BookCrossing on NPR

Scott was the guest on Winsoncin Public Radio. An whole hour of

http://clipcast.wpr.org:8080/ramgen/wpr/dun/dun070815e.rm
(or http://www.wpr.org/webcasting/audioarchives_display.cfm?Code=dun, date aug 15)

ResQGeek and Bookczuk called in, it was fun to be exclaiming excitedly to the speaker, oh, that’s someone I know, someone I met a few months back in Charleston!  As I told Scott, they even arranged a bookseller to call, and a teacher/member, how perfect!! 

Literary Birthdays

Curious which famous authors you share birthday with? Check this out. (Thanks labmomnm for the link.)

Gosh I share birthdays with George Bernard Shaw and Aldous Huxley.  Can’t say they are my favorite but at least two big names.  Makes me feel very special now.

Meet the Author – Lisa See

I was so glad to make it to Books & Books to meet Lisa See.  She wrote Snow Flower & the Secret Fan, one of my best loved books of 2006.  She was in Miami to promote her new book, Peony in Love.  I haven’t read it yet but know that it’s somewhat based on the Chinese opera The Peony Pavilion, which I briefly studied in high school.

When we arrived on Sunday 4pm, we were amazed at the crowd.  I didn’t realize, but was gladly surprised, by how popular her books are.  When Lisa See came to the podium, Michael whispered that she doesn’t look Asia at all…

She talked about how she started writing about the story Peony in Love.  She was writing some publicity material for the Chinese opera The Peony Pavilion, which would be performed at Lincoln Center in New York in its entirity, the whole 25 hours of it, a feat not done in over 200 years.  During her research, she found that many young girls in ancient China read the book and then fell ill and died.  She also noted that there was a short period of time in China when women were writing and publishing stories  (more details here).

She also mentioned that the book she is working on now is about two sisters from Shanghai arriving in Los Angeles Chinatown, and about her experience as a very white “Chinese” growing up in Chinatown. 

After the talk was the book signing section.  I asked her to sign my copy as addressed to: Dear BookCrosser.  And this is what she wrote:

Dear BookCrosser -
To share with your sworn sisters.
                          Lisa See

When I told pkboo she decided to do the same with her books.  Naturally that got Lisa very curious about what bookcrossing is.  So we told her how we bought multiple copies of books we like and leave them around. “Leave them where?” “Oh, everywhere -” and we started counting the places, coffee shops, Panera… even the Great Wall!