Cool idea of the day. (But on Valentine's Day, maybe it's a warm idea.) This morning the Harvard Book Store, Cambridge, Mass., announces the winners of its "I Heart Harvard Book Store" contest, in which customers were asked to "share your story of the love you found (or lost) in the aisles of a bookstore, be it with a person, an author, a fictional character or even a beautiful, elegant, life-changing idea." Submissions may be read on the store's Web site.

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Here's another sweet story for Valentine's Day: the State profiles Literary Sweets, a combination book and chocolate-candy store in Columbia, S.C., which at two years of age has moved from a 150-sq.-ft. location to one with 1,301 square feet of space. Owner Shennice Pruitt said the store combines "two of my favorite things" and is "geared toward women." She added, "Cooking brings people together. Food is intimate."

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We've learned that there is more than one Bush countdown clock. We now count two. Backwards Bush has the oldest, launched just before the president's second inauguration in January 2005. Check out the company's Web site, which has a clock (705 days to go) and information about the key chain (retail price: $8.99), desk clocks ($19.99), T-shirts ($19.99-$21.99), wall clocks ($119.99), downloadable screen savers (free) and more. The company sells to stores; for more information about ordering, e-mail retail@backwardsbush.com.

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Homage to the 16th president: the Abraham Lincoln Bookstore in Port Isabel, Tex., celebrated Lincoln's birthday with the viewing of a long-lost 1915 film about Lincoln shot by Thomas Edison commissioned by the state of Illinois in honor of the 50th anniversary of Lincoln's assassination, according to the Brownsville Herald.

The store, owned by Hank and Wanda Boughter, served cookies, popcorn and malt cider during the event. 

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The Spring Book Show, the bargain and remainder book show that will be held in Atlanta, Ga., Fri.-Sun., March 23-25, will draw more than 700 buyers and 100 dealers, who will offer more than 50,000 book titles. The Show is again coordinating with the Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance, which will offer educational sessions on Friday and Saturday.

SIBA panels include:

• E-mail Newsletters & Marketing for Busy Booksellers
• Using Above the Treeline Software
• Above the Treeline--Advanced Users Group
• Making Your Bookstore More Profitable with Used Books & Remainders (led by veteran used and remainder bookseller Gayle Shanks of Changing Hands Bookstore, Tempe, Ariz.).
• Making Your Bookstore More Profitable with Gift Items (also led by Shanks)
  

In addition, SIBA is holding a resource roundtable breakfast featuring nine seasoned bookseller who will discuss merchandising, remainder buying, book clubs, creating community events, using talk radio: The Book Report, author events, creative advertising and getting the most out of SIBA. 

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Kalen R. Landow has joined Chelsea Green Publishing Co.'s Golden, Colo., office as communications director. She was formerly executive director of the Publishers Association of the West and earlier worked at the Tattered Cover Bookstore, Ingram and several Colorado publishers.

At Chelsea Green, she will be responsible for "developing and implementing a communications strategy that reflects Chelsea Green's mission and history of successful independent publishing, focusing on the company's strong relationships with both media and leaders in the political, environmental, and sustainable arenas."

The publisher has been busy in 2007. Already this year Chelsea Green, whose headquarters are in White River Junction, Vt., opened its Colorado office and launched an in-house sales force.

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At the end of April, the Borders at 1123 N. Milwaukee Rd., Boise, Idaho, will move into a 22,342-sq.-ft. space in the Boise Town Square at I-184 and Franklin Rd. At the same time, the 3,890-sq.-ft. Waldenbooks in the Boise Town Square will close.

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Ross Womack has been named v-p of global transportation for Ingram Book Group, succeeding Shawn Everson. Womack joined Ingram 10 years ago and was formerly director of transportation for Ingram Book Group. He earlier worked for MagneTek and FedEx. 

 

Directed by Michael Apted (the director of Coal Miner's Daughter and the 7 Up, 14 Up, etc., series), Amazing Grace opens a week from Friday, February 23. The movie tells the story of William Wilberforce, Olaudah Equiano and the anti-slavery movement in Britain--and the genesis of the song of the title. Amazing Grace features Ioan Gruffudd as Wilberforce, signer Youssou N'Dour as Equiano, Albert Finney and Ciaran Hinds.

Although not an official tie-in, Bury the Chains: Prophets and Rebels in the Fight to Free an Empire's Slaves by Adam Hochschild (Mariner, $16, 9780618619078/0618619070) covers the same ground.

This morning on the Early Show, Terrence Real outlines The New Rules of Marriage: What You Need to Know to Make Love Work (Ballantine, $24.95, 9781400064014/1400064015).

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This morning's Book Report, the weekly AM radio book-related show organized by Windows a bookshop, Monroe, La., has the theme Love in the Ruins and features two interviews:

• Matt Haig, author of The Dead Fathers Club (Viking, $23.95, 9780670038336/0670038334). (See Marilyn Dahl's review of this title below!)
• Christopher Moore, author of You Suck (Morrow, $21.95, 9780060590291/0060590297).
  

The show airs at 8 a.m. Central Time and can be heard live at thebookreport.net; the archived edition will be posted this afternoon.

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Today the Martha Stewart Show chats with Jennifer Weiner and Jane Green. Weiner's most recent book is The Guy Not Taken: Stories (Atria, $24.95, 9781416535201/1416535209) and Green's is the novel Swapping Lives (Viking, $24.95, 9780670034802/0670034800).

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On today's 700 Club, Tricia Cunningham and Heidi Skolnik discuss The Reverse Diet: Lose 20, 50, 100 Pounds or More by Eating Dinner for Breakfast and Breakfast for Dinner (Wiley, $24.95, 9780470052297/0470052295).

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Today on the Rachael Ray Show, Stacey Ballis offers tips for last-minute Valentine's Day gifts. Ballis's most recent novels are Room for Improvement (Berkley, $13, 9780425209820/0425209822) and The Spinster Sisters (Berkley, $14, 9780425213568/0425213560), on sale March 6.

Also on the Rachael Ray Show, Dr. Timothy Brantley discusses The Cure: Heal Your Body, Save Your Life (Wiley, $24.95, 9780471768258/0471768251).

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Today the Diane Rehm Show hooks up with Virginia Vitzthum, author of I Love You, Let's Meet: Adventures in Online Dating (Little, Brown, $23.99, 9780316057844/0316057843).

Also today on the Diane Rehm Show: Dr. Sharon Moalem, author of Survival of the Sickest: A Medical Maverick Discovers Why We Need Disease (Morrow, $25.95, 9780060889654/0060889659).

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Today the Montel Williams Show hears from Jen Schefft, reality TV star and author of Better Single Than Sorry: A No-Regrets Guide to Loving Yourself and Never Settling (Morrow, $21.95, 9780061228070/0061228079).

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Today on NPR's Day to Day and Here & Now, Daniel Jones shares stories from Modern Love: 50 True and Extraordinary Tales of Desire, Deceit, and Devotion (Three Rivers Press, $14.95, 9780307351043/0307351041).

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Tonight on the Daily Show with Jon Stewart: Ishmael Beah, author of A Long Way Gone: Memoirs of a Boy Soldier (FSG, $22, 9780374105235/0374105235).

 

Rodney Jones, a professor of English at Southern Illinois University and author of the collection Salvation Blues (Houghton Mifflin), has won the $100,000 Kingsley Tufts Poetry Award, according to today's New York Times. The award is presented annually "for a work by an emerging poet, one who is past the very beginning but has not yet reached the acknowledged pinnacle of his or her career."

Eric McHenry has won the Kate Tufts Discovery Award for Potscrubber Lullabies (Waywiser Press) and receives $10,000. The awards are administered by the Claremont Graduate University.

 
Eleven-year-old Philip Noble's father was killed in an automobile accident, and as the novel opens, the boy is quite startled to see his dad appear as a blood-stained ghost at his own funeral. Philip is the only one who can see or hear him and discovers that his dad has become a member of The Dead Fathers Club, which consists of fathers who have been murdered. Dads Ghost explains that his brother, Uncle Alan, cut the brake lines in his car because the uncle wants both Philip's mother and the family pub, the Castle and Falcon. He further explains that the only people who end up as ghosts are murdered; all ghosts get the Terrors; the Terrors stop only when ghosts stop being ghosts, and that happens only when the murderer is killed. If his death is not avenged, he will spend eternity in the Terrors. The catch: the revenge has to take place in No Time, which in Dads Ghosts case is 11 weeks. This is a tall order for a young lad who's not particularly adept at sports.
 
Philip is a slightly nerdy boy, not too popular at school, with a grand imagination. He loves history, particularly Roman history, and often imagines Roman scenes. During a field trip to Hadrian's Wall, "[He wonders if] Emperor Hadrian was murdered and if he ever comes back to see what is left of the wall and if he gets sad when he sees just lumps of stone in the ground with grass growing over them and a few people walking with maps and looking at them and wanting to go home." He isn't afraid of his father's spectre but is worried about his ability to follow his father's directions and kill his uncle. He's game, though, and when Dads Ghost persuades Philip to steal the keys to a teacher's minivan to hurry home to warn his mum that trouble was coming to the pub, Dads Ghost tells him how to shift and steer, but he gets caught before he can get far. Dads Ghost then guides Philip in helping his mum when the pub does get smashed up, and later leads him through a rugby game at school. In the meantime, Uncle Alan makes inroads--he brings karaoke to the pub and convinces Philip's mother to marry him. The pressure on Philip increases as time begins to run out, but all his plans to kill Uncle Alan seem hopeless until he gets a few ideas in chemistry class.
 
Matt Haig's prose is quirky, with no apostrophes, liberal use of capital letters, and some creative typesetting. He captures Philip's young voice with its innocence and acceptance of a new reality. When Philip asks his father if there are any Romans in The Dead Fathers Club,
 
"Dads Ghost said Romans?
I nodded my head and said Roman soldiers?
He said No but theres a Victorian.
I said Oh."
 
Haig has a deft descriptive touch. A church "smelt of God which is the smell of old paper." When Philip reluctantly answers Uncle Alan, "In an invisible ice cube out of my mouth I said Yes."
 
Philip negotiates a way between anger and pain, bewildered by his mother's capitulation to Uncle Alan, while being visited by an increasingly insistent ghost. He experiences his first romance and deals with well-meaning teachers, along with school bullies, a bit of shoplifting, a suicide attempt and tranquilizers. Jacket copy alert: The Dead Fathers Club can be described with many superlatives, but it's not "incredibly funny." It is, however, a poignant, original, often charming story of a boy struggling in sorrow and misery with all his heart.--Marilyn Dahl
 

Anne Laird is adjusting to her new role at the Town Book Store in Westfield, N.J.: being the boss. Laird worked at the store part-time for six years before purchasing the business from Grace Roth, who had owned it for a decade.

Along with a change in ownership, the Town Book Store has a new location. Customers should have no trouble finding the shop, though, which is across the street from the building where it was previously housed. A steep rent increase necessitated the move, and the bookstore is now situated in a former library built in 1906, one of the many funded by Andrew Carnegie.

Other retailers in the building are an antiques stores and a dress shop. The proprietor of the dress shop, Felice Cohen, owns the building and was instrumental in making it possible for the bookstore to remain in town. Cohen offered a rent "that we can live with," said Laird, and she also held the space for several months while the Town Book Store was in transition. "She has been a literary godsend," Roth said of Cohen, whose late husband was a strong supporter of small business.

The change of venue is a chance for a fresh start for Laird, who admits that her current vocation is an unexpected one. When Roth announced last summer that she would be selling the store to spend more time with her family, Laird was disappointed at the thought of losing a job she enjoyed but did not consider pursuing it further--until the evening she was out for a stroll with her husband, who brought up the possibility of her buying the store. "It didn't enter my mind that it would be something I could fit into my life," said Laird, a lifelong Westfield resident and a mother of three. "I'm the kind of person who needs time to adjust to an idea," she added, but after mulling it over and discussing it with Roth, she "decided to go for it."

Aside from her personal interest in having the store remain open, Laird didn't want to see the community lose a vital resource. Many independent retailers in Westfield have been replaced with chain stores like Ann Taylor, Gap, Williams-Sonoma, Eileen Fisher and Express, leading to what Roth described as a "mall town." The Town Book Store has been a fixture in Westfield for more than 70 years, and Laird is the store's sixth owner.  

Laird and Roth, who is staying on two days a week at the store, worked to make the transition seamless for customers. The day after Roth closed up shop in the old location, Laird opened the doors to the store's new space on January 6. "Opening day was phenomenal," said Laird, who was unsure whether to attribute the enthusiastic response to excitement about the store staying in town or to the balmy 72-degree weather. "We had people waiting in line to check out," she said, "which usually only happens at Christmas time." For the opening day festivities, Laird provided refreshments and raffled off gift baskets. Themed baskets included a selection of kids books, a copy of an Andrew Carnegie biography and 1,001 Books You Must Read Before You Die along with tomes from the list.

Customers seem unfazed about the behind-the-scenes changes, Laird said. "People love the switch in roles," she continued. "They think it's fun." What is stopping customers in their tracks is the store's new look. "They walk in the door," said Laird, "and their mouths drop open." Why such a dramatic reaction? Although the size of the store decreased by about 25 square feet, it has a much different layout. The previous location was a long, narrow space with windows at only the front and back of the store and nowhere to sit. The shape of the current site "is more of a square," said Laird, with an abundance of windows. A reading room with leather seating offers a respite for shoppers, and a children's area has a table and chairs.

Title selection has remained largely the same; Laird kept three-quarters of Roth's inventory and has supplemented it. "One of the biggest challenges is trying to figure out what to bring in the store," she said. "With only 1,200 square feet you can't be indiscriminate about what you bring in."

Laird hasn't missed a beat holding in-store events, and a packed line-up for February and March includes appearances by Annie Modesitt, co-author of Men Who Knit & the Dogs Who Love Them; Jeff Markowitz, author of A Minor Case of Murder; and Arlene Matthews, author of Getting in Without Freaking Out: The Official College Admissions Guide for Overwhelmed Parents. Laird recently had a new computer system installed with Anthology software, and in the coming months she plans to revamp the store's Web site and "News and Notes" newsletter.

There's one more thing on Laird's to-do list--watching You've Got Mail. Customers have been comparing the Town Book Store to the shop owned by Meg Ryan's character in the movie. "I know I saw it years ago," said Laird, "but obviously at the time I had no idea what my future was going to be."--Shannon McKenna

The Town Book Store is located at 270 East Broad St., Westfield, N.J.; 908-233-3535; the store's Web site is www.townbookstore.com.