In the early 1990s, Nancy Pearl was working as a librarian in Tulsa, Oklahoma, when her daughter dropped out of college at the University of Chicago and moved to Seattle to, in Pearl’s words, “hang out at the market and smoke a lot of stuff and all that.” Soon Pearl came out to visit her daughter and saw a friend who had left Tulsa to work at Seattle Public Library. “And he said, ‘What if I could find the money and we could create a position for you to come out here and do what you do best, which is talk about books and put people together with books, and not have to do anything you don’t do well? Would you move out to Seattle?’”

Pearl said she would. And then, she says, “I called my husband.” Thirty years later, Pearl is one of America’s preeminent connectors of people to books, and a local literary superstar. She is the author of the Book Lust series, plus a novel, George and Lizzie. She also hosts Book Lust with Nancy Pearl on the Seattle Channel. Pearl spoke with Seattle Met about the city’s changing literary scene, the joy of walking, and other local favorites.

Library Branch

The Northeast Branch, because it’s my local, closest branch, is the one where I go pick up my holds. And when I was writing my novel I did a lot of the writing there. They had a quiet area where people could just sit with their computers, and that was really useful for me. You know, I couldn’t go to a coffee shop. I had these visions of myself doing that. But it just was so distracting. Even when I tried wearing Bose noise-canceling earphones. I just couldn’t do it. I was too interested in the people around me. But at the library, you just kind of faced a blank wall.

Neighborhood

I live in Hawthorne Hills which I describe as the non-view part of View Ridge. It has great access to the Burke-Gilman Trail. I’m a walker, my husband’s a bicyclist. It’s perfect for that. But overall, I love that people here identify themselves by their neighborhood. I love that Seattle is a city of neighborhoods.

Hidden Gem

I think Seattle’s hidden gems are all its trees. And for a while, I would take a picture of a tree a day and post it on Twitter. You could spend a day walking around and looking up or looking at the trunks of the trees.

Place to See the Arts

The Henry Art Gallery. They have a little cafe in the basement. So when you get sort of overwhelmed with the art you can get a panini or something and get back to real life, and then go look at the art again. I think we’re so lucky. The Seattle Asian
Art Museum: When I came here, in 1993, it wasn’t the Asian Art Museum. That was a big change—a welcome change. And the Frye, it’s so wonderful that there’s no charge, so anybody is welcome to go and appreciate the art. I’m not much of a concert person because I don’t like to hear musicians talking. I just want to hear the music.

Day Trip

Bellingham. I love the Fairhaven neighborhood. One of the things that’s so nice about that area is that you can’t have chain stores there. There’s a terrific bookstore, which is mostly new books, but then there’s a used bookstore, too, which is terrific as well. For any book lover, a trip to Bellingham [is great]. Plus, it has a nice college town feel.

Place to Read

My house. I don’t understand how people can read in a coffee shop or on light rail. I like to read in my living room, which has my favorite art on the walls. So, yeah, my favorite place to read a book is at home.

Bookstore

I don’t think I could choose. I go to all of them. I love Phinney Books because I worked at a bookstore in Tulsa that was very much like it. I think they do a great job with book selection, and their newsletter is great. Madison Books as well. Those two for small, independent, heavily curated bookstores are wonderful. What I think of as the three big ones, Elliott Bay, Third Place, and the U Bookstore—I go to all of them variously, and they’re all just what you would look for in a bookstore. Seattle is rich in bookstores, rich in readers, and rich in authors.

Grocery Store

The Fred Meyer in Lake City. You can kind of find everything at Fred Meyer, and in addition to that, you get a very diverse clientele. And that’s always interesting to someone who’s a writer or who’s interested in people, whether you’re writing or not.

Place to be Outside

The Burke-Gilman, which I’ve walked and bicycled [since I moved here]. There’s a big change, too, because of all of the electric bikes and scooters on the trail. I’ll tell you, in 1993—I know this is exaggerated—but nobody used to honk their horns. There was none of that. And everybody on the trails when they passed said “on your left.” But it’s still my favorite place. It’s a great place to look at trees, too.

And I know I said I didn’t like noise when I was writing or reading, but in fact when I was stuck at a place in my writing, on my walks I’d listen to books or sports podcasts, and when I was listening to those things, somehow the problem worked its way through, and by the time I got home, I knew what to do. It’s kind of contradictory, but it’s helped me, the walking.

Place to Celebrate a Special Occasion

I like going out for lunch to celebrate rather than in the evening. For me that means going to Cafe Campagne at the market and having a croque monsieur or a croque madame.

Seattle Hot Take

My hot take is not really a hot take. But it’s that all the issues facing Seattle are all intertwined. And you’re not going to fix the city unless you start working at the problems from all these different angles. To just go in and look at it with one way, trained on one aspect, that’s not going to fix what’s wrong with the city.