Happy Thanksgiving
As many of you know, I’m based in Australia. At this time of year a lot of people here complain about the “Americanisation” of our culture, with some neighbourhoods celebrating Halloween and trick-or-treating. Another American holiday we don’t have is Thanksgiving.
Several years ago we became friends with someone from the US who had moved here to marry an Australian woman. When their marriage broke down, we were helping support him, and one of the things he asked was whether we could throw a Thanksgiving for him. So we got to work making all the staples—turkey, pecan pie, cornbread, roast vegetables, sweet potato, green beans with creamy sauce, corn, pumpkin pie… we went all out. One thing that didn’t cross our minds, though, was that we didn’t actually have anywhere to seat all our friends. We were building at the time, so we grabbed a few saw horses and some 2x8s, screwed them together, and suddenly we had a 15-foot table out on the deck.
I’m guessing the coziness is a little different when you’re outdoors, the temperature is in the mid-80s°F, and it’s still light at 9pm—but there’s nothing like breaking bread with good friends and remembering all you have to be thankful for, even when life is hard.
It became a tradition for a few years, and we even used to throw one for the kids in our youth group (moved to winter—roast meals taste better in winter!).
No matter where you are in the world, I’d like to invite you to take a moment today, or over the next few days, to pause and be grateful for the wonderful things in your life.
I’ll keep these related to LBP and the people without whom I couldn’t have released a record number of books this year.
Firstly, thank you. Without the support of my incredible customers I wouldn’t be doing this. I never intended to start a business—just to help make a few books easier to obtain and more affordable. Thank you to everyone who has kept requesting more books, pointed out mistakes so I can fix them, and left lovely notes with your orders. Book people are the loveliest people. I’ve lost track of the times I’ve been feeling low and a kind message has picked me up.
If you’ve bought any of my books, sent me a correction, made a request, liked or shared a post, told a friend about LBP—anything at all—thank you. Every bit makes a difference.
This year I’ve been working to expand my team and take some jobs off my plate. I can’t mention everyone who has helped, but a huge thank you to Renee, who is doing such a great job with social media—photographing the books, making the posts, and staying in touch with people there. And to Julienne, who is getting the emails out regularly, even though I seldom manage to get the personal posts to her.
Thank you to Lee, who does such a great job transcribing the books I hope to release, and to Gia, who helps track books down, update indexes, find new images, fact-check, and do countless odd jobs. Without you both, many new books simply wouldn’t have been released.
To the rights holders: thank you for trusting me with your work, or that of your parents and grandparents.
To the wonderful ladies in my proofreading team: whether you’ve read dozens of books this year or just one or two, I appreciate you so much. It’s a job I’m awful at, and your help means a lot.
Thank you to Pari, who cleans and tweaks old imaging, making everything look far better than I ever could, and who patiently works with me as I keep tweaking our system.
And to my friend who keeps the wheels on here at LBP, Arup… I don’t know where to start. For seven years you’ve been keeping me (relatively) sane, looking after the routine things I struggle with, seeing problems and fixing them before they occur, and keeping me in line. I’m so grateful for you.
Running LBP has never just been about books—it’s about the people who read them, cherish them, and help keep them alive. Thank you for your support, your kindness, and your love of good books. I’m deeply grateful for each of you. Here’s to another year of reading, restoring, and rediscovering treasures together.