"I continue to be astounded by the gnashing of teeth about Harry Potter discounts and how cheap the book is at some outlets. We have sold over 1,100 copies and fully expect to sell out the 1,500 we ordered by next week--all at full price. Independents cannot compete on price with outlets who thrive on loss leaders. We don't even try. Instead we offer a great party and an atmosphere that parents will happily bring their children to enjoy."--Steve Bercu, owner of BookPeople, Austin, Tex.

 

The American Booksellers Foundation for Free Expression is launching a campaign to promote books about free speech by selecting a title every month as its "ABFFE Book of the Month." The title will appear on its website and include a list of other pertinent newly published works. Commenting on the program, ABFFE President Chris Finan said, "Free speech is a hot topic in our country, and publishers are producing a growing number of important books on the subject. We want to help them get the attention they deserve."

The first ABFFE Book of the Month is Speechless: The Erosion of Free Expression in the American Workplace by Bruce Barry (Berrett-Koehler, $27.95, 9781576753972/1576753972). ABFFE describes the title this way: "Barry, a professor of management and sociology at Vanderbilt University and president of the American Civil Liberties Union of Tennessee, observes that contrary to what most Americans believe, they enjoy few protections for free speech on the job. The First Amendment bars censorship by government, not private parties, Barry notes. It is even legal for an employer to fire a person whose car sports a bumper sticker boosting the 'wrong' candidate. Barry believes that efforts to control employee speech are growing--both on and off the job." ABFFE is featuring an interview with Barry on its website.

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Bookselling This Week profiles A Thirsty Mind Words & Wines, Lakeway, Tex., founded by Pam Headrick, a retired archeologist and illustrator, and Anita Mapes, a retired nutritionist, in 2004. The 1,500-sq.-ft. store is near Austin and has become popular with locals. "Usually at around four o'clock, we have our regulars come in, and they have all kinds of philosophical, scientific, political, and religious discussions," Headrick said.

Wine and author events are a classic combination, she added, telling BTW, "We always make more money on wine than on selling books. It's just another hook, and it's been successful. Customers walk around with a glass of wine. It mellows them out, and they spend more money."

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BTW also has an update on the Book Vault, Oskaloosa, Iowa, which opened 18 months ago in a former bank. Among recent highlights: an appearance on Independence Day in the adjoining Smokey Row café by presidential hopeful Barack Obama. The store stayed opened, and the Senator signed every copy of his books.

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Patricia Kim has joined Labyrinth Books, New York, N.Y., as events coordinator and marketing director. In addition to "having grown up on the University of Chicago campus," Kim spent eight years working for the Seminary Co-op Bookstore, Chicago, Ill. She can be reached at Labyrinth Books, 536 W. 112th Street, New York, N.Y. 10025; 212-865-1588, ext. 11.

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A moving remembrance of Wesley Vincent, co-owner of Blue Eagle Book Shoppe, Albuquerque, N.M., was published in the Albuquerque Tribune. Vincent died of cancer on July 10. He was 50. "He was adamantly opposed to conventionality," said Mitch Rubin, his co-owner and partner.

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The Madison, Wis., Capital Times used the imminent closing of Star Books as a springboard to explore the challenges face by Madison's independent bookstore community.

"It's been horrible," said Russell Potter, who has worked at Star Books since it opened five years ago. "We tried to be the neighborhood bookstore, but maybe the neighborhood wasn't big enough."

Sandy Torkildson, co-owner of A Room of One's Own Feminist Bookstore, said, "We're hanging in there, but I wouldn't say it's outstanding. It's a struggle, but it's a struggle worth doing. It's sort of like being a farmer: You work harder and hope for the best."

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At the Huffington Post, Nicole Scherer defended librarians from that Hipper Crowd of Shushers featured recently in the New York Times: "Like many others, I found this to be simply more old news. As a librarian under 30, the idea of young and interesting people shaking up the perception of librarians is as outdated as thick stockings and sensible shoes."

And Lissa Warren cast her ballot for indies: "Despite the fact I tend to vote the donkey ticket in elections, there's one area of my life where I lean distinctly independent: bookstores."

 

Tom Campbell, co-owner of the Regulator Bookshop, Durham, N.C., offered the following thoughts on Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows in his newsletter, The Regulator Irregular:

"This is the last Harry Potter book, and it will quite likely be the last time in any of our lifetimes that people will line up, in the middle of the night, all across the country, and all across the world, to buy a book. To 'see what happens next' in a story. The only other time this has ever happened, as far as I know, was with Charles Dickens more than 150 years ago when crowds waited on the quays in New York for the ship carrying the latest installment of The Old Curiosity Shop to dock, calling out to the passengers and crew, 'Is Little Nell dead?'

"We don't yet know who is going to die in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, but we do know that more than a million Harry Potter readers are dead to the real significance of this event. These are the people who ordered their books from Amazon, and who at 12:01 a.m. Saturday, July 21, will be home asleep, waiting for the UPS delivery of their book the next day, or two days later, or whenever it arrives. They are indeed getting a great deal on the price of their book, but sometimes in life you get what you pay for. And sometimes you also get an experience that is truly priceless, a once in a lifetime kind of thing."

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The world of books will briefly run in a Harry Potter Time Zone next weekend, and we'll all reset our clocks accordingly. For example, Partners/West Book Distributing will have special hours for HP7 weekend, opening 10 a.m. until 4 p.m. on Saturday, July 21, and Sunday, July 22. Books will be available for pickup at the Partners/West warehouse in Renton, Wash. and the Northern California Independent Booksellers Association offices in San Francisco, Calif. 

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John Crace, London Guardian book reviewer, reflected on the hazards of "instant reviewing" and offered instead his pre-review of HP7: "The book will start with Harry making his way back to Hogwarts for his final year and his scar will be hurting. Ginny and Ron will be flirting a bit, while Harry tries to take himself seriously by almost swearing. There will be loads more unedited, not very interesting back story that should have been cut and there will be a 'terrifically, exciting denouement that I can't reveal as I don't want to spoil the plot in which two much-loved characters die.' Oh, and J.K. will make another fortune."

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An interactive retrospective on the "business of Harry Potter" is available at the Wall Street Journal.

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Redbery Books, Cable, Wis., has an exhibit of original artwork by Mary GrandPre, illustrator of the Harry Potter books. Bev Bauer, owner of Redbery Books, once worked as a school librarian. She had encouraged students to read Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, and asked GrandPre to visit the school. During her presentation, GrandPre sketched Harry Potter and Hermione, and now these poster-size, framed sepia, black and white charcoal drawings have been loaned by the school to Redbery Books for the exhibition, which runs from June 28 to July 22.

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Embargo breakers. The Toronto Globe & Mail reported that "All 300 Mac's Convenience Stores in the three prairie provinces and British Columbia have been denied permission to sell the newest, and last, installment of the popular Harry Potter series when Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows goes on sale July 21."

Jamie Broadhurst, vice-president of marketing for Raincoast Books, publisher and distributor of the series in Canada, did not name Mac's specifically, but said, "We have reviewed the security procedures with all our customers, big and small, and if we have concerns that the security of the novel can't be guaranteed, then we've made the tough decision not to ship for the on-sale date. . . . Security is our absolute, paramount concern."

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In a Christianity Today article headlined "When Harry Met Satan," Harry P. is reconsidered through the traditional lens of good versus evil: "So whether you're a Potter-Maniac or just a casual observer, remember the real battle you are in as a Christian, put on your armor, and fight in the power of God. I guarantee that if you do, the action/adventure of the Harry Potter series will pale in comparison!"

 

Today on the Today Show, Nancy Yi Fan discusses her new book, Swordbird (HarperCollins, $15.99, 9780061130991/0061130990).

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Tonight on ABC's 20/20: Elie Weisel, author of Night (Hill and Wang, $9, 9780374500016/0374500010), and Ishmael Beah, author of A Long Way Gone (FSG, $22, 9780374105235/0374105235).

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Tonight on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno: James Blake, author of Breaking Back: How I Lost Everything and Won Back My Life (HarperCollins, $25.95, 9780061343490/0061343498).

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Today on Fox & Friends: Marc Freedman, author of Encore: Finding Work That Matters in the Second Half of Life (PublicAffairs, $24.95, 9781586484835/1586484834).

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On Sunday on the Today Show: Andrea Arden, author of Dog-Friendly Dog Training (Howell Book House, $18.99, 9780470115145/0470115149).

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On Sunday on Meet the Press: Bill Engvall, member of the Blue Collar Comedy Tour, will discuss his new book, Just a Guy: Notes from a Blue Collar Life (St. Martin's, $19.95, 9780312362676/0312362676).

 

With a New England Puritan heritage, Mildred Armstrong Kalish's family was generally a somber lot--"Life was a serious challenge and they brooked few frivolities. They read the Bible, prayed every day, and entertained themselves by critiquing the minister's Sunday sermons." These were the folks who Mildred, her mother, and her three siblings grew up with in 1930s Iowa. When she was about five, her father was banished from the family for some unnamed trespass or character defect, the Depression was imminent, and so they moved in with her grandparents. In looking back on her life, she views that time as a gift: "Austere and challenging as it was, it built character, fed the intellect, and stirred the imagination." How all of that happened is the story the author tells in this delightful, salty and plain-speaking book.

Kalish calls her childhood a romp, but still, it was a difficult time for the household. The kids were under the surveillance of loving but strict grandparents. As for the grandparents, retired at last, they were now forced to raise another generation. And given the Depression years, their normally austere habits were imposed on the household with a vengeance. But time and experience have given Keith sympathy and understanding for her grandparents: "Two old people who had thought they were heading into a comfortable, if frugal, retirement . . . must have been scared to death."

When school was out, Mildred and her family left the grandparents' house for a farm in the country, and their lives expanded with this break. Farm chores created a sense of responsibility and also could be sheer fun, and Kalish revels in memories of gardens, animals, cousins and sun. She learned much from listening, usually to women, as they talked while they worked. Thrift and its virtues accounted for many of the sayings she learned: "She can throw out more in a teaspoon that he can bring in with a shovel." In the community there was quiet competition to see who could be the most thrifty, and recycling was a given.

Literature was seen primarily as useful for edification and for overcoming the "disability" of childhood, and reading was considered a privilege, a prize to be earned after doing chores. Religious influences abounded, including her Bible-quoting grandfather who had just one beef with Jesus: he turned water into wine. Kalish had a particular fondness for her Grand-Aunt Belle--a spinster who brought magic and delight into the children's world with picnics, Saturday nights making popcorn and fudge, games and riddles.

Depression-era Midwest life is laid out in fascinating detail, from medicine (which is best for drawing out a splinter, eggshell membrane or a piece of saltpork?), to the weekly washday routine, to farm food, complete with recipes (including marshmallows and Grandma's delicious shortcake recipe). Kalish writes about country schools, box socials (with a lesson in humiliation and social cruelty), and a near-tragedy collecting wood. Along with the horrors of Iowa winters, she lyrically describes the mesmerizing summer thunderstorms. "Transported, we would watch the great wall of rain advance slowly across the oat field, eagerly awaiting that brief moment when raindrops the size of plums pelted us. And then came the deluge, engulfing us in a gigantic drapery of rain."

Mildred Armstrong Kalish had an enviable childhood and the good fortune to grow up in a community where everyone knew each other, where she had the conviction that she had nothing to fear from people. "This atmosphere created in us a sense of security, a sense of belonging in the world. Is there a more valuable gift than that?"

We are fortunate that Kalish has shared her childhood and her wisdom with us.--Marilyn Dahl