book, the delight of spending time with many characters across many settings and allowing them to reveal themselves to you, slowly, and, by the time its over, you feel like you lived a life with someone who just died.
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Corrine Marchetti: Liberté, Sexe, Education. It is a collection of her art, embroideries, sculptures, sketches, watercolors, collages, clothing personalization. Not only am I a fan of her niche feminine French “you can play like an ingenue and still be sophisticated” style, but the format of the book is very unique with a ring binding and stretchy neon green fabric band which slips over the book’s fore-edge. The covers are frosted and multilayered with her illustrations. I’ll never part with it because it is a visually inspirational piece of art. I want to drape my body in fabrics like the ones on her sculptures.
- Tony Weller’s small book of poetry. It is a book - or rather zine - made by the Tony Weller in his youth, when he was around my age. It is funny reading thoughts from his younger head, and comparing them to what I hear today. I cannot part with it because if I did, I may never see one again!
- Ishmael Reed’s Mumbo Jumbo, signed. One of the funkiest things I’ve read so far. It’s rare that I’m unable to adjust to a prose style before the end of a book, but this is a “history” of the United States I should keep on my shelves for years to come.
A book that changed your life:
- Providing you with any titles here would be a lie. I was most impressionable as a child. My earliest memories of reading are characterized by the I Can Read! Series. These books changed my life because I learned how to read from them. After that my memory skips to Chinese and Japanese folktales, like Momotaro or Tsuru Nyobo, and some more generic fables, like those of Aesop, which gave me many basic ideas as to how people interacted with each other, why people ask favors, what it means to return one, why we lie or tell the truth, why we interact with each other at all, and so on.
A book you're an evangelist for:
- Byung-Chul Han’s Psychopolitics. There’s no fun to be found in this last prompt and I have chosen a book that is no fun. My friends frequently hear me proclaim, "Protect me from what I want," a quote from Jenny Holzer and the epigraph to Psychopolitics. I refer to it often and find it frequently encapsulates my desires. The book I have chosen asks that you practice a little restraint from your smartphone as an exercise of free will. It likens smart tech to religion and the iPhone to a rosary. It’s all very illuminating in a holy sense.
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Liam -
What's on your nightstand now?
5 books you will never part with:
A book that changed your life:
A book you're an evangelist for:
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Siena-
What's on your nightstand now?
5 books you will never part with:
A book that changed your life:
A book you're an evangelist for:
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Thomas -
What's on your nightstand now?
- A friend and I are reading through the Horus Heresy series. Currently on book 17, The Outcast Dead by Graham McNeill, and going strong!
5 books you will never part with:
- The first D&D adventure module I ever purchased, Curse of Strahd first edition
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I, Strahd: the Memoirs of a Vampire by P. N. Elrod.
- Additionally, my special editions of Blackstone Fortress, its sequel, Ascension, and companion book Liber Xenologis by Darius Hinks.
A book that changed your life:
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Artemis Fowl by Eoin Colfer, the author whose books first sparked my reading passion.
A book you're an evangelist for:
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Tony -
What's on your nightstand now?
5 books you will never part with:
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Silence by John Cage. Wesleyan. 1961. A manual of creativity and Joy.
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The Blue Cliff Record translated by Thomas Cleary. Shambhala 1976, 1977. Deepest Zen dig I have done.
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Living My Life by Emma Goldman. Knopf. 1931. Inspirational idealism liberty and love.
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Tao te Ching by Lao Tzu. Gia-fu Feng translation. Basis on sanity. Does not contradict reality. No leap of faith.
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The Journal of Albion Moonlight by Kenneth Patchen. Padell. 1941. Surrealistic nightmare of compassion and terror.
A book that changed your life:
A book you're an evangelist for:
Editor's note: Check out Tony's review here!
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Wade -
What's on your nightstand now?
5 books you will never part with:
A book that changed your life:
A book you're an evangelist for:
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RECEIVE 20% OFF WHEN YOU PURCHASE DURING JULY AND AUGUST | |
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By Annalee Newitz
W.W. Norton
Hardcover $27.99
Best Wellers' Price $22.39
Reviewed by José Knighton
In a nation where everything—even words (especially words)—has been weaponized from its inception, declaring yourself to be nonbinary is a warrior's act. And Annalee Newitz's words are as sharp as a samurai's katana.
Newitz's deep dive into the swampy history of weaponized narrative propaganda commences amid the Cold War with the surprising tale of legendary, pseudonymic, science fiction author, Cordwainer Smith. His real name was Paul Linebarger and under that name he wrote the seminal and secretive U.S. Army publication, Psychological Warfare, which became a template for future governmental PSYOPs.
But that publication was merely a modern codification of a previous pattern. Benjamin Franklin concocted a fake story for a fake newspaper slandering the English government and Indigenous Americans with a fake conspiracy. It was later "reprinted" in an actual British newspaper. This was an opening salvo in propaganda wars against England, and Indigenous peoples. One PSYOP generated the Revolutionary War. The other, with its propagandized concept of "Manifest Destiny" and its imaginary (and mobile) "Frontier," combined with the myth of the "Last Indian," became an epic PSYOP that facilitated an actual, continent-wide, Indigenous genocide.
During previous hot and cold wars, propaganda demonized purported alien and alienated enemies. But, as Newitz declares, "When we use PSYOPs in cultural conflicts, we tear down the wall between what's appropriate in domestic disagreements among Americans and what's acceptable in combat against a foreign enemy."
And that's the rabbit hole to Hell we've all tumbled down during the current Internet War (my term not Newitz's) with its social media PSYOPs. Newitz performs a thorough, dissecting reveal of how gullible, authoritarian American sycophants (manipulated by Russian troll farms) have corrupted and threatened democracy and continue to pursue PSYOP assaults on women, Black, and LGBTQ citizens in a manner that echoes earlier PSYOPs against Indigenous peoples. In their final chapter Newitz attempts to shine a light of hope into the darkness at the end of this tunnel, albeit a faint, flickering light.
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Book-lovers and collectors meet in the Rare Book department for the Collectors' Book Salon the last Friday of each month, January through October. We begin casually around 6:30 PM with socializing, light refreshments, and shared bibliolust. At 7:15, an invited bibliophile leads the Collectors' Chat about a topic of their particular knowledge and passion. Each Salon, Tony offers a special deal on rare books that is only for Salon guests. | |
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The August Collectors Book Salon will be dedicated to our 95-year history. Instead of a designated bibliophile chat, we want stories, of course with the appreciated show-and-tells, when possible. Do you have an interesting story involving this bookstore? What is the oldest memory you have? Did you find an amazing treasure? Were you changed? If you have a good tale about our old but modern bookstore, please attend the August Salon and share it with us. We attend to the present and look to the future. On the 30th of August, we will reminisce.
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By Nelson A. Denis
Bold Type Books
Paperback $21.99
Reviewed by Dylan Parry
Puerto Rico is often thought of as many things, but little do people know, Puerto Rico was once the center of a Cold War-era revolution! That’s right, this little island in the Caribbean more than once attempted to rise up against American colonialism and become its own nation. The biggest and boldest attempt was in 1950, when Puerto Rican Nationalists of the Puerto Rican Nationalist Party (PNPR) led by the charismatic Pedro Albizu Campos, rose up across the island and even attempted to assassinate then President, Harry S. Truman.
In War Against All Puerto Ricans, author Nelson A. Denis reconstructs the lives and times of Puerto Rico and her people, before, during, and after the 1950 revolution. Starting at the U.S. takeover from the Spanish at the end of the Spanish-American War in 1898, Denis reveals the feelings and actions of American politicians, and society as a whole, towards the newly acquired island. Let’s just say, Puerto Rico wasn’t seen too differently by the Americans, than by their former Spanish rulers. Both nations saw the island and its people as an exploitable source of riches, especially in relation to the ever lucrative sugar and fruit industries already established elsewhere in the Caribbean.
Greed, exploitation, racism, and the conditions that stem from them gave, birth to a proud and eager Nationalist movement in the 1920s. The movement solidified itself as a path to liberty in the 1930s after the 1937 Ponce Massacre, culminating in an island-wide uprising that was ultimately crushed by the U.S. Government.
It is a little part of history not to be forgotten, and Denis’ book does an excellent job of making sure it’s not.
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By Myriam Gurba
Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster
Hardcover $27.00
Reviewed by Aura Martinez
Violence creeps onto girlhood softly.
You don’t see it coming until it’s upon you, a fog surrounding the systems we are blindly thrust into. As a child we make morbid games out of this violence, as if pain were a friend to laugh with, nothing more than a four letter vocab work. P-A-I-N. Extra credit points to all that inflict it correctly. Typical societal constructs are always making excuses for women’s pain. If it’s a boy pulling pigtails it just means he has a “crush” on you. If it’s a man it was just “an accident, it will never happen again.” If it’s a family member “that’s just how they show their love.” We have interwoven love with violence like some kind twisted, fucked up version of a Pas de Deux, hand to hand to bruise.
In Creep, Myriam Gurba delves into this pervasive ideology of toxic masculinity that plagues our society– from homes, to schools, to the content we consume, no one is spared from the biases and violence the American system has structured and perpetuated. With a blend of cultural analysis and her own anecdotes of growing up as a queer woman of color in 80’s America, Gurba recontextualizes everyone. Her subjects range from infamous California serial killer, Night Stalker, to prominent literary figures like Joan Didion and William S. Burroughs, and even her own former abuser. Her voice is full of scathing wit, laying everyone’s dirty laundry out for her audience to read. Creep is structured as a series of essays peppered with memories from Gruba’s past that tie into the larger theme of the piece. Each piece culminates until we reach the titular essay “Creep,” a final raw display of vulnerability and corruption. If you want something insightful, funny, and above all– real, this book is for you.
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Click here for our August events newsletter.
And, as always, view our events calendar to see all of our upcoming events.
We host both virtual and in-person events, and we look forward to seeing you soon.
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Come visit us!
SUNDAY 12-5
MONDAY-THURSDAY 10-8
FRIDAY & SATURDAY 10-9
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Can’t make it to the store?
Support your local indie from home!
Order by phone or online, then pick up at the store or the curb! We also ship!
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Give us a call at 801-328-2586.
Shop new books on our website
Browse our entire inventory of new, used and rare books on Biblio.com
Listen to audiobooks from Libro.fm
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