My name is Patrick Reinhart and I have been working for Tom for a decade now. There were more of us "book guys" back then, now it's down to Tom and Lisa, and me. So what do I do around the place?
Well, a little bit of everything, like people do in most small businesses. One thing I have always specialized in around here are the rare and antiquarian books; I love doing the research and getting lost in rabbit holes... but always with a rope, you know, so I can climb back outta that hole at a moment's notice. I have also always taken the lead as far as marketing and social media, and maintaining the website and updating the blog. Tom is more interested in the business of it all and old enough that he's not interested in fiddling around with social media, which, all the more power to him. I can respect that. And that's why he's got me to do it for him! Make no mistake, though, Tom is just about the most outgoing and good-natured fella you're likely to talk to or do business with.
My interest in books goes beyond the business of wheeling and dealing them: I have started my own small publishing business called Curiouser House, where I reprint and publish obscure and classic literature that's in the public domain (the books in the header image are from Curiouser). This allows me to have full control over the design and editing; editing in the form of what additional essays or illustrations to include to enhance an edition of, say, Moby Dick, or choosing which translation of a work not originally published in English, and so forth. I love designing books. Studio Arts is what I majored in, back in my college days, and I have maintained a healthy curiosity regarding graphic design ever since.
In 2013 I attended the Denver Publishing Institute, which was an intensive summer course all about the publishing industry where leading experts from across the country came and gave talks. That was an incredible experience with lots of insight. Highlights for me were getting to meet Joyce Meskis, long-time owner of Denver's legendary bookstore Tattered Cover. She was leading the Institute at the time. The other highlight was in getting to meet and speak briefly with Gary Groth, legendary editor of Fantagraphics. Inspiring stuff. I didn't go the professional publishing route then because, frankly, I didn't want to move to New York City, and neither did I particularly want to become an editor. That's not to say there aren't publishing jobs here in Denver and in various places that are not NYC, and that there aren't EVERY position imaginable other than editor in publishing; it's a vast and complex business involving an enormous variety of disciplines.
I've illustrated a couple books. I learned the basics of binding books. I read and listen to a lot of books. I've tried my voice at narrating for LibriVox, which is a great resource for audio books in the public domain, but kind of hit-and-miss as far as narrators go because they rely on volunteers and don't reject any help they can get. I've put together a few amateur handwriting fonts, which if nothing else was an education in the complexity of fonts.
But I haven't written and published anything yet. Back in college I was pretty happy with some of the poetry I wrote, but it's nothing I'd want to publish today, and I haven't written much since. Yes, yes, I do have idea for stories and stuff I'd love to have the mental space to focus on, and silly children's books I'd love to construct.
At any given time there's about a dozen projects I'd love to sink my teeth into. You remember text-based computer games/interactive fiction? How cool would it be to write some interactive fiction? These days you don't necessarily even have to know how to code to do that...
Ain't enough hours in the day, days in the week, years in a life... so much to do, limited energies with which to do them.
Where else can you find me online these days? Plenty of places, but here's the main ones:
- MrPatrickReinh.art/
- Instagram: @MrPatrickReinhart
- Curiouser.House/Publishing
- Bookshop.org - lists of a lot of my favorite books! (affiliate link)
- TikTok: @CuriouserHouse - but talking books in general, not just CH