Who We Are and What We Read

Donna Allen, Owner Cindy Dike, Children's Event Planner and Book Buyer, Maple Street New Gladin Scott, Manager, Event Planner, and Book Buyer, Maple Street New Matt Carney, Manager, Bayou Saint John (BSJ) Maureen Iverson, Bookseller, Storyteller (& Assistant Book Buyer) Ben Jenkins, Manager, Maple Street at the Healing Center Ken Foster, Bookseller Sara White, Bookseller Michael Glaviano, Bookseller Clark Allen, Bookseller

We’ve all got favorites. Ask about our staff picks at each of our locations. We live to recommend.

You can also see some more recommendations on our bookshelves at goodreads!

Donna Allen, Owner back to top

Donna purchased Maple Street Book Shop from longtime owner, Rhoda Faust, in the Spring of 2007. Prior to this, she taught history at several local universities, including Loyola. When she’s not at the book shop, she can be found either renovating her home or gallivanting somewhere along the Mediterranean. Some of her favorite authors include Michael Grant, Tony Perrottet, John Steinbeck, Robert Graves, and Beppe Severgnini. Although she primarily reads non-fiction, her favorite book of all-time is John Kennedy Toole’s Confederacy of Dunces. Donna recently finished The Solitude of Prime Numbers.

E-mail Donna.

Cindy Dike, Children's Event Planner and Book Buyer, Maple Street New back to top

Cindy has been a bookseller since 1986. She was a partner at Maple Street Children’s Book Shop from 1988 till she closed the doors of the shop in 2009. She is the children’s and young adult buyer (and event planner!) at Maple Street’s main branch.

In high school and in college, she enjoyed the required reading (with the exception of The Red Badge of Courage and The Scarlet Letter). She likes novels, murder mysteries and autobiographies. Her all time fav novel is To Kill a Mockingbird. Jane Austin, Charlotte Bronte, Charles Dickens, and John Stinebeck are all old friends whom she likes to visit every now and then. Jane Smiley, Kate Atkins, Tim Gautreaux, Richard Russo, Amy Tan, Annie Proulx are some of the contemporary authors on her favorites shelf at the book shop. On the subject of murder, Michael Connelly, P. D. James, Robert Goddard, and Janet Evanovich are her go-to authors. The bios she has read recently are Dead End Gene Pool by Wendy Burden and The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls .

E-mail Cindy.

Gladin Scott, Manager, Event Planner, and Book Buyer, Maple Street New back to top

A long time customer of Maple Street Book Shop, Gladin joined the staff after a career in music and video distribution. Favorite writers include Pat Barker, Paul Bowles, E.M. Forster, Alan Hollingsworth, Ian McKuen, Iris Murdoch, Richard Russo, Paul Scott, Anne Tyler, and Evelyn Waugh. When he is not in the shop over-ordering the work of aging, obscure, or deceased British novelists, Gladin can frequently be found wandering Maple Street in search of coffee and other refreshments for the staff. Mr. Gladin includes these books among his memorable recent reads: Johnathan Franzen’s Freedom, Patti Smith’s Just Kids, and Alan Hollinghurst’s, The Stranger’s Child.

E-mail Gladin.

Matt Carney, Manager, Bayou Saint John (BSJ) back to top

Matt grew up in Baton Rouge then lived in New Orleans until he didn’t anymore and stayed away until he did again. He is relatively omnivorous when it comes to reading, though tends to grant concessions to certain genres over others. A few of his favorite authors include Philip K Dick, William Gibson, Michael Chabon, and J.M. Coetzee.

His newest venture is something about covers.

E-mail Matt.

Maureen Iverson, Bookseller, Storyteller (& Assistant Book Buyer) back to top

Maureen has been a resident of New Orleans and a customer of the Maple Street Book Shops since 1995, age nine. Her favorite authors are Ellen Gilchrist, Kevin Wilson, Jeffrey Eugenides, Donald Barthelme, and Russell Hoban. She likes short stories, books about girls, and always starts mysteries at the end.

E-mail Maureen.

Ben Jenkins, Manager, Maple Street at the Healing Center back to top

Ben actually thinks it’s the heat and not the stupidity.

He is happy to be back in New Orleans after his latest stint in Baton Rouge where he partook in more schooling. When he is not getting his learn on, Ben enjoys doing freelance PR work. His favorite books include The Sun Also Rises, Kitchen Confidential, and Dune. He has read more than his fair share of Star Wars literature.

E-mail Ben.

Ken Foster, Bookseller back to top

Ken Foster is a writer and reader. His books include the memoir The Dogs Who Found Me and the short story collection The Kind I’m Likely to Get, as well as his newest title, I’m a Good Dog. His work has appeared frequently in Salon.com, Time Out New York, Bark, and other publications and has been translated into German, Arabic, Japanese and Turkish. Some of his favorite books are William Maxwell’s They Came Like Swallows, Zadie Smith’s White Teeth, Jennifer Egan’s A Visit from the Good Squad and Jim Gorant’s The Lost Dogs. He lives in the Lower Ninth Ward with his dogs: Brando, Zephyr, Douglas and Bananas.

E-mail Ken.

Sara White, Bookseller back to top

Sara White is a printmaker and resident of the Bayou St. John neighborhood. She got her start selling books with Crescent City Books in the French Quarter, where she worked from 2007-2010. Sara enjoys printed ephemera and reading books of all sorts. Some of her favorites include Maxfield Parish illustrations, John Steinbeck, and early Black Sparrow Press publications. Sara sells letterpress goods locally and on etsy.

E-mail Sara.

Michael Glaviano, Bookseller back to top

In middle school Michael was briefly ranked among the ten best American players of a game called Propaganda, but he failed to parlay this into a career as child-god. He was born and raised in New Orleans and got his B.A. at LSU, where he studied English and philosophy. A writer, editor and bookseller, he spends almost all of his waking hours squinting at text. He likes literature with a sense of criticism and criticism with a sense of humor. Some of his favorite writers are Roland Barthes, John Berryman, Judith Butler, Anne Carson, Stuart Dybek, Barry Hannah, bell hooks, Frederic Jameson, Karl Jaspers, Emmanuel Levinas, Ben Lerner, Ariana Reines, George Saunders, and David Foster Wallace.

E-mail Michael.

Clark Allen, Bookseller back to top

An immigrant bookseller from the San Francisco Bay Area, Clark settled himself in New Orleans late 2011. But why? Is California not a desirable locale for an avid reader in their mid twenties? Is it not a veritable Garden of Eden ripe to harvest lofty ideals, admirable standards, small publishing houses, and rare literature galore? When asked for answers to these questions and others alike Clark has been known to respond by saying, “I don’t know,” and “I just like The South.” Oftentimes following his brief response he returns to whatever book he may currently be reading, usually something new to him but occasionally a re-read of an old favorite by, perhaps, Tom McCarthy or Osamu Dazai or Blaise Cendrars or Isaac Bashevis Singer. Aside from a deep love of reading, his personal interests include photography, illustration, and writing in his own right under the pseudonym Sink Stuart, a title which came about due to his utterly un-Google-able proper name, a dilemma his parents certainly did not foresee in the early 80s.

E-mail Clark.