Art dealer and gallerist Larry Gagosian is buying BookHampton in East Hampton, N.Y. Owner Carolyn Brody, who bought the store and extensively renovated it in 2016, shared the "exciting news about the future" of the bookshop in her "Dear Reader" e-newsletter yesterday, noting: "As many of you know, last fall, I decided it was time for me to find the next steward of the bookstore...  it had been a childhood dream to open a bookstore, to live more deeply in the world of books and reading. I felt strongly that I couldn't live in a place without a bookstore. Indeed, I feel the same way today, perhaps more so. 

"I'm immensely proud of what we've accomplished together in the past nine years. I've been heartened by your support, well-wishes, and loyalty. Owning BookHampton has been one of the most satisfying and exciting experiences of my life. It has been an honor and a privilege to be part of this world."

Brody wrote that new owner Gagosian "is equally passionate about books and bookstores. He plans for the store to remain a general interest bookstore, although I am sure we can expect expanded offerings of art and design books! I feel confident that he will carry BookHampton into the future, while preserving and protecting its almost 50-year legacy. In Larry, I believe I've found someone who will bring energy, commitment, vision, and resources to ensure that BookHampton will remain an integral part of the dynamic East Hampton retail environment. I welcome him wholeheartedly and wish him much success!"

Gagosian, who has published art books via his gallery, told Page Six: "I have lived in Amagansett for 35 years and always loved the fact that Main Street in East Hampton had a wonderful independent bookstore. BookHampton is an important part of the community, and I felt it was crucial that it was preserved."

He told the East Hampton Star: "I'm not going to turn it into a Gagosian Gallery, by any means. There are a couple of things I'm going to change. I want it to remain relevant. It's still going to be run as a general interest bookstore, but I will be emphasizing more art books. East Hampton is a community where there are a lot of people who care about art. I want to bolster that part of the store."

Brody noted that she considers the ownership change "a win for the Village of East Hampton and the East End. In the face of strong market pressure, an independent bookstore will remain on Main Street. Not a small feat!"

The Next Chapter Bookstore celebrated its grand opening on May 1 at 404 Main St. in Williamsburg, Ky. The Times-Tribune reported that "from an overnight dream to reality, owner Katrina Henry aims to offer a cozy and creative space for readers and gift-lovers alike."

A local artist puts the finishing touches on The Next Chapter's window.

"One night, I told my husband this was what I wanted to do," Henry said. "And just about three weeks later, we made it happen."

In addition to books, the new shop features T-shirts, book accessories, and other gifts. The Next Chapter aims to be a gathering place for locals and visitors to connect through stories, creativity and community. 

"I wanted to bring something new to the area," said Henry. "I also wanted to create a spot for the community to come together."

In a Facebook post on opening day, the Next Chapter wrote: "We are beyond grateful and truly blessed to be part of such an incredible community! The outpouring of support you showed on our very first day was absolutely breathtaking. Thank you from the bottom of our hearts to everyone who came in--we couldn't have asked for a better start!"

The American Booksellers Association has announced the names of the authors and speakers who will appear next month at Children's Institute 2025 in Portland, Ore.

The group of keynote speakers includes Samira Ahmed, author of The Singular Life of Aria Patel; Mac Barnett, the 2025-2026 National Ambassador for Young People's Literature and author of Twenty Questions; em dickson, author of Beyond They/Them; Petra Lord, author of Queen of Faces; Claribel Ortega, author of the Witchlings series; Nate Stevenson, author of Scarlet Morning; Mychal Threets, author of I'm So Happy You're Here!; and Lee Wind, author of Like That Eleanor.

The complete list of speakers and authors can be found here.

The Authors Guild has drafted a petition urging Congress restore Shira Perlmutter to her position as Register of Copyrights and Director of the U.S. Copyright Office, from which she was abruptly fired last Saturday, just two days after the firing of Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden. 

Shira Perlmutter

Noting that Perlmutter is "a renowned expert with deep knowledge of the importance of copyright to authors," the Authors Guild said that in her place, "the White House is attempting to install an administration official with no apparent copyright expertise. The livelihoods of writers and other creatives are protected by copyright. Don't let the administration take over copyright policy--it's illegal and puts the very foundations of our creative economy at risk."

The petition reads, in part: "Register Perlmutter is an extremely well-respected, nonpartisan copyright expert who has ably carried out her statutory responsibility to provide unbiased advice to Congress on copyright law and policy. By firing such a highly qualified, respected, and effective Register, much less attempting to replace her with someone who has no expertise in the field, the Administration has improperly interfered in the functions of a nonpartisan Legislative Branch agency, one that operates under the direction of Congress, not the Executive Branch. It is a shocking, disrespectful abuse of authority. We strongly urge Congress to stop this attempted overreach and immediately restore Register Perlmutter to her position.... 

"Regardless of party, members of Congress should be deeply troubled by this action, which, if allowed to stand, will undermine public trust in the Copyright Office's independence for years to come. Moreover, it will give future administrations license to exert control over matters that the law places squarely within the domain of Congress. We implore you to act to reverse this unlawful power grab and reinstate Shira Perlmutter as Register of Copyrights."

Nahid Rachlin, an Iranian-born writer "who defied her parents' expectations of an arranged marriage, instead winning a scholarship to study in the United States in the 1950s and becoming one of the first Iranians to write a novel in English," died April 30, the New York Times reported. She was 85.

Rachlin's debut novel, Foreigner, published just before the Iranian revolution of 1979, "depicts the slow transformation of a 32-year-old Iranian biologist named Feri from a woman living a comfortable but unsatisfying suburban life with her American husband to an ill-at-ease visitor in Iran to an indistinguishable local after she abandons her job and her spouse and resigns herself to wearing the veil," the Times wrote. Her second novel, Married to a Stranger (1983), explored post-revolutionary Iran.

In a 1990 lecture, author V.S. Naipaul said that Foreigner, "in its subdued, unpolitical way, foreshadowed the hysteria that was to come" for Iran.

Her other works include two short story collections, Veils (1992) and A Way Home (2018), and three novels: The Heart's Desire (1995), Jumping Over Fire (2006) and Mirage (2024). Her last novel, Given Away, will be published next year.

In her memoir, Persian Girls (2006), Rachlin recalled that while attending college in Missouri, she discovered that even though she had escaped the "prison" of her home country, she felt utterly isolated in America. 

While still in Iran, she wanted her father to send her to the U.S. to attend college, like her brothers, but he refused. But political tensions were escalating and both her feminist teacher and the bookseller who sometimes slipped her banned literature had disappeared. Her father relented and allowed her to apply to Lindenwood University in St. Charles, Mo., on a full scholarship, "hoping his headstrong daughter would cause less trouble abroad--though not without stipulating that she return home after graduation to marry," the Times noted.

"Late at night I turned to my writing, my long-lasting friend," she wrote in her memoir. "Writing in English gave me a freedom I didn't feel writing in Farsi."

She majored in psychology and after graduating chose not to return to Iran, a decision that caused her father to not speak to her for 12 years. Rachlin moved to New York City, married and had a child, then eventually moved in the mid-1970s to Stanford, Calif., where, on a Wallace Stegner Fellowship, she worked on Foreigner.

Iranian censors blocked the novel's publication in Farsi. Her literary agent, Cole Hildebrand, said he believes that none of her books were translated into Farsi.

Independent Publishers Group will sell and distribute worldwide Kodama Tales, effective June 1.

Founded last year and launching this year, Kodama Tales, Los Angeles, Calif., specializes in bringing the best Japanese manga, both classics and new material, to English-speaking readers. Initial titles include the Baki series, which has sold more than 100 million copies in Japan, making it one of the bestselling martial arts manga series ever.

Kiyotaka Hirai, president of Kodama Tales, said, "For us in Japan, manga is more than entertainment. It's a deeply rooted part of our culture, offering not only joy and inspiration, but also valuable life lessons. We're excited to share this rich manga culture with readers around the world. Each title has been carefully selected and will be printed in Japan to ensure the highest quality."

Pierre Dubost, co-founder of Kodama Tales, added, "At Kodama, our goal is simple: publish exceptional manga with the quality and attention these works deserve. As readers ourselves, we care deeply about every detail, from production to translation to how a book feels in your hands. This launch is just the beginning, and we're excited for what's ahead."

"Read good books and ask hard questions." That was the recent sidewalk chalkboard message in front of Good on Paper Books & Stationery, Houston, Tex.

"Atticus is doing his best to stop Katie from putting together another book order," Finch & Fern Book Co., Sylvania, Ohio, posted on Instagram. "Why not just lie down right on top of the catalog? Pop into the shop to see the very ginger cat appropriate places Atticus likes to nap in!"

Katie McKee has been promoted to deputy director of publicity at Putnam. She started her career at Putnam 20 years ago as a publicity assistant.

Sunday:
NPR's Weekend Edition: Daniel Salmieri and Sophia Haas, authors of Next to Me (Rocky Pond Books, $19.99, 9780593462003).

Screenwriter Liz Maccie will adapt Bruce Schoenfeld's book The Match: Althea Gibson & Angela Buxton: How Two Outsiders--One Black, the Other Jewish--Forged a Friendship and Made Sports History into a film, according to the Hollywood Reporter. 

Tennis legends Venus and Serena Williams and half-sister Isha Price are set to executive produce the project, which is from 1Community, Access Entertainment, and Four Daughters. Emily Blavatnik and Danny Cohen will produce for Access Entertainment; Scott Budnick and Ameet Shukla will produce for 1Community, with Saúl Delcompare overseeing the project. Caroline Currier oversees the film for Serena Williams's Nine Two Six Productions.

Paul Reitter has won the 2025 Helen & Kurt Wolff Translator's Prize for his translation of Capital: Critique of Political Economy, Volume 1 by Karl Marx (Princeton University Press). Reitter receives $5,000 and a fully funded trip to the Frankfurt Book Fair.

Judges commended Reitter for having "achieved the near-impossible task of translating Capital, Volume 1, into what the Nation has lauded as 'crisp and contemporary' English. Our jury has marveled at Reitter's ability to retain the accuracy of the lengthy original, seemingly forbidding text, while rendering it an inviting and even humorous read. Together with editor Paul North, Reitter has brought us an extraordinary edition that also features a sweeping scholarly apparatus drawing on generations of scholarship and helping to make this new translation the definitive one for our era."

In addition, Juliane Scholtz is the winner of the Gutekunst Prize of the Friends of Goethe New York for her translation of a portion of Judith Kuckart's auto-fictional novel Die Welt zwischen den Nachrichten (The World Between the News).

Organized by the Goethe-Institut New York, the prizes are funded by Friends of Goethe New York with additional support from the Frankfurter Book Fair and the German Consulate General New York.

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The shortlist has been released for the £5,000 (about $6,650) Klaus Flugge Prize, which recognizes "the most promising and exciting newcomer to children's picture book illustration." The winner will be named September 11. This year's shortlisted illustrators are:

Emma Farrarons for My Hair Is as Long as a River, written by Charlie Castle
Mikey Please for The Café at the Edge of the Woods
Rhian Stone for Grandad's Star, written by Frances Tosdevin

photo: Lara Downie

Lizzy Barber is the author of psychological suspense and lives in London. She studied English at Corpus Christ College, Cambridge University, and has worked as an actress, in film development, and spent nearly 15 years as the head of brand and marketing for a restaurant group, working with her brother, a restaurateur. Her novel Out of her Depth was a Richard and Judy Book Club pick and has been optioned for television. Be Mine (Datura Books, May 20, 2025) is her fourth psychological thriller and a gripping ride about identity, manipulation, and the desperate desire to belong.

Handsell readers your book in 25 words or less:

New mother with a secret past. San Francisco wellness "cult" with a score to settle.

On your nightstand now:

I am right at the "crunch point" of Katherine Faulkner's latest thriller, The Break-In, which I was lucky enough to score a proof of! Katherine has such elegant prose and such an astute eye for character development; reading her books is always such a pleasure. This centers on a middle-class mother who accidentally kills a young man who breaks into her house, and presents such a compelling moral dilemma. It's out this summer, so it's one to add to your TBR!

Favorite book when you were a child:

I was that absolute cliché of an author as a child who hoovered up anything and everything that was available to me. I had very itinerant tastes and was as big a fan of Noel Streatfeild's Ballet Shoes and Enid Blyton's Malory Towers series (all quite prim British classics) as I was of Goosebumps and Point Horror. Philip Pullman's Northern Lights absolutely floored me at a young age and opened up my eyes to the worlds books can bring you to; it's something I'm really keen to develop in my children--that joy of taking your imagination on a wonderful journey.

Your top five authors:

I find Emily St. John Mandel's world-building out of this world. Abigail Dean is one of the smartest and most eloquent psychological suspense writers in the business. I always return to the Brontës (can I squeeze all three into one?) for the dark and the heart-wrenching; it always amazes me how fresh their stories still seem. Taylor Jenkins Reid turns anything she touches to gold. And then I have to pay homage to Patricia Highsmith, who is just the most excellent study of character, and was the inspiration for my second novel, Out of Her Depth.

Book you've faked reading:

Middlemarch by George Eliot. One of two or three "absolutely required" texts for my English degree. Forgive me but I couldn't get past the opening chapter, or the name Dorothea.

Book you're an evangelist for:

Jessica Knoll's Bright Young Women. One of my absolute favourites from 2024; it was such an intelligent and visceral take on the '70s serial killer narrative.

Book you've bought for the cover:

Butter by Asako Yuzuki. That creamy yellow cover. The simplicity of the perpendicular title. Add in a cow and a swipe of blood. So alluring.

Book you hid from your parents:

Forever by Judy Blume. Hi, fellow millennials!

Book that changed your life:

Without doing too much of a plug, I would have to say my debut novel, A Girl Named Anna. I mailed the opening chapters to a first novel competition on the last day of entries, then went on with the rest of my life, having absolutely no illusions of even being shortlisted. When my agent, Luigi, called to say that I'd won the competition, which included his representation and a published contract with Penguin Random House, I sank to the office floor and had to be prised off it. It completely changed the course of my life, and I wouldn't be talking to you now without it!

Favorite line from a book:

"Whatever our souls are made of, his and mine are the same" --Emily Brontë, Wuthering Heights

Cathy is such an imperfect, impudent, headstrong woman. This line guts me every time.  

Five books you'll never part with:

This one is very specific and very niche, but my collection of L.J. Smith's Nightworld series. I have been holding out hope that she'll publish the final book in the series since 1998.

The battered but signed copy of Philip Pullman's Northern Lights, lying in wait to read to my son.

The Crime Writer's Handbook by Douglas Wynn, which has an excellent glossary for ways to kill off your characters.

The Royal Shakespeare Company's Shakespeare: The Complete Works. I had a bit of a past life as an actress and was also a keen Shakespeare scholar at university. This is such a wonderful edition which includes fascinating insights into how the plays would have been performed at the time. My desert island book!

Kazuo Ishiguro's Never Let Me Go. This is one of those books I will reread again and again. So weird and wonderful and tragic and beautiful.

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

Gillian Flynn's Gone Girl--that midpoint twist was genre defining and I'd love to relive it.

Your books have taken readers from Florida to Florence, Cornwall to California. Why do you like setting books in different locations, and can you give us any hints as to where you might lead us to next?

I think I'm a very visual person and I really like to become immersed in the world I'm creating, so setting is a very big part of that. I like to get really under the skin of a location--the flora and fauna, the style of houses, where they'd eat, drink, play. Even if I've fictionalized a location, I'll pick a stand-in on Google Maps to get a sense of the streets, and flood myself with shows, books, or even just YouTube videos of the area to create a full sense of place. The book I'm currently writing is set in a fictionalized suburb in '90s Pennsylvania, and I'm enjoying the challenge of bringing that to life from 2020s London!

It's been said that friends are the family we choose. The difficulties sometimes posed by those choices are the subject of Hal Ebbott's debut novel, Among Friends, a sensitive, intelligent psychological drama that tests the ties of longtime friendships and plunges two families into crisis.

The novel begins in an idyllic setting, as Amos, a therapist, his physician wife, Claire, and their 16-year-old daughter, Anna, arrive at an upstate New York vacation home. The home belongs to Amos's college roommate and best friend of more than 30 years, Emerson, a lawyer, his wife, Retsy, and their daughter, Sophie, who is Anna's age. They've gathered on a gorgeous October weekend to celebrate Emerson's 52nd birthday. At this age, he both stands at the height of his powers and yet somehow can glimpse the first hint of decline over the horizon. It's a scene reminiscent of James Salter's Light Years, but the perfection of this serene outer world is undermined that weekend by an incident that's known only to two members of the collective at the time. How that incident becomes known to others and the implications of that knowledge propel the novel's second half.

As Ebbott patiently but determinedly reveals, the glittering surface of the "smooth, edgeless life" of privilege these characters inhabit conceals a set of relationships that are far more fragile than any of their participants can imagine. Amos and Claire's marriage is the result of a post-college introduction by Emerson. Amos grew up in financially straitened circumstances, while lifelong friends Emerson and Claire have always moved in the circles of the affluent and powerful. And yet, despite this seeming imbalance, the latter two have their own vulnerabilities that are exposed by this crisis. All of these elements coalesce in the characters' agonizing struggles with choices that may imperil not only the ties of long and deep friendships, but the very existence of their "dense, dependable" family lives.

Ebbott's prose is both elegant and seemingly effortless, and he displays a consistent talent for producing what Claire thinks of as Amos's gift for "easy, pretensionless metaphor." Thus Emerson's face "wore its age lightly, like dust," while a shrug that passes between Emerson and Claire evokes "two children who'd found a wallet and decided against trying to find its owner." The novel shifts perspective smoothly among its sextet of characters while maintaining its acuity in examining the desires and motivations of each. Among Friends is a sophisticated exploration of some fraught and challenging subjects that exerts an insistent pull on both the mind and heart. --Harvey Freedenberg, freelance reviewer

Shelf Talker: Enduring friendships are thrown into crisis by an incident that rocks the friends' beliefs about what those relationships truly mean.