Under The Table Books

Under the Table Books

2010 Bay Area Independent Publishers Award Winner: Best Fiction2010 National Indie Award for FictionForeword Magazine Bronze Award for FictionSet in an anarchist bookstore somewhere in northern California and dedicated to bookstore people and librarians everywhere, these interwoven tales illuminate life in a collective of artists and renegades, a de facto family of social outcasts for whom the bookstore is home, community center, and grand experiment in pragmatic mysticism. The rich cast of characters includes visionary poets, painters, and musicians, a ten-year-old genius, a homeless savant who claims to have once been the world s richest man, a master chef, a former movie star turned recluse, and a pair of eighty-eight-year-old identical twin sisters.As these intriguing and funny individuals go through their changes large and small, the collective evolves with them, for the bookstore is as much a character as the people who live and work and love therein. And as their personal and communal struggles mirror the challenges facing the world at large, these lovable people are drawn into dramas that transcend their own. In the end, all of these very real characters have grown into a deeper awareness of why they re alive and what they must do to keep the magic in their lives. Review A splendid collection of great and magical stories. --Elizabeth Marshall Thomas author of The Hidden Life of Deer and The Animal WifeIf Lawrence Ferlinghetti and Lewis Carroll created a bookstore together, the place might very well resemble Under The Table Books. Todd Walton takes you on a whimsical, lovingly detailed tour of a universe that is equal parts bookstore and state of mind; a literary counterculture version of the Star Wars bar, peopled with one-of-a-kind characters lucky enough to have found each other. --Merrill Markoe, author of Merrill Markoe s Guide to Love and Walking in Circles Before Lying DownPunctuated by the author s beguiling drawings, these stories add up to one big story about everything. Open to any page and you ll fall right into the lives of people you want to know more about. It knocked me out. A very good book. --Bruce Anderson, Editor, The Anderson Valley Advertiser, and author of The Mendocino PapersPunctuated by the author s beguiling drawings, these stories add up to one big story about everything. Open to any page and you ll fall right into the lives of people you want to know more about. It knocked me out. A very good book. --Bruce Anderson, Editor, The Anderson Valley Advertiser, and author of The Mendocino PapersA splendid collection of great and magical stories. --Elizabeth Marshall Thomas author of The Hidden Life of Deer and The Animal Wife From the Author UNDER THE TABLE BOOKS, with illustrations by the author, was many years in the making. The audio version includes my original piano music and my special voices for the many marvelous characters. If I had a dollar for everyone who has said this book will make a great play or a fabulous movie or a long-running television series, I'd have fifty dollars. What I love most about the book is that it is both funny and sad, fantastic yet true, as only fiction can be true. I have written the sequel and hope one day to bring that opus forth. In the meantime, I hope you will come into the bookstore and open yourself to its wonders. About the Author Todd Walton was born in San Francisco. His fiction began appearing in national magazines in 1975 with the publication of Willow in Cosmopolitan. In 1978, Todd published his critically acclaimed novel Inside Moves, which sold over 160,000 copies and was made into an Academy Award nominated film. His second novel, Forgotten Impulses (Simon and Schuster, 1980) was chosen by the New York Times as one of the best of that year. Louie & Women was published by Dutton in 1983, and Night Train by Mercury House in 1986. Todd s fifth novel, Ruby & Spear, was published by Bantam in 199