Reading Room closes on Strip

Literary life in Vegas has never been so high-profile. Both the Las Vegas Sun and the Las Vegas Review-Journal offer features on Charles Bock. Bock's novel "Beautiful Children" and also the recently published "The Delivery Man" by Joe McGinniss Jr. are both set in Las Vegas.

I am working on a review of both books for Las Vegas Weekly. It is very exciting to see Vegas as the setting for other than genre novels. Over the years, few established novelists have chosen to dedicate an entire novel to a Vegas setting. It is no surprise to me that this is a debut novel for both writers. The list of masterpieces of Las Vegas fiction, in my opinion, has yet to lodge a single candidate. Obviously, the one book that is considered a classic set in Vegas is "Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas." But the story is not told as fiction and, even then, Vegas is grotesquely caricatured in the book by an author who is less interested in observing the Strip than in using Vegas as a stand-in for his larger points about America.

Anyway, I am vested in this issue because I hope one day to publish a novel set in Vegas. I am not the only one in Vegas with this desire. And like some of the others I know, this fantasy comes with a location attached. The place where we want the first reading from our yet-to-exist books to take place: the Reading Room at Mandalay Place. But, in my case, I took too long to paint my masterpiece. The Reading Room is closing.

The Reading Room is the only bookstore on the Strip (unless you count the paperbacks you can buy in resort snack shops or the high-end first edition market). There is nothing on the Strip anything like the stock of books and magazines available there.

Recently I wrote on the Buffet about how I gave my copy of Ovid's "Metamorphosis" to Jay-Z. What I did not mention was that I bought the new translation of that classic poem at the Reading Room. I knew it would be the sort of book the store carried, and so when I next went to the House of Blues in Mandalay Bay, I stopped at the Reading Room to buy the book because the store is right next to House of Blues. I was correct that they had it in stock.

The proximity of great music to great books made this location one of my most frequent places to spend time on the Strip. But even when the Reading Room opened in November 2003, I always knew the store was a hard-sell addition to the Strip. In addition to poetry, the Reading Room boasted a strong contemporary fiction section, as well as odd specialty books and limited editions. But sadly, the Strip really only needs paperbacks to be read on airplanes.

As with most of the very cool things on the Strip, the Reading Room was a pet project of an important Las Vegas executive, Glenn Schaeffer, who was once president of the Mandalay Resort Group. Schaeffer is a graduate of the Iowa Writers Workshop, and he saw potential in an area most book retailers thought of as a literary dead zone, the Las Vegas Strip. So, unlike most of the retail shops at Mandalay Place, the employees of the Reading Room are employees of the casino.

Over the years, I allowed myself to grow cautiously optimistic about the store's future. The Reading Room is a tiny store, and there is a loyal coterie of locals and I frequently see plenty of tourists when I shop there. I also thought the store would get a lot of help by holding an occasional celebrity book-signing. But even that turned out not be a perfect fit. A UFC fighter recently did a signing in which, to get a ticket, people had to buy their copy of his autobiography at the Reading Room. But he was too popular to actually hold the signing in the bookstore.

Anyway, math always wins in the end in Las Vegas, and selling books is apparently not capable of justifying 1,300 square feet of the Las Vegas Strip. (Photo by Sarah Gerke)

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01:34 PM PT, Feb 5 2008 in Mandalay Bay | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

At Mandalay Bay: Hot Restaurant and Free Music

Tonight is the grand opening of Michael Mina's Strip Steak restaurant inside Mandalay Bay. At 7 p.m., there is a VIP party with free food and drink and a house DJ. Then at 9, Thunderball performs.

I'll be long gone by then. In fact, the only reason I am going to drop in on Strip Steak at all is because I'll be at Mandalay Bay anyway to see a free "Crossroads" acoustic series concert at House of Blues at 9 p.m. Stephanie Jordan is performing. Jordan's day job is as singer in the topless show "Fantasy" at the Luxor. After seeing it, I have only two good words to say about "Fantasy": Stephanie Jordan.

During "Fantasy," Jordan is not a topless showgirl. She wears sexy outfits while she does karaoke of dull songs like "Black Velvet," "Lady Marmalade" and "Roxanne." Yet, despite the context and the material, I was thrilled by Jordan's voice. Samples of her original material can be heard on her MySpace page. The samples offered, like "Lady Dancer" and "Door to Yesterday," show that Jordan makes her own brooding and sultry music that I am sure rips hard live. In fact, "Fantasy" could be vastly improved by having her sing those songs.

Anyway, maybe the folks who are signing Vegas acts like Panic! at the Disco and The Killers should consider the vast reservoir of diva talent in Las Vegas that includes Jordan as well as Nicole Sottile, who used to front local rockers Mama Zeus.

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12:17 PM PT, Oct 12 2006 in Mandalay Bay | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

The Early Love Story of Pam and Kid Rock

Memories of young love. One of the first, if not the first, public date that Kid Rock and Pamela Anderson had was at Tiger Jam in April 2001 at Mandalay Bay, a concert to support the Tiger Woods Foundation held annually in Vegas. Rock wasn't scheduled to perform that night, but John Mellencamp was and I was taken to a greenroom to await my moment to interview Mellencamp.

As I waited for Mellencamp's attention, I saw Kid Rock, who I knew slightly from a couple Grammy parties, in a corner with a beer in one hand and Pamela Anderson on his lap. He wasn't set to perform so no one else seemed to notice him and there was no publicist guarding him.

I actually find Rock's company relaxing. One year at the Grammy Awards he asked me to hang out with his mom while he did an interview for MTV. "She's just like Madonna," Rock told me. "Mrs. Ritchie." I like this guy. So, I went to wait with Rock and Anderson. Rock was in full courting mode, singing the opening line of one of David Allen Coe's notorious XXX-rated songs to his new girlfriend — one that proclaimed in detail a very specific kind of sex act he wished to perform on Anderson. She was totally charmed.

Interestingly, when I was then led to Mellencamp's dressing room for the actual interview, before we started, I had to hear Mrs. John Mellencamp give an earful to her husband about the trampy looking girl. Clearly neither of them recognized Anderson. But Mellencamp for his part said he hadn't noticed her either. It was a very diplomatic comment, considering I watched him notice her in great detail.

He also told me he didn't know much about Kid Rock though Rock made a cameo onstage that night to sing, I think, "Pink Houses" or "Small Town" with him. The other memory I have of that night is that Mellencamp was one touchy interview. After a few abrupt answers he lit a cigarette. I remember asking him if he was surprised to find himself smoking again after having already had a heart attack. Wow, did he go off on my perceived slight. He told me that no one without his number of hit singles, his number of hit albums, his number of fans should be lecturing him about his smoking. And by the way, how many doctors have ever had a hit record?

(Photo: Peter Morgan / Reuters)

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11:17 AM PT, Jul 19 2006 in Mandalay Bay | Permalink | Comments (1) | TrackBack (0)

Catching Up With Artie Lange

I interviewed Artie Lange last night for my July 16 Sunday Calendar column. He will be back in Vegas at the end of that week for a television taping at Mandalay Bay.

Lange seems in good spirits. He is really happy about the review Variety gave his movie. During his last visit here, Lange felt bound to maintain fidelity to his longtime girlfriend. But on this next trip to Vegas he promises things are going to be different. Until then he says he is too busy to fool around — his schedule includes nothing but promotional work until he gets to Vegas. Lange says has set aside time while here to cut loose. Lange was his usual candid self. I will post some excerpts from the transcript of our conversation here Monday.

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12:36 PM PT, Jul 7 2006 in Mandalay Bay | Permalink | Comments (0) | TrackBack (0)

Neil Diamond or Black Eyed Peas?

Neil Diamond is at MGM Grand tonight and Black Eyed Peas are at Mandalay Bay. Where would you rather be?

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07:24 AM PT, Dec 30 2005 in Mandalay Bay , MGM Grand Hotel , Neil Diamond , Vegas Headliners | Permalink | Comments (2)

Francois Paolini's We All Live in Vegas

One thing you don't often do in a casino is go to a book signing. In fact, there is only one bookstore on the Strip: The Reading Room at Mandalay Bay. Its unique existence is likely the result of a quirk in that a former Mandalay Bay executive was a graduate of the famous Iowa Writers Workshop (whose alumni include Flannery O' Connor, John Irving, Raymond Carver and T. C. Boyle). The Reading Room is located right near The House of Blues in the casino. The store is a total joy in its wonderful oddity. True story: One day while waiting for doors to open for a Seether concert I was writing about at HOB I headed over to The Reading Room hoping to show a friend an Osip Mandelstam poem I had told her about earlier in the day and, yes, in the casino on the Las Vegas Strip, we discovered a translation of the work of that great Russian poet.

On Saturday afternoon I returned to the Reading Room for a signing by French photojournalist Francois Paolini. We All Live in Vegas features 320 of Paolini's photos many artfully arranged into collages that offer juxtapositions that really capture the energy of the town. One of my favorites merges the frontage of Circus Circus with the ceiling of the Star Trek Experience at the Hilton.

I asked Paolini what his favorite casino was to photograph: "The MGM. I've stayed at the MGM Grand many times. And, the more I stay at the MGM the more I love it. But I know it is not the most beautiful of the resorts. Here (Mandalay Bay) is better than the MGM, of course, and Bellagio and Four Seasons. But I feel better in MGM. I don't know why. It is an interesting place. When night falls on MGM, its color, its special green is completely strange. I don't know how they make this green. It is green from a dream. I also like to get pictures of the street from the rooms at the MGM."

I had to ask Paolini where he got his jacket. "Las Vegas," he said with a huge smile

(photo by Sarah Gerke)

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08:37 AM PT, Dec 12 2005 in Francois Paolini , Mandalay Bay , Vegas Books | Permalink | Comments (0)

Few New Year's Eve Concerts

It will be slim pickings this New Year's Eve. Matchbox 20 (at the Hard Rock) and Goo Goo Dolls (at House of Blues) with the big show being Kanye West at the Aladdin. It looks like among the major venues in town who will have nothing going on December 31: Hilton Theatre, The Colosseum at Caesars Palace, MGM Grand Garden Arena and The Mandalay Bay Events Center. December 31 is a Saturday night and so I am a bit surprised or maybe that is the issue (people might need more attractions to come here for a New Year's Eve that fell on a Tuesday). But it seems that New Year's Eve in Las Vegas--at least if it lands on a weekend---has become enough of a draw that casinos no longer feel the need to book a big name.

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07:59 AM PT, Dec 9 2005 in Aladdin Hotel , Caesars Palace , Hard Rock Hotel , Las Vegas Hilton , Mandalay Bay , MGM Grand Hotel , Vegas Headliners | Permalink | Comments (0)