"Authors are probably my favorite guests. Better than I thought they'd be, but I should have realized they're all natural storytellers. Even though a lot them have not been on television before, they're just great. They have a mastery of language... and they're all so different. I'm always going to be fascinated talking to people about writing process."

Auntie's Bookstore in Spokane, Wash., has been sold. Effective today, John Waite, owner of Merlyn's comics and games store, takes over the nearly 40-year-old independent bookshop from co-founders Shannon Ahern and Chris O'Harra.

In announcing the change of ownership, Waite explained: "Recently Chris hoped to pass Auntie's on to someone that would treat it with the love and respect it deserves. I am excited to take on the legacy of Auntie's, and build it into a 21st century bookstore for Spokane. So as of June 1st I will be working there with the current staff to bring you the best experience possible. And we want your help and support.

"We want Auntie's to be the local place for your book and literature needs. While times are tough with Internet competition, I think of bookstores as cultural and creative centers for our community. I want Auntie's and Merlyn's to be places to dream about, create and explore the universe. I am dedicated to making them hubs for local community activities. And I am dedicated to making the inclusive and open to everyone. These are stores for all people to enjoy and be part of. And this is just the start of a sort of community ownership of local commerce. I want to work with Spokane to make Auntie's and Merlyn's the stores we need here in Spokane."

Jane Friedman

Effective immediately, Jane Friedman has stepped down as CEO of Open Road Integrated Media Inc., a digital publisher and multimedia content company she co-founded in 2009. She is being succeeded by media executive Paul Slavin, who joined the company last September as president. Friedman, the former CEO of HarperCollins, will serve as Open Road's chairman of the board and executive publisher.

"Jane Friedman is an industry legend, and it is a privilege to work with her. Jane and our team of editors, marketers, and producers have achieved so much over the past few years," said Slavin. "I believe that we have the right strategies, practices and creative energy to continue in this direction."

Paul Slavin

"I'm so proud of what Open Road Integrated Media is--a company that publishes and markets stories which entertain and illuminate readers around the world," Friedman said, adding: "I know that Open Road's authors, partners, and staff will work incredibly well with Paul. His experience in developing successful digital media companies, his business acumen, and his deep appreciation for media position him well to capitalize on the incredible growth that we've seen. And he's someone who understands the value of our books and authors."

Slavin told the Wall Street Journal that Open Road "has gotten itself to a level of importance and built a great catalog; my job is growing the company’s revenue at an expanded rate and give us a much larger footprint.  We’re generating a fair amount of revenue, with a growth curve on the rise, so this isn’t a turnaround. We need to manage to maximum effect.

Cynde Acanto, who launched Book Club Bookstore & More in Broad Brook, Conn., two years ago, plans to open a second location June 24 in Westfield, Mass. with co-owner Jessica Martin. MassLive.com reported that Martin originally got to know Acanto by participating in a Stephen King book club, and "as Acanto got ready to expand, she brought Martin on as a business partner for the new store."

"The store in Broad Brook is at 100 Main St.," said Acanto, who scouted several Westfield locations with Martin before selecting a 1,000-square-foot storefront at 2 Main St. "I guess we have a thing for Main Street."

She added: "You have a walkable downtown. People want to go out to someplace comfortable. Sit out and have lunch with a friend. Meet a new friend.... Book lovers want to go to a bookstore. They want to talk about books. If you have a bookstore, book lovers will go there because there are services they can't get anywhere else. They want to meet people. They want expert recommendations."

Martin said Westfield shows a desire for a bookstore, noting that as they have been setting up shop, people "keep poking their heads inside asking when the business will be open."

During the Hay Festival this week, the BBC has debuted its Love to Read campaign, a "rebranded incarnation of the BBC's year-long Get Reading campaign, launched at the end of last year, which aims to encourage people to read by recognizing the work of well-known authors," the Bookseller reported.

The promotion culminates in a #LovetoRead Weekend November 15-16, during which "BBC presenters from across all local, regional and network stations and channels will provide 'inspiration' for new reading material through their own recommendations, and presenters from local radio stations will do readings from their favorite books in their local libraries," the Bookseller wrote.

Partners in the campaign include the Society of Chief Librarians, the Reading Agency, the Scottish Library and Information Council, the National Literacy Trust, the Book Trust, the Scottish Book Trust, the Publishers Association and the Booksellers Association.

BBC director of Arts, Jonty Claypole said the campaign's goal "is to move reading further up our agenda; to include more people, let everyone have a say on the books that matter most to them and importantly inspire a new generation to love reading. We'll work with leading partners and use the BBC's full range of services--TV, radio and online, national and regional--to inspire the whole of Britain to join a unique national conversation about books."

Yang Jiang, a Chinese author, playwright and translator "whose stoically restrained memoir of the Cultural Revolution remains one of the most revered works about that period," died May 25, the New York Times reported. She was 104. Howard Goldblatt, the English translator of Six Chapters From My Life "Downunder", described the memoir as "deeply personal and broadly representative of the 'mundane' lives of intellectuals during that time."

During the mid-1960s, Yang was translating Don Quixote and "had completed almost seven out of eight volumes of the translation when Red Guard student militants confiscated the manuscript from her home in Beijing," the Times wrote. She and her husband were consigned to "reform through labor" and sent to the countryside in Henan Province, in central China. As the Cultural Revolution subsided, she returned to Beijing to work on Don Quixote. The Times noted that the "nearly completed draft that had been confiscated by Red Guards is said to have been discovered in a pile of scrap paper and returned to Ms. Yang. Published in 1978, it remains widely regarded as the definitive translation of Don Quixote in China."

Sue Little, owner of the Jabberwocky Bookshop, Newburyport, Mass., proudly shows off the new solar panels that will soon supply all the store's electricity.

Cooking the books? On its sidewalk chalkboard, Books & Books (Cayman) dished up a creative, if questionable, culinary bookish suggestion.

BookTrib's Matt Gillick highlighted some "independent bookstores you need to visit on a summer getaway," noting that in "a country of big corporations and homogenized megastores, the little shop down the street has become all too rare. Everywhere I go I try to find that bookstore where I can have my own little keepsake; My own memory of the places I've been to."

It's Okay to Laugh (Crying Is Cool Too) by Nora McInerny Purmort (Dey Street Books).

Tomorrow:
Live with Kelly: guest co-host Anderson Cooper, co-author of The Rainbow Comes and Goes: A Mother and Son On Life, Love, and Loss (Harper, $27.99, 9780062454942).

Meredith Vieira repeat: Tim Gunn, author of Tim Gunn: The Natty Professor: A Master Class on Mentoring, Motivating, and Making It Work! (Gallery, $25, 9781476780061).

The first photos have been released of Harry, Ginny and Albus Potter as they will appear in the London stage production of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child Parts One and Two. The four portraits feature actors Jamie Parker, Poppy Miller and Sam Clemmett. The play, written by Jack Thorne, is based on an original story by J.K. Rowling, Thorne & John Tiffany and premieres July 30 in London's West End.

At 12:01 a.m. ET on July 31, Scholastic is releasing the Special Rehearsal Edition of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child Parts One and Two (9781338099133) in print in the U.S. and Canada. The script e-book will be published by Pottermore simultaneously with the print editions by Scholastic in the U.S. and Canada, as well as Little, Brown in the U.K.

The winners of this year's Reading the West Book Awards, sponsored by the Mountains & Plains Independent Booksellers Association, are:

Adult fiction: Black River by S.M. Hulse (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt)
Adult Nonfiction: Ladies of the Canyons: A League of Extraordinary
Women and Their Adventures in the American Southwest by Lesley Poling-Kempes (University of Arizona Press)
Children's: A Series of Small Maneuvers by Eliot Treichel (Ooligan Press at Portland State University)

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The finalists have been announced for the £10,000 (about $14,490) Caine Prize for African Writing--sometimes referred to as the "African Booker." The winner will be named July 4. This year's shortlisted authors are:

Abdul Adan (Somalia/Kenya) for "The Lifebloom Gift"  
Lesley Nneka Arimah (Nigeria) for "What it Means When a Man Falls From the Sky"
Tope Folarin (Nigeria) for "Genesis"
Bongani Kona (Zimbabwe) for "At Your Requiem"
Lidudumalingani (South Africa) for "Memories We Lost" 

photo: Dave Hall

Rachel Howzell Hall is the author of the Detective Elouise Norton series. The third novel in the series is Trail of Echoes (Forge, May 31, 2016). Land of Shadows and Skies of Ash were included on the Los Angeles Times "Books to Read This Summer" for 2014 and 2015, and the New York Times called Lou Norton "a formidable fighter--someone you want on your side." A featured writer on NPR's Crime in the City series, Hall also served as a mentor in AWP's Writer to Writer Program and is a member of the Mystery Writers of America. She lives in Los Angeles with her husband and daughter.

On your nightstand now:

You mean other than the four remote controls, the Xbox game controller, the tube of hand lotion, the Fitbit charger and water bottle? In paperback, The Martian by Andy Weir. I'm almost done, swear! My e-reader's also sitting on my nightstand, and the stories I'm actively reading include The Road Out of Hell by Anthony Flacco and, once I'm finished writing my last draft of City of Saviors, I'll start The Cartel by Don Winslow. Reading Winslow right now as I'm writing would leave me feeling terribly inadequate.

Favorite book when you were a child:

So many books, how to choose? Okay, Charlotte's Web by E.B. White--I've read that beautiful story over and over again, and had the chance to enjoy it as my daughter read it for class. And in my mind, Paul Lynde will forever be the voice of Templeton the Rat.

Your top five authors:

Only five, huh? Okay. Stephen King, Toni Morrison, Dennis Lehane, Gillian Flynn and Ira Levin. Bonus: Paul Beatty. A little literary, a little horror and a lot of mystery.

Book you've faked reading:

I haven't faked--I'll just flat-out say, "Yeah, I tried but nooo...." That happens with all Jonathan Franzen novels for me. I just... can't. I think I've stopped trying. Oh. Wait. In college, I fake-read Finnegans Wake after barely making it through Ulysses. College. Good times. Anyway, life's too short to fake-read when there are so many thrilling books out there waiting for my eyes!

Book you're an evangelist for:

I think every writer everywhere should and must read Stephen King's On Writing. Praise him, praise him! The genius and everyman offers practical advice as well as insight about the writing life.

Book you've bought for the cover:

I barely remember the title because I bought it for the cover. Lemme Google... it was The Boy in the Suitcase by Lene Kaaberbøl. So pretty. So haunting. It's in my library and I'll get to read it someday (which is why I don't fake read--The Boy in the Suitcase is waiting for my eyes).

Book you hid from your parents:

I remember hiding Wifey by Judy Blume deep inside my backpack in junior high. I'd just consumed Forever, which had been taken away by one of my teachers--someone had underlined the naughty parts with orange ink. After that literary adventure of discovering words that I didn't know (and there was no Google back in 1982, and the Oxford Dictionary did not have, ahem, certain words in their pages), I hustled back to the library for my next Judy Blume fix.

Book that changed your life:

Nearly every book I start and finish changes my life, even if it's a molecular shift on my brain. A ridge becomes deeper. Still, the book that really affected me was It by Stephen King. That's when I realized I wasn't the only person in the world scared of both clowns and sewers. That story spoke to my fear. I was no longer embarrassed.

Favorite line from a book:

"Open your eyes and see what you can with them before they close forever." --from All the Light You Cannot See by Anthony Doerr

Five books you'll never part with:

They'll have to pry from my cold, dead hands Charlotte's Web by E.B. White, Into Thin Air by Jon Krakauer, Beloved by Toni Morrison, The Stand by Stephen King and Rabbi Jesus by Bruce Chilton.

Book you most want to read again for the first time:

I was vacationing on the Big Island in Hawaii when I opened All the Light We Cannot See by Anthony Doerr. And even with the beautiful ocean and volcanoes and drinks with little umbrellas, I didn't want to stop reading. Can't wait to read it again!

What you would be if you were good in math:

Glad you asked! I would be an astronaut--something about being way out there in Nothing-Something intrigues and terrifies me.

When 17-year-old River Dean gets dumped by his girlfriend, Penny Brockaway--while in a pedal boat on Echo Park Lake--he believes what he needs is a second chance. So, on his 10.2-mile walk home, when he spots a sign on a tattered awning in East L.A. that proclaims "A SECOND CHANCE," he's convinced that destiny is speaking to him: "Hey, you! River Anthony Dean! Seventeen-year-old nobody without a license or a girlfriend! Over here! This way!"

He walks through the door under that fateful awning and finds himself in an addiction support group for teens. But his problem, according to Penny, is that he doesn't think enough about things: "You just follow along and do what you think you're supposed to do. You don't even try to understand yourself and your issues...." Sure enough, by the time River leaves that first meeting, his apathy, confusion and a desire not to make an even bigger fool of himself has him tying himself up in knots of deception. Before he knows it, he's confessed to a marijuana addiction (not true).

River continues to pine for Penny, showing up at her house with soup and flowers and a hangdog face, and, at his peak of manipulation, with his adorable little sister, Natalie, who misses Penny, too. It's this obsession that keeps him lying to his friends and family and sneaking back to the support group in East L.A. on Saturday nights, where he meets the sharp, beautiful Daphne Vargas, a chronic shoplifter sorting out her own problems.

Predictably, River's fabrications and secrets turn into one big tangle of trouble. A crazy, messy coincidence links Daphne to Penny, and his mom and stepdad discover his "addiction," as well as his preoccupation with Googling the name of the father who abandoned him. It's time, as the support group leader, Everett, says in every meeting, to "Tell us something real. Tell us something true." Or, as River's best friend, Maggie, says, "What you need to do, River, is grow up."

In the witty, page-turning and poignant Tell Us Something True, Dana Reinhardt (The Summer I Learned to Fly; We Are the Goldens) skillfully captures the chaos of adolescence, and also the joy. Readers will groan as River's lies beget lies. But they'll also cheer him in his nascent grasps at change, especially during support group meetings when he's savvy enough to understand the parallels between pot addiction (however fake) and love:

"The problem isn't that you need weed, River," [Daphne] said. "It's why you need weed. So why? Why do you need weed?"
"...I just stared at the sidewalk and thought of Penny. 'I guess it's what made my life feel full. And without it....' "
"You're empty."

River's steadfastly wonderful relationships with his little sister and with his hilarious and long-suffering best friends offer reassurance to River and readers alike that redemption is possible, if not nigh. --Emilie Coulter, freelance writer and editor

Shelf Talker: In Dana Reinhardt's novel, 17-year-old River Dean buries himself--and everyone around him--in lies as he struggles with his issues of love and abandonment.