Book People by Monte Smith

Security

"Do you listen to bouzouki music?"

I'm at the doughnut cart at the corner near our publishing house on a beautiful morning. And I'm profiling. Well...not profiling, exactly, but I'm trying to establish if the doughnut guy is Greek or what. He's definitely Mediterranean. There's a postcard in the window of his cart that shows a pile of noble-looking ruins on a rocky hillside and in the distance you can see the blue of the sea. But the ruins aren't necessarily Grecian. It isn't the Parthenon. Could it be that one in Jordan. Petra? Where they filmed the third Indiana Jones movie? I guess those Jordanian ruins are Grecian ruins; they just ended up in the wrong country. I once asked the doughnut guy straight out if he was Greek and he got surly.

"What do I look like?" he barked. "Do I look [expletive] Greek?" That's where we left the subject. I don't know why I am so curious. I just like sorting people out. But now I have to be subtle.

"You ever read any, uh, Euripanes?" I say.

"You mean Euripides?" he barks. "[Expletive]."

Before I can get to the bottom of the mystery, I hear shouting. There's a commotion going on up the block. People are yelling. And it looks as if whatever is happening is taking place over by our building. Yes, there's definitely a protest going on in front of the publishing house. There must be fifty people waving placards and chanting, "hey-ho, hey-ho." Can't really catch the rest, something about fish? Or blowing stuff up? One of the activists is carrying a bucket of red paint that looks like blood. It's an honest-to-God protest. This is awesome!

And about time.

Publishing is freedom of the press in action, and freedom can be messy. If you live your life in the realm of ideas-like I pretend to do-then the writing, editing, and production of books is like serving on the front line. Journalists, those flibbertigibbets, get all the respect because they're out there asking questions. "What did you know and when did you know it?" But come on. Books are more important because they're more lasting. And they cost more than newspapers do, too. So there.

I wonder what we published that has this crowd so worked up?

Members of our security team are out in front trying to pacify the mob. I can't help but wonder... no "hope" is a better word, if it wasn't some of my editing work that lit the fuse on this powder keg. Going down the list of my recent titles, though, is discouraging. There's the photo memoir of a celebrity knitter and a compilation of wise sayings from famous grandmothers. Also there's a social history of American plumbing that disappeared without a plop, despite it being copiously illustrated and exhaustive of the subject. As a body of work, these volumes make me want to scream about blowing stuff up, but surely I am alone here. And plus the shouts seem, by and large, to be about fish.

The only thing I can think of is that Salman Rushdie guy. Hahaha, "salmon." They bombed the office of Rushdie's publisher in England back in the 1980s, after he published The Satanic Verses. Wow. Bombs. Now those are some readers who believe in the importance of the written word, although they are rather negative about it. The only recent publishing kerfuffle I know of involves Karl Rove. Do yourself a favor and Google "Karl Rove" and "book signing" and watch as the former White House aide confronts protests in an attempt to hawk his new bestseller. It's great publicity, and Rove's editor has got to be over the moon about it, but I pity the poor bookstore employees who get stuck between the combatants.

"Hey ho! Hey ho! Something fishy has got to go!" You can get in the spirit of these protests quite easily. I like this mob, even if they must despise me as a tool of the publishing business they are here to bring down. Yikes! When I look at my watch, it's 10:05. I should have been at work fifteen minutes ago. So I flash the peace sign at my comrades in full respect for the cause, whatever it is. The only revolution I am truly down with is the one that takes me through the spinning door toward where I earn my meager paycheck.

"Can I see ID?" says Jim at the security desk. Jim is the senior guard, which is why he's not out pacifying the mob.

"Oh come on, Jim," I groan as I flash my employee identification, the very symbol of my attachment to the First Amendment. "I've been working here for five years. So what's happening out there? Why are we being protested?"

"It isn't you book people," Jim chuckles. "It's your tenants."

"Huh? What tenants?" I ask.

"The top floor of this building is leased to a diplomatic consulate," says Jim. "Iceland or the Norwegians or something. Anyway, they are having a big whale hunt this week in international waters and it's got the Sierra Club types all in a hissy."

"Whale hunt? What? You mean this protest has nothing to do with books?"

"Nope. Unless maybe it's Moby-Dick."