Dave Eggers does his best thinking on his bicycle. The San Francisco author, artist and literary activist rides an old British production bike that he picked up for $300 in North Beach. A few weeks back while riding between outdoor concerts in the Mission during SF Porchfest, inspiration struck. Without a pen and paper handy, he was stuck texting the idea to himself. The problem? Eggers doesn’t own a smartphone.

“It takes 20 minutes to write a sentence,” Eggers said.

It’s a funny predicament for Eggers, given that he’s arguably the city’s biggest proponent of the written word.

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Eggers is speaking with me at the offices of McSweeney’s, a nonprofit publishing company on Valencia Street. It’s run in the back of the International Library of Young Authors, which houses 2,000 works by people under the age of 18. To enter the offices, you walk through a secret door in the form of a mirrored armoire, then emerge into a room of wall-to-wall books that the imprint has published: issues of McSweeney’s Quarterly shaped like trapper keepers, pocket-sized hardcover novellas from Eggers’ “Forgetters” series, curious nonfiction titles like a reissue of a 100-year-old autobiography by the founder of Hollister, the San Benito County city now known for its annual biker rally.

Eggers moved to the Bay Area from Illinois in the early 1990s and started working as a graphic designer, then writing for Salon.com. In 2000, he released a memoir called “A Heartbreaking Work of Staggering Genius” that was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize. He’s since published in just about every medium you can imagine — a dozen novels, 20 children’s books, short story collections, nonfiction works. He also co-founded the educational writing nonprofit 826 Valencia, which doubles as a store that sells pirate accessories.

Now age 56, Eggers’ latest book is called “Contrapposto.” Released this week, it follows childhood friends Cricket and Olympia as their lives intersect........

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