The wave of protests across the U.S. over the weekend against ICE tactics generally, as well as the tragic January killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretti in Minneapolis, continue to resonate in the book world. 

Literati Bookstore, Ann Arbor, Mich., posted on Instagram that it was closed on Sunday because of the storm, adding, "Stay safe and perhaps read a great book like George Orwell's 1984, which includes poignant and relevant quotes such as, 'The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.' "

Print: A Bookstore in Portland, Maine, another city invaded by ICE last week, is highlighting "Resisting ICE" books, which include a range of nonfiction, fiction, and poetry about the history of immigration, deportation, resisting deportation, organizing, and more.

Another Portland bookseller, Back Cove Books, posted on Instagram last week: "Not the merch we expected to drop this year, but FREE WHISTLES are here! We are hell bent on sharing our resources in all the ways we can to help protect our community and neighbors."

WordHaven BookHouse, Sheboygan, Wis., posted on Instagram on Saturday "ways to be advocates": 

• Look for observer trainings if you feel able.
• Educate yourselves.
• Record everything you see when ICE is present.
• Report their presence to local/state watch groups.
• Blow your whistles.
• Help your neighbors and community members get what they need to survive.
• Hold space for what people are feeling.
• Give people rides home after being released from detention centers.
• Share credible information/stay informed.
• Check in on your people.
• Connect/process with yourself and others: Emotional health is important.

Christina Ward of Feral House is offering booksellers, record stores, and activists "winter whistles" that can be used to warn people when ICE and other federal agents are in an area. Ward called the whistles "useful tools that help people feel like they can do and be a part of something." Among the stores distributing the whistles, with the phrase "This machine kills fascists," are Extreme Noise in Minneapolis and White Bear Lake Records in nearby White Bear Lake.

Ward said she chose "to use Feral House's platform to Do Something. I chose to use my money to Do Something." She is paying for the whistles and for shipping, and hopes that bookstores and other publishers will join the effort to make whistles or "other activist tools" and distribute them, too. She emphasized: "I'm not doing it to lead anything, I'm just another link in the chain and so too, can anyone become a link in the chain."

On Saturday, Possible Futures Books, New Haven, Conn., posted in part on Instagram, "We do have things here that you might need... Like a reminder that the state has always used strategy and force to beat back the principled pursuit of justice (Police Against the Movement) and that we are strengthened by knowing that history, or a reminder of the importance of being an unruly witness, and the people who have gone before us and shown us how (This Unruly Witness: June Jordan's Legacy), or a reminder that we have always had wings and that those wings are tethered to our ancestral roots (We Always Had Wings), or a reminder that even the things that seem mundane are deeply political (Radical Cartography), and that we have to boldly fly the flags we stand for, especially in the face of evil (Abolish ICE)."

South Main Book Co. in Salisbury, N.C., said it is "closed for commerce until our neighbors across America can safely get to and from work and back to the business of living again. We refuse to participate in an economy that condones state-sanctioned murder. Our doors will always remain open to community organizers when space is needed and staff can be paid for scheduled work lost, but time. is. up. on. this. mess. right. here." The bookseller also posted notes on what a strike means for bookstore operations.

At the Open Book

The Open Book, Simi Valley, Calif.: "To the person who tore down our ICE flyer: Thank you for making space for our new and permanent statement in our front window!"

Foxes & Fireflies Booksellers, Superior, Wis.: "My heart goes out to everyone in the Twin Cities. And I want to send a sincere thank you to everyone who has been going out in the cold to record the actions of ICE and document them. Democracy dies in darkness. These people shine a light so we can see the truth for ourselves. Take care of yourselves, and be kind to others. Hugs to you all. Keep the pages turning... and keep the light on."

Thank You Books, Birmingham, Ala.: "We stand in solidarity with the people and businesses of Minnesota and are horrified by the actions of ICE. This week (1/25-1/31) we will be donating 10% of sales to support @hica.alabama. Please take care of yourselves and your neighbors [photo via the @nytimes]."

Greedy Reads, Baltimore, Md.: "The sidewalks are so bad! We're closing for another day; please be careful out there if you need to be out and about. Meanwhile, our government continues occupying, terrorizing, brutalizing, and killing the residents of an American city. We're extending our fundraiser, and 15% of all prepaid online orders will go to the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota. We were able to give over $1,300 last time, thank you!! We'll keep this going until we reopen. Visit us online!"

Betty's Books, Webster Groves, Mo.: "We are not only open today but making sure it's clear that our space is welcome to all EXCEPT ICE. Thank you to @themicaproject , @saintlouisdsa, and @stlrapidresponse for all the stellar resources, @ravenbookstore for the wording used in our sign, and @femmearchist for the much needed stickers and pins to get the message spread far and wide. Let's make sure we stick together and protect each other, now more than ever. BB's will always be a safe space."

The Book & Cover, Chattanooga, Tenn.: "At The Book & Cover our motto is to 'read books, stay curious' AND we also frequently fold into that an encouragement to 'take care.' We, alongside many of you, have been horrified and enraged by ICE's assault on our Minneapolis friends and neighbors. We were encouraged by our friends @thankyou_bham to take the care we can within our community. This week (1/25-1/31) we will be giving 10% of all proceeds to @lapazchatt. Reading isn't inherently political but it can (and should!) call us to open our minds and exercise care--and if that feels 'too political,' perhaps that's something to consider. Read books. Stay curious. Melt the ice."

This year marks the 150th anniversary of the American Library Association, and at the 2026 Youth Media Awards announcement yesterday in Chicago, ALA executive director Dan Montgomery noted the many special events that will be held throughout the year to celebrate.

All the Blues in the Sky (Bloomsbury Children's Books) by Renée Watson won the oldest of the Youth Media Awards, the John Newbery Medal, which is awarded annually to the author of the most distinguished contribution to American literature for children.

Cátia Chien won the Randolph Caldecott Medal, awarded annually to the artist of the most distinguished American picture book for children, for her illustrations for the picture book Fireworks (Clarion Books) by Matthew Burgess.

The anthology collection Legendary Frybread Drive-In (Heartdrum), edited by Cynthia Leitich Smith, won the Michael L. Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature as well as both the American Indian Youth Literature Award (Young Adult) and an Odyssey Award Honor (for the best audiobooks produced for children and young adults). Author Candace Fleming, who won the Award for Excellence in Nonfiction for Young Adults with Death in the Jungle (Anne Schwartz Books), received the Children's Literature Legacy Award and the Margaret A. Edwards Award for lifetime achievement in writing for young adults.

The full list of winners is here. We'll have interviews with some of this year's winners throughout this week.

The Otto Bookstore in Williamsport, Pa., will expand later this spring into an adjacent storefront.

Located at 107 W. 4th St., the Otto Bookstore will be taking over a storefront that previously housed a bridal shop. The two spaces will be connected via an interior opening built in a shared wall, and the expansion will nearly double the size of the bookstore. 

The extra room will allow owners Kathryn Nassberg and Isak Sidenbladh and their team to expand the book inventory and create a designated event space. Sections pertaining to hiking, fishing, camping, and other regional interests will see a large increase, as will the store's offerings for early childhood literacy and families dealing with memory loss. The event space, meanwhile, will be used for author events, book launches, book clubs, birthday celebrations, and more.

"We are excited to have this opportunity to not only expand the bookstore's physical space, but also the kinds of events we can offer as well," said Nassberg. "We want Otto Bookstore to be a place of learning, discovery, and community here in Williamsport, and the updated location will allow us to do that with an even greater impact."

"This represents a pivotal moment for the Otto Bookstore, and Kathryn and I are excited to usher in this change," said Sidenbladh.

Construction will begin soon, and the bookstore will remain open while new floors and furnishings are installed in the new space and inventory is moved. The expansion is expected to be open in the spring. 

"It's going to take a lot of work," said general manager John Shableski, "but we have the best people here who are all pitching in to make it work."

The bookstore dates back to 1841. Its first incarnation was a general store called A.D. Lundy and Co., which sold books along with insurance and a variety of other merchandise. By the early 1900s, it was called the Loan Book Shop and owned by a man named John Otto. In 1940, a longtime employee named Jack Roesgen bought the bookstore, and following his death in 1958, ownership passed to his daughter, Betsy Rider. She went on to oversee the store for the next five decades. In 2017, Nassberg and Sidenbladh took over the Otto Bookstore.

After more than 20 years as head of the Frankfurt Book Fair, Juergen Boos is retiring after the fair takes place in October. He will be succeeded as president and CEO by Joachim Kaufmann, longstanding CEO of Carlsen Verlag, which is part of Bonnier Group.

Juergen Boos

The Börsenverein des Deutschen Buchhandels (the German book trade association), which owns the book fair, said Kaufmann "brings a strong publishing perspective, extensive market expertise and an outstanding international network to the further development of the fair."

Before joining Carlsen Verlag in 2006, Kaufmann worked in sales and marketing at Herder, Christophorus, Bertelsmann, and Ravensburger. He has been a member of the Börsenverein's publishers committee since 2012 and has represented German publishers internationally first at the International Publishers Association and currently at the Federation of European Publishers.

Joachim Kaufmann

Kaufmann said: "After 20 amazing years at Carlsen and the Bonnier Group, I am very much looking forward to starting an entirely new chapter in my professional life and continuing the extremely successful work of Juergen Boos. I can hardly wait to work with a great team to further develop the world's most important book fair. In its role as the leading international event for the global book industry, it must remain the central venue for both rights trading and personal exchanges for the entire book world, and constantly adapt to the needs of its customers. I also see excellent opportunities to develop it into the largest festival for booklovers and reading far beyond Frankfurt and to draw the public's attention to the wonderful world of books and stories during the fair week."

Boos said, "I am very pleased that Joachim Kaufmann has been chosen as my successor. I have known and valued Joachim for many years of working together for the international book industry and for freedom of expression. Few leaders in our world of books are as capable as he is of inspiring people with his ideas and convictions. He and the strong culture of collaboration within the Frankfurter Buchmesse team are an ideal match."

Philip Ruppel (photo: Madison Fender for BFA)

Philip Ruppel has been named CEO of Phaidon Press and its affiliated companies, the Monacelli Press and Artspace, succeeding Bob Miller, who is leaving and setting up his own book and creative development company (see following story). Ruppel has been chief operating officer at Phaidon since 2015. Before that he worked more than 20 years at McGraw-Hill, where he was president of McGraw-Hill Professional and McGraw-Hill International.

In his time at Phaidon, Ruppel has overseen finance, production, operations, and North American sales. In 2020, he led the acquisition of the Monacelli Press and served as its publisher. He also established strategic publishing partnerships with organizations such as the Leading Hotels of the World, Edward Jones, and Wrightwood 659.

Representing the Phaidon board, Debra Black said, "For more than a decade, Philip has been essential to the exciting growth of Phaidon, Monacelli, and Artspace. We are thrilled that he is stepping into this well-deserved leadership role and are confident he will guide the organization to even greater success."

About Miller, she said, "We are grateful to Bob for his contribution to Phaidon and wish him the very best in his future endeavors."

Ruppel commented: "I am honored to be trusted to lead such a venerable publishing house as Phaidon. I look forward to collaborating with our authors, partners, and dedicated employees to publish the extraordinary books and limited editions for which Phaidon is known."

Bob Miller is leaving his position as CEO of Phaidon Press to establish Bookswork Press, a book and creative development company serving authors and publishers. Future projects are planned with bestselling author Brad Meltzer and former Disney CEO Michael Eisner, among others. Miller is also an adviser to Ania M. Jastreboff, M.D., and Oprah Winfrey on Enough: Your Health, Your Weight, and What It's Like to Be Free, published by Avid Reader Press.

Bob Miller

Miller described Bookswork Press as a natural outgrowth of his several decades of experience publishing bestselling fiction and nonfiction, including such authors as Caroline Kennedy, David Halberstam, Randy Pausch, Jon Kabat-Zinn, Michael J. Fox, and Mitch Albom at Hyperion (the company he founded for Disney in 1990 and ran until 2008) and Oprah Winfrey, President Joe Biden, Matthew Perry, Brad Meltzer, Glennon Doyle, Leigh Bardugo, Liane Moriarty, and S.A. Cosby at Flatiron Books (the company he founded for Macmillan in 2013 and ran until 2024). He also was the founder of HarperStudio at HarperCollins and was group publisher of Workman Publishing.

Miller said, "I'm really looking forward to working in depth with authors and publishers, doing what I love best, which is helping new ideas make their way into the world."

Loretta Ellsworth visited Three Bells Books in her hometown of Mason City, Iowa, to sign copies of her new historical romance, The Jilted Countess (Harper Perennial), which is based on a true story. Ellsworth (r.) is pictured with Three Bells Books manager Julie Bublitz.

Posted by Neighborhood Books, Presque Isle, Maine: "I was driving around trying to figure out where to pick up my UPS boxes for the day because we NEED to have our Dear Debbie books ready for 10AM tomorrow, and since we're closed Mondays UPS typically doesn't deliver to us. I checked in with this guy who said I'm bringing them right to you! Now that's service! Look at all these boxes! I wouldn't have wanted to put them all in my car anyways. We'll be ready for our Freida McFadden fans first thing tomorrow morning thanks to our great UPS service! THANK YOU!!! Just doing our little part to keep UPS jobs here!"

At Simon & Schuster:

Grace Rambo has been promoted to assistant director, advertising & paid digital media.

Dalia Baban has been promoted to manager, advertising & paid digital media.

Julianna Markus has joined the company as manager, advertising & paid digital media. She was previously a senior account executive of paid media at Burson Global Communications Agency.

Kate Peppiatt has joined as advertising assistant.

Birdie Books in Westerville, Ohio, posted a cheerful customer service Instagram reel, noting: "We are always more than happy to help you find what you are looking for."

Tomorrow:
Good Morning America: Amy DuBois Barnett, author of If I Ruled the World: A Novel (Flatiron, $29.99, 9781250378125).

CBS Morning: Ben Crump, author of Worse than a Lie: A Beau Lee Cooper Novel (Bantam, $30, 9780593875704).

Today: Ali Rosen, author of The Slow Burn (Montlake, $16.99, 9781662535963).

The View: Spencer Pratt, author of The Guy You Loved to Hate: Confessions from a Reality TV Villain (Gallery, $30, 9781668211762).

Tamron Hall: Jonathan Haidt and Catherine Price, authors of The Amazing Generation: Your Guide to Fun and Freedom in a Screen-filled World (Rocky Pond Books, $14.99, 9798217111916).

Fresh Air: Jason Zengerle, author of Hated by All the Right People: Tucker Carlson and the Unraveling of the Conservative Mind (Crooked Media Reads, $28, 9781638932932).

A live-action movie adaptation of Eloise is in the works, with Netflix recently boarding the project to distribute, Deadline reported. Based on the children's book series written by Kay Thompson and illustrated by Hilary Knight, the film will be directed by Amy Sherman-Palladino from a script she co-wrote with Hannah Marks and Linda Woolverton.

The cast includes Ryan Reynolds, Sally Hawkins, David Haig, Victor Garber, Max Casella, Isaac Bae, and Mae Schenk. Reynolds will produce through his Maximum Effort company, along with George Dewey, Ashley Fox and Johnny Pariseau. Woolverton will also produce, with Molly Milstein and Sophia Travagliae exec producing for Maximum Effort.

"The family film's logline is currently under wraps but will be a wholly original adventure," with Reynolds playing a new villain, Deadline noted. Independent film and TV studio MRC acquired rights to Eloise in 2019 and is overseeing production. Handmade Films will work in conjunction with MRC on the production. MRC is collaborating on the film with the Thompson estate, Knight, and Simon & Schuster, the book series' publisher.

Wellwater by Canadian poet Karen Solie has won the £25,000 (about $34,220) T.S. Eliot Prize, sponsored by the T.S. Eliot Foundation and "awarded annually to the author of the best new collection of poetry published in the U.K. and Ireland."

Chair of judges Michael Hofmann commented: "In Karen Solie we have an outstanding winner. The poems of Wellwater come from the whole of an adventurously lived life. They hold the two sentiments, The world is a beautiful place/ The world is a terrible place, in perfect equipoise. They offer no happy endings, no salvation in past or future, in epiphany or private happiness. And yet they are anything but grim, with an ironic humor that plays over our increasingly euphemism-hungry culture."

Solie grew up in southwest Saskatchewan. Wellwater is her sixth collection. She previously won the Dorothy Livesay Award, Pat Lowther Award, Trillium Poetry Prize, the Griffin Prize, and was joint winner of the 2025 Forward Prize for Best Collection. She has been shortlisted for the Derek Walcott Prize and the T.S. Eliot Prize. Solie teaches for half of the year at the University of St Andrews in Scotland and lives the rest of time in Canada.

Jennifer Mandula's engaging debut novel, The Geomagician, brings together fossil hunting, Victorian labor politics, and a baby pterodactyl--with a dash of romance and a generous helping of magic.

Mary Anning, poor but brilliant, has earned a reputation as a respected fossil hunter. But Mary yearns to be a geomagician: to join the all-male ranks of the Geomagical Society of London, whose members can use fossils to practice magic (and who also conduct and publish the academic research Mary loves). When Mary unearths a pterodactyl egg that hatches in her hands, she hopes the infant creature (whom she names Ajax) could be her ticket into the Society. But when Mary tells the Society about Ajax, they demand she hand him over--via their representative Henry Stanton, her former fiancé. As Mary tries to navigate Society politics and the equally baffling social codes of London, she also grows concerned about her best friend Lucy's involvement with the labor reform movement--and their increasingly dangerous tactics.

Mandula paints a striking portrait of Mary, struggling to run her shop alone and still missing the father she adored. Despite Mary's intellect, her social isolation renders her naive, especially given her complicated feelings for Henry. In London, she and Lucy enter the household of William Buckland, Mary's longtime mentor, and Mary tries to protect Ajax while fighting for entry into the Society. Meanwhile, Lucy joins a shadowy group known as the Prometheans, who agitate for fairer labor practices for working-class Britons. But their methods give Mary pause, and the friends clash over a central question: Is it better to gradually reform the system of buying and selling magic, which exploits poor people, or destroy it altogether?

Alongside Mary and Lucy's debates about labor reform, Mary and Ajax are drawn into the Society's ongoing arguments about fossils, magic, and creation--which strongly resemble the debates about evolution and creation that will be familiar to many readers. Though some geomagicians, including Buckland, want to find a way for magic and faith to coexist, the existence and use of magic pose a threat to powerful Church leaders, and Mary must tread carefully lest she be marked as a witch. As the various simmering questions come to a boil, Mary discovers some damning secrets about the Society, and she is forced to decide what--and whom--she is willing to give up in order to belong.

Packed with historical details and layered with emotion (not to mention amusing pterodactyl encounters), The Geomagician is an entertaining fantasy with big questions at its heart. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams

Shelf Talker: A female fossil hunter tries to protect a baby pterodactyl while navigating tricky academic and magical politics in Jennifer Mandula's entertaining debut historical fantasy.

Poetry is one of the more emotionally resonant categories in a bookstore--and it can also be one of the hardest to merchandise with confidence. Too often, poetry shelves are treated as static or purely alphabetical, when in reality poetry readers are as varied as fiction readers, with distinct buying patterns.

The Poetry Shelf is my monthly, publisher-agnostic curation, researched and designed to help independent bookstores rethink how poetry is presented, discovered, and sold. It came about after last year's Winter Institute when so many booksellers told me they didn't know what to do with their poetry sections. (To be clear: there were lots that did!) It's data-informed, but practical--created with the realities of indie retail in mind. In many stores, there is already a local poetry expert, and those shops may not need this resource. But for stores that don't have that depth of specialization, my goal is not to dictate what they should carry, but to offer a flexible starting framework that can be adapted to suit local communities, budgets, and tastes. The project is updated monthly and shared via a free e-mail subscription, an Edelweiss catalog, and on the Central Avenue Publishing website.

Before publishing, I spent years working in market research, advising consumer packaged goods retailers on category optimization--how customers shop, and how assortment and adjacency drive sales. Now, as Publisher at Central Avenue Publishing, I've applied that experience to poetry--our specialty--particularly within the accessible and social-media-driven segments of the market. These are readers who tend to buy multiple poetry books per year and who tell me they still strongly prefer in-store browsing. 

One of the core ideas behind The Poetry Shelf is segmentation. Poetry is traditionally shelved alphabetically by author, but that assumes a uniform reader. In reality, the poetry category contains multiple reader types--each with different motivations, comfort levels, and expectations. Grouping poetry by segment, and arranging those segments intentionally, can encourage browsing across comfort zones and increase multi-unit sales.

Michelle Halket

Drawing on merchandising strategies used by larger book retailers and other retail sectors, I developed a simple shelf schematic: a sample 36-inch poetry shelf divided into seven segments and arranged left to right to guide reader discovery. The flow introduces customers to what's new and popular, then gradually invites them into deeper, more foundational work--before ending with featured and themed selections.

The segments include New Bestsellers (titles appearing on Circana lists or trending across retailers), Viral (poets with strong online momentum), Accessible (proven, high-volume sellers with lasting appeal), Experienced Readers (award-winning and academically rooted poets), Classics (foundational voices), Local (regional and small-press standouts), and a rotating Themed Section.

Each segment balances new releases, steady performers, and essential backlist titles. The shelf schematic shows approximate space allocation--not as a rule, but as a visual guide to proportion and flow.

The Themed Section is especially important. While you can add in some new titles, I encourage booksellers to re-merchandise from existing stock--refreshing the shelf visually while tying poetry into cultural moments, heritage months, or in-store tables elsewhere in the shop.

At its heart, The Poetry Shelf is about confidence and discovery. Poetry sells when it's easy to browse and easy to fall into. If this framework helps even a few bookstores rethink their poetry shelves--and sell a few more collections along the way--then it's doing what I hoped it would. I'm often asked why one publisher would put this much work into supporting books that aren't even their own. For me, the answer is simple: this is about lifting up the entire category and giving readers what they're looking for, without forcing them to an online retailer. It's about recognizing that poetry buyers are different and, even for small stores, helping them offer a meaningful selection of what's out there--still curated by the bookseller.

For the February edition, I've focused on the lead-up to Valentine's Day and Galentine's Day. The featured suggestions include both recent and classic titles that explore love in many forms: romantic, self, familial, cultural, and friendship-based. I recommend starting with classics like Shakespeare's Sonnets, Neruda's Love Poems, and Rumi's Love Poems; adding in older titles such as June Jordan's Haruko/Love Poems and Nikki Giovanni's Love Poems; and rounding out the section with newer work by contemporary poets including Keetje Kuipers (Lonely Women Make Good Lovers), George Abraham and Noor Hindi (Heaven Looks Like Us), and Iain Thomas (I Wrote This for You).

You can find out more about this project at our website. And if you're interested in talking directly with me, I'll be at Winter Institute again this year at Publishers by Appointment and Meet the Presses. And if not, feel free to e-mail here. --Michelle Halket

The bestselling self-published books last week as compiled by IndieReader.com:

1. Heated Rivalry by Rachel Reid
2. The Long Game by Rachel Reid
3. Game Changer by Rachel Reid
4. Mountains to Cross by Abraham M. George
5. Tough Guy by Rachel Reid
6. Role Model by Rachel Reid
7. Insatiable by Leigh Rivers
8. The Power of the Only by Angela Chee
9. Little Stranger by Leigh Rivers
10. The Ritual by Shantel Tessier

[Many thanks to IndieReader.com!]