This is what reading looks like: Local authors became live models in a Philadelphia bookstore window

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Instead of celebrating National Read-A-Book Day on Friday by putting books by local writers in the window of Barnes and Noble bookstore in Center City, manager Lynn Rosen thought: Why not put the writers themselves in the window?

“It was a tough sell to my staff,” Rosen admitted. “They thought I was crazy. We’ll leave that question unanswered as to whether I am or not.”

On the other hand, it sounded like a great idea to the writers. All of the two dozen authors Rosen reached out to agreed to come down to the store, sit in the leather chair in the window display outfitted with a side table and lamp, and silently read a favorite book.

“They are performance art,” Rosen explained. “It is a live display.”

The rosters of writers included recognizable and bestselling local authors, including Lorene Carey, Jason Rekuluk, M.L. Rio, and Jamie Brenner. They each read for 15 minutes and then swapped out for the next writer’s time slot. This went on for almost seven hours.

“It involved no talking, which is a big bonus for me,” said Brenner, who had done speaking events at the store in the past.

She sat in the window and put her nose into Grady Hendrix’s 2020 horror novel, “The Southern Book Club’s Guide to Slaying Vampires.”

“Every writer is a reader first,” she said. “This is showing everyone what our first love is, which is sitting with a book.”

M.L. Rio, whose first novel “If We Were Villains” became a bestseller and is now being pitched for television, recently relocated to Philadelphia from Washington D.C.  A former Shakespearean actor, she felt comfortable in the fishbowl of Barnes and Noble’s storefront window.

She wore dramatically heavy eyeliner and sat down with a classic: Shirley Jackson’s “We Have Always Lived in a Castle” (1962), which she re-reads periodically.

“It’s one of my favorite horror novels. I think it’s a horror novel. People might fight me on that,” she said. “It always feels right for the fall and spooky season.”

Zenboia Lundy, who goes by Zenobia The Poet, did not hesitate when Rosen made the request. Since the Free Library of Philadelphia’s Author Events series went through a period of public turmoil last summer, retail stores like Barnes and Noble have reinforced their own author programming.

“Lynn has been an avid supporter of mine and I had several book signings here,” Lundy said. “Barnes & Noble has been a big supporter of new authors and especially local authors.”

Lundy brought her copy of the 2009 novel by Kathryn Stockett, “The Help,” which was made into a movie starring Emma Stone and Viola Davis. She said she never reads from a tablet or Kindle. She is strictly old-school hard copy.

“I think with texting and AI and everything, people just don’t read enough. I’m a big supporter of reading books,” she said. “And with so many books being banned right now, we really need to support authors.”

Most passersby in the street didn’t notice that the figure in the window with their face partially covered by a book was actually a living person engaged in an introverted activity. Some turned their heads as they walked past to see what reading looks like.

“It’s slow. It’s usually private,” Rosen said. “Maybe you read on public transportation, but I asked people: Where is your favorite place to read? By far the most common answer is, ‘In bed.’”

“So maybe next time we’ll put a bed in the window.”