Team Booksweet, pictured from left to right: Zoe and Monique.
At Booksweet, teamwork really does make the dream work. The co-owners of Booksweet, Shaun and Truly, are excited to (formally) introduce you to Team Booksweet: Monique and Zoe!
Monique comes to us from the Ypsilanti District Library, where she also works as an Outreach Paraprofessional. Zoe has been a bookseller for nine years and is wrapping up her degree in German Studies at U-M.
Read on to learn more about Team Booksweet — and what they love to read — in the Q&A below.
What kinds of stories or books are you drawn to?
Monique: Mostly I am drawn to adult fiction and teen fiction. Any sub-genre of fiction will do. I also enjoy graphic novels, and the occasional memoir. Oh, and I love when a book makes you laugh unexpectedly!
Zoe: Don’t tell the novels, but I’m a sucker for a well-crafted short story (Tobias Wolff’s “Bullet in the Brain” is a forever favorite, found in the collection, The Night in Question). Comics and Graphic novels occupy a fair few of my shelves at home. Nonfiction-wise, I really appreciate deep dives into narrow topics. If an author can take something seemingly mundane, long overlooked or misunderstood and hinge a total perspective/opinion shift in ~300 pages, count me in. (Special recognition goes to Oliver Sacks’ Hallucinations and Kassia St. Clair’s The Secret Lives of Color).
What are you reading now?
Monique: Currently reading: Apples Never Fall by Liane Moriarty and Huda F Are You? By Huda Fahmy
Zoe: Currently reading The Poetics of Space by Gaston Bachelard and Brian Selznick’s newest, Kaleidoscope.
What was your favorite book as a kid?
Monique: I loved the Ramona Quimby series. Anything by Beverly Cleary really, and of course Judy Blume. Are You There God, Its’ Me Margaret was monumental to 12-year-old me.
Zoe: Sandra Boynton’s But Not the Hippopotamus is recited in my head almost daily, Brian Jacques’ Redwall series, Roald Dahl, Philip Pullman’s His Dark Materials.
Any areas of special interest that you’d like Booksweet readers to know about?
Monique: Besides reading? Journaling and sketching. Trying new pasta recipes. Hanging out with family and friends.
Zoe: Talk to me about the art of bookbinding! Or the ridiculousness (and strange beauty) of German grammar, vintage finds, cats — these are things I’ll never tire of.