It’s the beginning of the month, so I was looking forward to my First Saturday Book Browse at the Potomac Yards Barnes and Noble. But first I finished[amazon_link id=”0316093556″ target=”_blank” ] Chasing the Moon[/amazon_link], mostly at the gym, but I polished off the last few pages in the parking lot outside the bookstore. Like all Lee Martinez stories, it was a good romp through much weirdness that give the main character a chance to find themselves. In this case, it’s a girl named Diana, who moves into an apartment full of eldritch horrors that glom onto her, though it winds up a pretty good deal out of it for everyone, except maybe the moon, which is as the title promises, being chased. Sort of like a grownup version of Pixar’s Monsters Inc., without the Inc.

Then on to check out the April zeitgeist by browsing the bookstore. I hold open the door for a pretty girl entering the store, and she repays the favor by saying thanks without calling me “Sir,” which is only sounds good when it’s coming from the Queen. Inside the first thing I see is is James Gleik’s [amazon_link id=”0375423729″ target=”_blank” ]The Information Flood[/amazon_link], which, incidentally, my eighty-something mother is reading on her Kindle, and highly recommends. I am looking forward to it, as well as another info-title caught my eye, [amazon_link id=”0525952055″ target=”_blank” ]Future Babble[/amazon_link] by Dan Gardner, about the paucity of predictions.

Around the store there was an encouraging number of families shopping for books, the children clutching books with both hands to keep them from getting away. The Nook seller said “Hi” as I walked through, and we chatted…but she wouldn’t give up any sales figures about which sold better: color or black and white nooks. “We are eagerly awaiting our next software upgrade.” I told her I’d downloaded God’s War, the week’s free book and she started to go on about the hundreds of free titles…but I shut her down (nicely) by pointing out they were all public domain.

I really do hate it when they turn people into sales droids who are “not programmed to respond in that area.”

But coffee, and the mug of the month, beckoned. They were fielding two different styles, one all light and floral and mothers day-ish and the other a whole brash retro-diner vibe that jumps up and says “Here’s your coffee, now go do something with the day.” Both cool, but both just a little on the large side. Speaking of large, or grande, I picked up the usual, a coffee frapachino, no whip. Would I give my name? What do they fail to recognize the famous “Z!”? That’s my Starbucks name, though they misspelled it. Yes, it’s zee, exclamation point…or just “Zee” the way you have it on the cup already. Thanks.

In the Magazine section a wellness kiosk with big rubber bands, yoga matte and lots of videos has sprung up. Expect for the videos, I trip over all that stuff at home, thanks to my gal, so I sail on to the mags. I cruise the rack and grab a few covers that grab my eye, then find a table in the coffee nook and lay them out for a photo spread. Nobody ever blinks.

People magazine farewells Liz Taylor with a cover shot that reminds us that she really was young and beautiful and worth all that praise. Macworld covers the iPad 2 release, which somehow seems like it needs to be noted…if only in passing. The spare cover of Lapham’s Quarterly shows a carpenter’s bit and brace (and I wonder how many people here know what those are) and a feature topic, Lines of Work. Never heard of them, but I liked the look. It turns out that it’s a reserved yet mind blowing piece of work that thematically collects art, essays, snippets of stories, quotes and graphics all together four times a year. It’s fifteen bucks, but the quality of the printing (and the work) suggests they’re not in it for the money.

I almost passed on Dwell, one of my favorite architectural mags, full of young shelter seekers building cube-like creations with natural wood interiors in the woods, or on precarious hillsides, or in the middle of the city, for amazingly affordable sums. But I succumb and drool over alt-design houses I’d really like to live in. There are lots of terrific things going on in personal dwelling design, and Dwell manages to balance the pragmatic and visionary. The interiors could use some warmer tones though. All that blond wood gets to me after a while.

Wired‘s cover article is about making stuff, which is both tragic and fabulous in one sweep. Make magazine has been all over it for ages, and before that, there was the Amateur Scientist in Sci-Am for brainiacs and Mechanics Illustrated for the rest. Wired discovering making stuff is like teenagers discovering dating and sex. On the one hand, it’s not actually new, though there the fashions change from time to time. On the other, it’s a hell of a lot of fun and I hope they enjoy themselves. Wear safety goggles, OK?

Often the best stuff seems to be lying on the bottom rack. Communication Arts Interactive Annual is full of stuff I’d love to steal, but clicking and dragging it back to my lair would cost me twenty four bucks, and I just can’t go there.

But enough of mags. In New SF I’m very pleased to see Stephen Hunts The Rise of the Iron Moon out, M.J. Locke’s [amazon_link id=”0765315157″ target=”_blank” ]Up Against It[/amazon_link], out from Tor, looks like hard sf fun, and is surprisingly light when I pick it ip. What are they making paper out of, I have to wonder. It’s 409 pages, but feels weirdly insubstantial. Anyway, it’s an asteroid colony in crisis story, and I expect it would be a good read, much like James Corey’s really excellent [amazon_link id=”0316129089″ target=”_blank” ]Leviathan Wakes[/amazon_link], which I just finished. Dan Abnett’s [amazon_link id=”085766090X” target=”_blank” ]Embedded[/amazon_link] is here, which I reviewed as a guest reviewer for SF Signal. What I do not see, which makes me a little nuts, is Simon Morden’s [amazon_link id=”0316125180″ target=”_blank” ]Equations of Life[/amazon_link], the first of his trilogy out yesterday. You can’t miss the op art cover, nor do you want to. So I ask at the counter…and yes they do have it. It’s on the back side of New SF, down three, next to Elizabeth moon. The sales gal remembers the cover. Smaller than I thought it would be, expecting a trade paperback rather than mass market. Next to eBooks though, I love mass market as a format.

I’m pretty much done at this point, but I swing by the new cookbooks kiosk on the way out, looking for soup books for my YearOfSoup project. I don’t see anything new, but not for the first time I’m tempted by the Culinary Institute of America”s [amazon_link id=”0867308605″ target=”_blank” ]The New Book of Soups[/amazon_link].

Ok, one final last detour…the photography section, now by the comfy chairs, though of course none are free. There’s a copy of [amazon_link id=”1607100134″ target=”_blank” ]The Unseen Ansel Adams[/amazon_link] that reminds me of my friend David Em’s freeway pictures, which are really good, and below it a copy of [amazon_link id=”0316078468″ target=”_blank” ]Ansel Adams in the National Parks[/amazon_link], with Adams standing on then roof of his trusty station wagon. Reminds me of someone, but I can’t quite say who…