about last night

Hey! You’re here. Thank you.

Last night Broadside Bookshop, the little indie where I spend my working days, hosted Ocean Vuong for the final reading of his North American tour for The Emperor of Gladness.

If you read this newsletter or you’ve followed me for more than a minute, you know what a big deal this was for me.

Ocean was joined in conversation by the great poet Yona Harvey. Listening to these two great literary minds dance and play off one another was simply a dream.

I’m more tired than I’ve felt in a long time. But the feeling of standing on the edge of a theater of 800 people leaning in, hanging on every word of your favorite author? Unmatched. I’ll never, ever forget it.

This event was a massive undertaking for a small store like ours and it’s not giving away anything to say I was very nervous about it. But, we did it. Our community showed up for us in a big, big way.

If you’re going to host an event for 800 people, I recommend you make it 800 book lovers and poetry enthusiasts. The crowd was queer. The crowd was hyped. The crowd was patient, kind, understanding, and generous. I love my community so, so much.

My friend Henny, who I met through the inimitable Stacks Pack community, drove all the way from Canada to Northampton for the event. I got to meet her and hug her in person for the first time after seeing her face and talking about books with her in zoom book club discussions for years.

My friend and fellow independent bookseller Cristina, who I met at the bookselling conference I attended this winter, flew in from Boise, Idaho, to attend our event. She immediately made friends with everyone around her, and presented her heavily annotated and tabbed copy of The Emperor of Gladness for Ocean to sign at the end of the evening. Book people, man. I’m telling you they are just the best.

My parents came down from Maine and they didn’t just show up, they volunteered, helped with crowd control, brought snacks for the whole Broadside team (!!!), and helped facilitate the signing line like absolute pros. I am simply the luckiest.

The chairs and furniture on stage were all loaned by Wellness Within, the counseling center where Rebecca works. If you saw Rebecca and me rolling these chairs across the street in the middle of Northampton yesterday …. well yeah that was us.

Thank you to my friend and author/Northampton literary icon, Margot Douaihy, for this photo of the balcony view of me giving my introduction.

I had the honor and responsibility of introducing Ocean Vuong and his conversation partner, Yona Harvey.

I was a wee bit nervous.

When I remembered how many friends, family, and beloved Broadside customers were in the crowd, though, I felt like it might be possible.

In my introduction I said this about the Emperor of Gladness:

It’s a book that tells the truth about how hard and good it is to be here.

From the hundreds of people who lined up in the rain to get a good seat, to my Dad greeting all the damp, thrilled, beautiful nerds as they entered the theater, to making eye contact with Rebecca through the throngs of people, last night was more good than hard.

I don’t have many more words for it this morning, but I hope I will soon.

I love you.

I’m glad you’re here.

Love,

Rosamond