For the rest of the week, we're taking a break to give thanks for many things, so this is our last issue until Monday, December 1. Enjoy the holidays, and may all booksellers have excellent Black Friday, Plaid Friday, Small Business Saturday, and Indies First celebrations! (On Sunday, we encourage all booksellers to send reports about Small Business Saturday and Indies First, with pictures if possible, to news@shelf-awareness.com.)
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Blackbird Books, Curiosities and Apothecary will soft open this Friday in Mansfield, Ohio, the Richland Source reported.
The store will sell new and used titles for all ages along with clothing, apothecary items, crystals, and other curiosities. Located at 34 W. 4th St., it is a sister store to Operation Fandom and Blackbird Records, which have multiple locations in Medina, Mansfield, and Wooster, Ohio and sell graphic novels, vinyl records, games, and a wide range of pop-culture related items.
One of the Operation Fandom/Blackbird Records stores is located at 36 W. 4th St., and in 2024 owners Bethany and Josh Lehman learned that the neighboring business was going to move. When one of their employees suggested that they expand next door, they initially thought it was "too much to take on," Bethany Lehman told the Richland Source, but they "couldn't stop thinking about it and decided it was meant to be."
Following the soft opening on November 28, the Lehmans plan to have a grand opening celebration at a later date.
Erin and Matt Clare are the new owners of Battery Park Book Exchange & Champagne Bar in Asheville, N.C. The Citizen Times reported that earlier this month, Donna and Thomas Wright, who founded the business more than 16 years ago, "handed over the keys of the Grove Arcade business" to the local entrepreneurs.
Noting that she had been working closely with the new owners to ensure an easy transition, Donna Wright said they are the right people to sustain the establishment's business model, while bringing something new. She added that the Clares are Asheville residents and "book people," who own Story Parlor, a multidisciplinary storytelling hub for narrative artists, in West Asheville. This played a significant role in the decision-making process.
"They have a real love for the place," Donna Wright said. "We seem to be on the same page with so many things. Anything (Matt) is talking about expanding or changing or doing, I'm on board with that, too. It's heading in the right direction, keeping the heart and soul to make it better.... We're so grateful that we had the opportunity to be an integral part of Asheville's history and its move forward. We have loved our customers and staff, and we look forward to being patrons there, which we plan to be frequently."
In 2020, Erin and Matt Clare relocated to Asheville from Austin, Tex., and a year later launched Story Parlor, which fosters storytelling and connection through events, classes, community-building efforts and advocacy. They had visited Battery Park Book Exchange & Champagne Bar early on and loved it.
"Part of the reason that we landed here and were attracted to the city was because we were familiar with all of these incredibly literary legends and authors and people making an impact on the scene," said Erin Clare, adding that they plan to work with other literary groups to promote Asheville as a literary hub.
"We feel like it's an opportunity to do something more aligned in support of the literary community and the Asheville community, in general," Matt Clare said. "It felt like one of those opportunities that would never come about again."
The Clares are planning to make some changes to the space, including opening up areas to allow additional seating, as well as designating the upstairs room for crafts such as writing, filmmaking, and music. In addition, the book inventory will shift from about 98% used to about 75% used and 25% new books, with more local authors featured.
"A lot of people are happy it's open," Matt Clare said. "It's been a warm greeting that we're local and in the community. And we are intentional about trying to make this a space for locals, who are our first patrons, and we'd love for this to be a space where tourists want to be."
Linda Letra Bilingual Books in Portland, Ore., and the FLIP Museum in Hillsboro, Ore., have launched a partnership for the holiday season. The Hillsboro Herald Community News reported that the bookshop, which specializes in Spanish and bilingual literature for children, will operate a pop-up store at the museum from Black Friday to New Year's Eve.
Rachel Kimbrow, the bookshop's owner, and museum executive director Jack Graham said they are hopeful the holiday pop-up will turn into a long-term partnership, supporting multilingual and Spanish literacy in conjunction with exploration, creativity, and fun found at the FLIP Museum.
Kimbrow, who has 20 years of classroom experience in both the U.S. and Latin America, founded Linda Letra Bilingual Books in 2022 as an extension of her dedication to equity through literacy. Her bricks-and-mortar location opened in 2023 at 7101 NE Glisan St. in Portland.
Crazy Story Books, an all-ages bookstore and community space, will open next year in Red Bank, N.J., Red Bank Green reported. Store owners and married couple Rachel and Max Luce have signed a lease for a 2,400-square-foot space in a newly renovated building at 42 Monmouth St. The Luces plan to host storytime sessions, book clubs, and other events, with Rachel Luce telling Red Bank Green they want the store to feel "like a community space that has more to offer than just selling books."
Luce explained that she'd always wanted to open a bookstore, and after being laid off from her previous job, she and her husband decided that "this is the time." And as soon as she saw the Monmouth St. space, she thought, "It's perfect."
Their target opening date is March 2026.
Barnes & Noble and entertainment giant A24 have begun a partnership under which A24 will have sections in select B&N stores that "brings the beloved studio's signature storytelling to life." The space will showcase A24's bestsellers along with new products that include A24 Books, Blu-rays, vinyl, collectibles, and exclusive merchandise.
The sections are opening now in nine B&N stores, including the flagship Union Square store in New York City and the B&N at the Grove at Farmers Market in Los Angeles. Other locations are in Portland, Ore., Orlando, Fla., Seattle, Wash., Bloomington, Minn., Oak Brook, Ill., San Antonio, Texas, and Troy, Mich. A24 sections will open in more B&N stores next year.
The partnership includes events like the recent launch of Eleanor Coppola's final memoir, Two of Me: Notes on Living & Leaving (A24), which featured an in-store conversation between Sofia and Roman Coppola, moderated by Vogue editor Keaton Bell.
Founded in 2012, A24 produces and distributes films, TV series, documentaries, music, books, and more. It has a library of more than 150 films and TV series. A24's distinguished list of films includes Lady Bird, Moonlight, Minari, Aftersun, Past Lives, Everything Everywhere All at Once, The Brutalist, Highest 2 Lowest, While We're Young, Materialists, and Uncut Gems.
Bill Castle, B&N's director of media, said, "Storytelling has always been at the heart of Barnes & Noble, and we're thrilled to partner with A24, the home for storytelling on screen. This partnership gives fans another way to experience the stories, films, and artists they love."
Barry Austin, founder of Colour Library Books in the U.K., died in September. He was 78. The Bookseller reported that Austin launched the company in the early 1980s in Guildford, and "grew Colour Library--which produced high-quality, value, glossy coffee table books sold directly to the consumer via agents into people's workplaces--to produce and sell these books into the trade all over the world."
The two divisions of the business later expanded with the acquisition of children's publisher Zigzag, stationery publisher Waverley, and IMC Video Ltd.
In a tribute, Caroline Ridding of Boldwood Books noted: "It didn't matter what job you had within the office, receptionist or publishing director, Barry always had time to make conversation or if you had a problem his door was always open. A true gentleman, who will be missed."
At Barrett Bookstore in Darien, Conn, journalist Dom Amore (l.) and UConn coach Jim Calhoun signed copies of their book More than a Game: How the UConn Basketball Dynasty Was Built on a Culture of Caring (Woodhall Press). Go, Huskies!
"Hello! Happy Thanksgiving week forecast!!" Sunbound Books in Fort Wayne, Ind., shared a video on Instagram highlighting the shop's holiday weekend special offers.
Posted yesterday on Instagram by Vanishing Ink Books in Hastings-on-Hudson, N.Y.: "Beat the crowds! We just opened and it's super chill, the best way to shop our store before holiday madness ensues. We're here today till 3:30 p.m., tomorrow from noon to 5 p.m., closed for Thanksgiving, and back at you on Friday from noon till 7 p.m.!"
Trish O'Neill has joined Macmillan as director, D2C marketing & ecommerce strategy, central marketing.
Tomorrow:
The View repeat: Brie Larson and Courtney McBroom, author of Party People: A Cookbook for Creative Celebrations (DK, $35, 9780593970027).
Also on the View: Karine Jean-Pierre, author of Independent: A Look Inside a Broken White House, Outside the Party Lines (Legacy Lit, $29.99, 9781538777084).
Friday:
The View repeat: Jonathan Karl, author of Retribution: Donald Trump and the Campaign That Changed America (Dutton, $32, 9798217047000).
Tamron Hall repeat: Mayci Neeley, author of Told You So (Simon & Schuster, $29, 9781668099926).
Sherri Shepherd Show: Rainn Wilson, co-author of Soul Boom Workbook: Spiritual Tools for Modern Living (Grand Central, $19.99, 9781538775547).
Book TV airs on C-Span 2 this weekend from 8 a.m. Saturday to 8 a.m. Monday and focuses on political and historical books as well as the book industry. The following are highlights for this coming weekend. For more information, go to Book TV's website.
Sunday, November 30
8 a.m. Susan Orlean, author of Joyride: A Memoir (Avid Reader Press, $32, 9781982135164), at Politics & Prose in Washington, D.C.
9:05 a.m. Anthony Kennedy, author of Life, Law & Liberty: A Memoir (Simon & Schuster, $30, 9781668052747). (Re-airs Sunday at 9:47 p.m.)
1:30 to 7 p.m. Coverage of the 2025 History Book Festival in Lewes, Del. Highlights include:
The American Library Association released the six-book shortlist for the 2026 Andrew Carnegie Medals for Excellence in Fiction and Nonfiction, awarded for the best fiction and nonfiction books written for adult readers and published in the U.S. The two medal winners, who each receive $5,000, will be named January 27. The shortlisted titles:
Fiction
A Guardian and a Thief by Megha Majumdar (Knopf)
The Unworthy by Agustina Bazterrica, translated by Sarah Moses (Scribner)
We Do Not Part by Han Kang, translated by e. yaewon and Paige Aniyah Morris (Hogarth/Random House)
Nonfiction
Baldwin, Styron, and Me by Mélikah Abdelmoumen, translated by Catherine Khordoc (Biblioasis)
There Is No Place for Us: Working and Homeless in America by Brian Goldstone (Crown)
Things in Nature Merely Grow by Yiyun Li (Farrar, Straus and Giroux)
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| photo: Chris Galloway | |
Rebecca Brown is the author of more than a dozen books, including a 1994 novel set during the AIDS crisis called The Gifts of the Body, and a 2021 book of essays about artists and the seasons called You Tell the Stories You Need to Believe. Obscure Destinies (Pilot Editions, November 11, 2025), the 17th book in the Fellow Travelers Series, gathers four distinct forms--a story, a memoir, a play, and an essay--to bear on how the living cope with the dying of people they love. Brown's new memoir, My Animal Kingdom (FrizzLit Editions, December 6, 2025), tells her life story through her relationships with wild and domesticated animals.
Handsell readers your book in 25 words or less:
I rescued a squirrel my cat dragged in, and it changed my life. My Animal Kingdom tells that story. Plus my friendships with cats, otters, birds, monkeys.
On your nightstand now:
Mice 1961 by Stacey Levine, Broken Utopia by Ryan Boudinot, and Nobuko by Trisha Ready, three books by Seattle friends, each fantastic in their own way--formally inventive but in a sensible way, not in a look-how-weird-I-can-be way, and emotionally resonant and moving. Great stuff.
Favorite book when you were a child:
Rascal by Sterling North, a book about a raccoon that befriends a family.
Your top five authors:
Franz Kafka, Virginia Woolf, Samuel Beckett, Julian of Norwich, Gertrude Stein (mostly the prose, though). Can I please have one more? Willa Cather. I mean two or three more... Mary Shelley, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville.
Book you've faked reading:
James Joyce's Ulysses. I don't know that I have ever said, "I read this book," but I have nodded along knowingly when others discussed it in college. I didn't even try to get near Finnegans Wake. Though I love Dubliners.
Book you're an evangelist for:
William Goyen, The House of Breath. He was from the East Piney Woods in Texas and an amazing stylist. Sometimes almost incantatory and sometimes wonderfully beautifully bizarrely otherworldly. Like with strange human-angel creatures arising from fields and houses talking to their story. Also, stories about chickens.
Book you've bought for the cover:
Kathryn Davis, The Girl Who Trod on a Loaf, and it turned out to be a magnificent book, and now Davis is one of the contemporary writers I admire most. Her prose is incredible, her sense of being between worlds, her strange compelling characters. A truly great American writer.
Book you hid from your parents:
Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex* (*But Were Afraid to Ask) by David Reuben. Maybe I actually didn't hide it from my parents, as I read it with my neighbor from a few houses down the street, Susan Robinson, at her house, secretly from both our parents, as we tried to figure out what sex was all about. I think we were in seventh grade? Shortly thereafter she got a nice boyfriend. I did not.
Book that changed your life:
Shakespeare's King Lear. I went into reading it a fundamentalist Christian and came out of it... no longer a fundamentalist.
Favorite line from a book:
"I can't go on, I'll go on." --Beckett, The Unnamable
Five books you'll never part with:
Woolf, To the Lighthouse
Beckett, Waiting for Godot
Stein, The Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas
Kafka's Collected Works
Shelley, Frankenstein.
Book you most want to read again for the first time:
Marilynne Robinson, Housekeeping.
Anything you would like to add:
Can I say how much I love Melville and the Beatles and Built to Spill and this band I just started listening to from the Sahara called Terakaft. Amazing. Also, Japanese pop from the '60s. How pop music, classical, and jazz too, I guess, are things I have "read" or at least they have made my thinking and feeling and being as much as books have. I can't imagine how I would have approached reading deeply without having listened deeply, read the old liner notes to album when I was a teen and preteen, how I loved and studied what the music and words did, and the artists who made the music, how alive they were.
Selected new titles appearing next Tuesday, December 2:
House of Day, House of Night: A Novel by Olga Tokarczuk, translated by Antonia Lloyd-Jones (Riverhead, $28, 9780593716380) follows the eccentric inhabitants of a remote Polish village.
The Award: A Novel by Matthew Pearl (Harper, $30, 9780063445277) is a satirical thriller about an aspiring writer desperate for success.
A Long Game: Notes on Writing Fiction by Elizabeth McCracken (Ecco, $26.99, 9780063375291) explores the art of fiction writing.
In the Arena: Theodore Roosevelt in War, Peace, and Revolution by David S. Brown (Scribner, $31, 9781668204191) is a biography of the country's 26th president.
The Tower and the Ruin: J.R.R. Tolkien's Creation by Michael D.C. Drout (W.W. Norton, $35, 9781324093886) combines scholarship and memoir to reflect on 50 years of reading and studying Tolkien.
Every Day I Read: 53 Ways to Get Closer to Books by Hwang Bo-reum, trans. by Shanna Tan (Bloomsbury, $27.99, 9781639737796) is a memoir about the love of reading books.
American Canto by Olivia Nuzzi (Avid Reader Press, $30, 9781668209851) is a memoir by the reporter who had an affair with RFK Jr.
Canticle: A Novel by Janet Rich Edwards (Spiegel & Grau, $30, 9781966302056) is historical fiction about a teenage girl in 13th-century Bruges.
Silent Bones by Val McDermid (Atlantic Crime, $28, 9780802164391) is the eighth murder mystery with Scottish Detective Chief Inspector Karen Pirie.
Crowntide by Alex Aster (Amulet, $24.99, 9781419785719) is book four in the YA fantasy Lightlark Saga.
Better in Black by Cassandra Clare (Knopf, $24.99, 9798217225705) is a YA anthology of 10 different Shadowhunter romances.
Gabby Torres Is the Best Winner Ever by Angela Dominguez (Roaring Brook, $12.99, 9781250901392) is the second title in the Gabby Torres early chapter book series.
Paperbacks:
The Bodyguard Affair by Amy Lea (Berkley, $19, 9780593641781).
Cells: The Illustrated Story of Life by Christian Sardet and Eric Karsenti (The Experiment, $29.95, 9798893030839).
The Gallagher Place: A Novel by Julie Doar (Zibby Publishing, $17.99, 9798992377002).
The Orchard: A Novel by Peter Heller (Vintage, $18, 9798217008445).
The Complete Anti-Inflammatory Cookbook: Optimize Health, Boost Your Immune System, Promote Longevity by America's Test Kitchen (America's Test Kitchen, $35.99, 9781954210097).
From last week's Indie bestseller lists, available at IndieBound.org, here are the recommended titles, which are also Indie Next Great Reads:
Hardcover
Flat Earth: A Novel by Anika Jade Levy (Catapult, $26, 9781646222810). "Levy uses her acidic wit to reduce the pure meaning out of our cultural moment. Flat Earth is the cleanest satirical snapshot of the New York downtown scene; here are people I know, places I've seen." --Conor Hultman, Book Culture, New York, N.Y.
Hardcover: An Indies Introduce Title
Black-Owned: The Revolutionary Life of the Black Bookstore by Char Adams (Tiny Reparations Books, $32, 9780593474235). "Black-Owned is a timely and essential work that feels deeply personal to me as a Black bookstore owner. A must-read for anyone interested in entrepreneurship, history, or the vital role of independent bookstores in our communities." --Natalie Pipkin, Black Worldschoolers Mobile Bookstore, Indianapolis, Ind.
Paperback
The Bridesmaid: A Novel by Cate Quinn (Sourcebooks Landmark, $17.99, 9781464245701). "I am obsessed with this story, from the high society celebrity wedding to the forensic attorney solving the crime. I love a book that keeps me glued to the page, and Cate Quinn delivers that from the first chapter." --Beth Seufer Buss, Bookmarks, Winston-Salem, N.C.
Ages 4-8
The Old Sleigh by Jarrett Pumphrey and Jerome Pumphrey (Norton Young Readers, $18.99, 9781324054122). "The Old Sleigh is a tale of family, a celebration of movement, a story of changing and staying the same. Beautiful illustrations highlight a delightfully cozy tale." --Rae Ann Parker, Parnassus Books, Nashville, Tenn.
Ages 7-10
Xolo by Donna Barba Higuera, illus. by Mariana Ruiz Johnson (Levine Querido, $19.99, 9781646147021). "Xolo is a great addition to anyone's shelf. Mariana Ruiz Johnson's illustrations really bring the story to life. I love mythology AND Donna Barba Higuera, so Xolo is a double win in my book." --Kalli King, Rediscovered Books, Boise, Idaho
Ages 16-18
Seven Deadly Thorns by Amber Hamilton (Bloomsbury YA, $24.99, 9781547616596). "Amber Hamilton has created a captivating dark academia romance where magic is not a gift but a deadly curse. The enemies-to-lovers relationship between Viola and Roze isn't based on misunderstanding or power struggles, but is driven by survival--a much stronger motivation than usual." --Natasha Birham, 192 Books, New York, N.Y.
[Many thanks to IndieBound and the ABA!]
Starred Children's Review: Frog
Frog: A Story of Life on Earth by Isabel Thomas, illus. by Daniel Egnéus (Bloomsbury Children's Books, $19.99 hardcover, 48p., ages 5-8, 9781547618200, January 13, 2026)
Frog: A Story of Life on Earth is the third absorbing, flawless nonfiction picture book collaboration between author Isabel Thomas and illustrator Daniel Egnéus (Moth; Fox), this time linking the evolution of frogs to the origins of the universe.
A child with a net wades through "a pond full of jelly-like eggs" that will one day grow legs and become "frogs that lay eggs of their own." The ensuing chicken-and-egg question--"if frogs come from eggs, and eggs come from frogs, where did the first frog come from?"--proves the perfect jumping-off point for a journey back in time. The text reverses to a period before frogs and people, all the way "back to the beginning" when time began, and then back even further to when "everything that is, was, and ever will be was squashed together in a superheated speck too tiny to imagine."
That speck expands with a Big Bang to become the universe, "still small enough to hold in your hands" and "fizz[ing] with energy." But "there were no frogs yet." Time begins with new "tiny specks of stuff" that appear, "dashing and veering, colliding, disappearing," as the universe cools and forms atoms. The atoms gather into huge, hot clouds and create even bigger atoms. Billions of years later, these first stars explode, and their stardust is "the stuff that forms new stars and planets." Included in this star-stuff is Earth, a planet with a "not too hot, and not too cool" surface that collects rain "in dips and dents." In one pond "something spectacular" happens. Chemicals form the first cell, which multiplies and evolves into larger forms of life, "from sponges to sea squirts to fish that laid eggs," and from there into "the ancestors of every animal with four limbs," amphibians, including frogs.
Thomas expertly distills massive ideas into tangible facts in a dynamic text that wisely includes both a child stand-in and repeatedly returns to frogs as the touchpoint for exploring the universe. Egnéus's mixed-media illustrations are striking, featuring over-saturated colors and shapes that exude energy and motion. The art is so inventive and nearly neon that it demands viewers' attention. Back matter tells "the [greatly abridged] Story of Everything" in one final supplementary spread offering a bit more context. This clever, fascinating approach to evolution is told through the undeniably child-friendly lens of frogs, who are, clearly, nothing less than "the story of the universe." --Lynn Becker, reviewer, blogger, and children's book author
Shelf Talker: Dynamic and captivating, Frog: A Story of Life on Earth links the evolution of frogs with the origins of the universe.
