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Gothic Takes a Fictional Turn During the Summer

As the summer ends, mysteries and fantasies are still flying off the bookshelves

While they're
adroit in directing readers to religious studies, science titles and travel
books, the staff at the Gothic
Bookshop
in Duke's Bryan Center have proven themselves equally skilled during
the last days of summer at recommending good beach reads.

"In the
summertime mysteries are my guilty pleasure," says Gothic manager Kathy
World, who points a visitor to the expansive mystery section to the right of paperback
fiction. "I love reading them all the time, I have to admit, but in the
school year I probably read as much fiction."

At the beach
this summer she had a chance to finish Colin Cotterill's "Killed
at the Whim of a Hat,"
which begins the author's new series spun from
the adventures of a Thai crime journalist. World says it is as much about Jimm
Juree's "wonderful, delightful dysfunctional family" as it is about
his efforts to solve the mystery of an old van discovered with bodies inside.
[reviewed recently in NYT; possible link here]

"This
time of the year there are a few more people looking for relaxing reading,"
World says.

It's not
just the books that seem more relaxed during the summer. Duke Divinity student
and full-time summer bookseller Scott Rowan says professors come in wearing
shorts and sandals and seem in a lot less of a rush without classes to rush off
to.

Rowan has noticed
that browsing the Gothic is also a popular alternative when one family member
is less interested in what everyone else is doing during a campus tour, such as
T-shirt buying next door at the University Store. Booksellers have on multiple
occasions overheard a young person plead with their family to give them more
time amid the books.

During the
summer, the Gothic's book displays took on a different look. Graphic novels
popular with TIP middle-school students are put out front, alongside leadership
books by Coach Mike Krzyzewski that catch the eye of sports campers and their
parents. TIP students also scooped up more of the classics, such as Dumas' "The
Count of Monte Cristo," that they might be assigned in class.

The Internet
has changed summer book purchases in one way: Travel books sales are down as
more students go online to flesh out their plans for vacations and internships.
World says she used to see a surge in sales of those books from the end of
exams to graduation time.

Other
best-sellers this summer included "The Help," which has found a
second life in paperback following release of the movie, George R. R. Martin's
fantasy novel "Game of Thrones," made popular by the HBO series, and Suzanne
Collins' dystopian "The Hunger Games" trilogy.

Gothic booksellers
have also been surprised at the popularity of two new paperbacks: "On
Booze," a collection of F. Scott Fitzgerald's best "Jazz Age" drinking
stories and "Germania: In Wayward Pursuit of the Germans and Their History"
by Simon Winder, a book that Booklist called "an enjoyable, often amusing,
often serious effort to understand a people who remain at the center of
European civilization."