Every day should be like this one... Daylight hours spent buying books for the fall from a variety of interesting publishers, working with sales rep John Gould, who has become a good friend.

We spent a lot of time talking about families, and politics, before we got down to buying books. We're both old pros, with emphasis on the old, and we whipped through a dozen publishers in about seven hours, including lunch.

Then we and wives went out to dinner in Mendocino where we talked about books. And families. And politics.

Bread sticks, wine, women, books, and an attentive waiter. Life is good.

John listened to the recorded version of The Fortress of Solitude while driving across Nevada. He likes the book, and have we read it? It's a novel about growing up tough in Brooklyn.

Well no, I haven't read it, but like all good booksellers I know the author's rep, his other books, how well they're selling, what customers say about them, and if any local book groups have adopted one. I know the author's more famous book is Motherless Brooklyn which I also haven't read, and I saw the author once at a trade show and he's very young.

The food arrived, and John's wife Elly asked me if I had any books to recommend.

Well yes, I replied between mouthfuls. Have you heard of a writer named Alan Furst?

Yes, Elly said, I've read him. He doesn't mean THAT Furst, John interrupted. It's amazing how some couples can answer questions for each other that haven't even quite been asked yet.

Alan Furst, F-U-R-S-T, I said, writes atmospheric historical novels, or mysteries, or thrillers, or all three actually, set in obscure places around the Baltic or the Med, places like that, in the tense period before World War II, when people were taking sides, and would-be intelligence operatives were everywhere. Tramp steamers are big in these books, also smoky, secret places.

These books are so atmospheric, I quipped lamely, that you can just about see coal smoke curling out from between the pages.

The Alan Furst novel I just read is Dark Voyage and will be published in hardcover next month. One early scene is so masterly it is astonishing.

The Dutch tramp steamer Noordenham is sailing under false colors at night off Algeria in May, 1941.

"'There's some damn thing out there,' Kees said.

"DeHaan stared out into the rain and darkness, saw nothing. But, somewhere out to port, just astern, was the low rumble of an engine.

"'Smell it?' Kees said. 'Diesel fumes, and no outline I can see.'

"A ship low to the water, with big engines that ran on diesel. DeHaan swore to himself -- that could only be a submarine...

"'He's stalking us,' Kees said."

I made the mistake of reading the last few chapters of Dark Voyage late one night. I couldn't stop reading and I found myself turning the final pages at two in the morning, buzzed, jazzed, and nowhere near nodding off.

Joselyn is relishing the novel 1906 by James Dalessandro. You're three quarters of the way through the book, she reported, before the ground begins to shake:

"A rip in the ocean floor opened and shut with such force it spit a plume of water toward the surface more than two miles above," Dalessandro writes. "The watery blast slammed the hull of the wooden fishing boat Old Manassas, lifting it clear out of the water. Four thousand pounds of salmon and a sleeping crew of five floated in air, and then crashed to the sodden deck. They bobbed frantically as the sea parted and a mountain of water rained down on them..."

"One hundred fifty miles north of San Francisco, the fissure burst ashore, cleaving Alder Creek in two, and rumbled into the fishing village at Point Arena. It cracked the Point Arena lighthouse like a bull whip and tossed the sleeping light keeper into the opposite wall, inches below the window."

It's possible you have forgotten just how thrilling a good novel can be. These books will keep you awake late at night, or listening alertly as you drive the long track between towns in Nevada.

Aired Sunday July 11, 2004 at 10:55 am and Monday July 12, 2004 at 8:40 am

Orders/Information:

The Fortress of Solitude by Jonathan Lethem. Vintage paperback $14.95. ISBN 0375724885.

Motherless Brooklyn by Jonathan Lethem. Vintage paperback $13.95. ISBN 0375724834.

"Dark Voyage by Alan Furst. Random House hardcover $24.94. Publication date August, 2004. ISBN 1400060184.
I reviewed Furst's novel Kingdom of Shadows in the WOB dated July 26, 2003. You can read the article review here: http://www.gallerybooks.com/bkm/wob020726.html