Review of Shut Up and Read: A Memoir from Harriett’s Bookshop by Jeannine A. Cook

Bookseller, activist, and one-of-a-kind personality Jeannine A. Cook's voice shines through in this memoir of conversations with and deep inspiration around deceased authors; nerve-racking, enormous leaps of faith; living relationships with ancestors who have passed on; and shaping the future through empowering young people.

Jeannine A. Cook was raised by a blind librarian mother, and books have always been an important part of her life. She always imagined that she'd write a book of her own, and she imagined opening a bookshop in her old age.

But instead, she found herself working three jobs, stressed out and without time to read, much less craft something of her own.

In her journal, she began an imaginary conversation with Harriet Tubman about the woman's strength and resilience. And in 2020, Cook opened a bookstore called Harriett's Bookshop in Philadelphia, which was one of Harriet's first stops on her Underground Railroad journey. But then Covid hit, and Cook had to shutter the store.

But because of Cook's strength of spirit--and the power of books--Harriett's Bookshop remains open today, as do Ida's Bookshop (named after Ida B. Wells) in New Jersey and a literary installation, Josephine's Bookshop (named after Josephine Baker), in Paris.

Cook writes in a conversational style, and her mind and journey down various paths each seem to go a million miles an hour, so often I felt like I was just trying to keep up and keep track of where we were. But her explorations of different avenues are intriguing.

She carries on vibrant dialogues with deceased authors; simultaneously dives into multiple pie-in-the-sky endeavors without being certain of her landing pads; and leans into the power of her ancestors and traditions, growing spiritually closer to them. She believes in the power of empowering, educating, and expanding the horizons of youth, and she actively enters into doing so for the youth conductors involved in her shop.

Cook communicates often with her father, who is increasingly disabled, seemingly still in love with his estranged wife, Cook's mother, and who often seems to talk over and at Cook, as she does with him. Their relationship seems as though it would be more fraught; Cook references her parents' volatile relationship and mentions that her mother's blindness in her second eye was due to being kicked and stomped by Cook's father. But abuse is not mentioned again, and Cook feels deep emotional links to her dad.

The author's faith in resolutions presenting themselves despite logistical roadblocks (and, sometimes, what feel like logical challenges that might cause others to hit the pause button) means that she has at times had a bookstore missing drywall, shelves, finished flooring, and paint when it is due to open; she has lived in a home without plumbing--going to the bathroom in a bag--as she believed in its bones and promise; she has crisis-crowdfunded her bookshops; and she has taken many more leaps of faith, seemingly certain (and correct) that somehow it will all work out. This was often nerve-racking for me personally to read about, but I took some deep breaths and jumped in with Cook. Most of the details of wonderfully ambitious, enormously complicated, often high-stakes plans resolve themselves--sometimes seemingly through the force of Cook's will but, one has to think, also likely due to a cast of unnamed, supportive, supporting, busy figures helping serve as a framework for Cook's endeavors but largely invisible to the reader.

Cook's zigzagging journey in this memoir was often tough to track; she leans into various avenues of spirituality, accesses the presence of her ancestors, runs from mission to mission, promotes activism, and develops new ideas and passion projects. The book's voice and its jumps from topic to topic feel like a reflection of the author's nonstop mind and relentless push to explore, share, and manifest her ambitious dreams.

There's surprisingly little "book talk" here. Cook's connection to deceased authors feels mystical and mysterious--it's all deeper and shapes her more fully than simply a "love of books."

Shut Up and Read feels as though it explores the roots of family and pivotal figures who came before, the growing branches of all that's happening in the present, and the promise of later generations' leaves and flowers to serve as the tree's crown to come.

I've read many memoirs, and Shut Up and Read was unlike any I've encountered before.

I listened to Shut Up and Read courtesy of Amistad and Libro.fm.

More Books You Might Like

I listened to Shut Up and Read courtesy of Amistad and Libro.fm. Jeannine A. Cook is also the author of the novel It's Me They Follow, the writing of which she references in Shut Up and Read.

Please also check out these Bossy reviews of other books about books and memoirs you might enjoy.