The Smell of 57th Street Books

I got to go to my favorite city a few weekends ago for my 10th wedding anniversary. I moved to Chicago right out of college, and lived on the South Side for nine years. Chicago is where I fell in love with my husband, bought my first apartment, made some of my dearest friends, discovered I wanted to be a teacher, wrote my first book, was pregnant with my first child...it's where I grew up, really, if you think what I am now counts as grown up.

So, two favorites that will eventually lead us to something related to writing...

Favorite place in the whole wide world to go swimming:



Tiny picture of my favorite bookstore in the whole entire world:
57th Street Books is still my favorite. It was even better, of course, when I worked there with Franny Billingsley, storytelling, event planning, and helping run the children's section. But it's still the best. If you get to Chicago, you should go there. If you can't get to Chicago, you should dream of wall-to-wall books and a kids' section with a comfy carpet.

And here is the related-to-writing moment: I walked around Chicago reminiscing and missing it. I saw the lake, my old apartment, my old stomping grounds. But it wasn't until I walked into 57th Street Books that I thought, "Ah, I'm back." Not because of how it looked, but because of how it smelled. The bookstore is in a basement and it smells like cool air and good books. I inhaled and had a rare and great sensory memory, struck with the thought, "Yes! This is how it smells here!"

The challenge, I think, is to use all the senses in our writing. It's easy to focus on sight and sound, and even temperature or internal feelings ("her stomach jumped"). But I think the less-often described senses are the ones that are most powerful in our memories. Can you make your audience feel and smell and taste your character's experience from within?

And this leads me to In Search of Lost Time/Swann's Way, which is a vast epic memory, sparked by the taste of a madeleine dipped in tea. And which I will discuss soon.