Hello, Columbus
Because of the Columbus Day holiday, this is our last issue until Tuesday, October 9. See you then!
Because of the Columbus Day holiday, this is our last issue until Tuesday, October 9. See you then!
The Wall Street Journal
explores the contradictory aspects of the sale this year of Explore
Booksellers, Aspen, Colo., which was founded by the late Katharine
Thalberg, a very liberal activist, to Sam Wyly, "the Texas billionaire
who was a top supporter of George W. Bush and helped fund the 'swift
boat' ads that helped defeat Mr. Kerry."
Although the store hasn't changed in the time Wyly has owned it, some
Thalberg fans are avoiding shopping there. Wyly himself told the
Journal that his politics is irrelevant in owning the store and that he
bought Explore to save it--the Thalberg daughters' asking price of $5
million, which included the valuable building in which the store is
housed--made it likely that the business would be sold to developers
wanting to take advantage of a town where real estate prices have risen
dramatically.
"My motivation is that this was my favorite place to walk to in Aspen,"
Wyly continued. "I wanted to keep it. It's got such a good feeling.
It's cozy and comfortable."
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Bookselling This Week profiles ABDebs Books & Gifts, Knightdale, N.C., which Alyce Boyd-Stewart, a retired civil rights lawyer, opened in March.
The store had an amusing beginning, according to BTW: "In 2005,
both Boyd-Stewart and her husband, Edward Stewart, were at home trying
to enjoy their retirement. 'We were sitting around doing nothing,' said
Boyd-Stewart. 'And I said, "I'm opening up a bookstore." My husband
said, "You're nuts," as usual. And I ignored him . . . as usual.' "
The 900-sq.-ft. store stocks 12,000 books, and there is additional space
for a community center. The store's major areas include a "young folks"
section, history, classics, poetry, humor, biography, health, history,
African-American literature and fiction.
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BTW
also marks the 25th anniversary of Prince Books, Norfolk, Va.,
owned and co-founded by Sarah Pishko, who said that to celebrate, the 2,800-sq.-ft. store
will have a 25% off sale and refreshments next Wednesday, October 10.
Earlier this year, Pishko took action to prepare for the
August opening of a 28,000-sq.-ft. Barnes & Noble College store at a mall
two blocks away--an "academic superstore" that is affiliated with
Tidewater Community College. Among other things, she hired a PR firm,
which developed materials to use for publicity that emphasized the
store's strong points; stories and columns about the merits of
independently owned businesses and Prince Books ran in local media.
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There appears to be a new contender for world's worst poem. The Guardian reported that the reigning champ, by 19th century Scottish bard William McGonagall ("And the cry rang out all o'er the town, Good Heavens! the Tay Bridge is blown down") is now being challenged by Brussels native Theophile Jules-Henri Marzials ("Drop / Dead. / Plop, flop. / Plop"). Place your bets, ladies and gentlemen.
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This morning on the Today Show: Peter Greenberg, author of The Complete Travel Detective Bible (Rodale, $17.95, 9781594867088/1594867089).
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Today on Oprah: Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love: One Woman's Search for Everything Across Italy, India and Indonesia (Penguin, $15, 9780143038412/0143038419). Also on the show, Oprah makes her next book club pick.
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Today on NPR's Fresh Air: Robert Satloff, author of Among the Righteous: Lost Stories from the Holocaust's Long Reach into Arab Lands (PublicAffairs, $26, 9781586483999/1586483994).
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Tomorrow on Larry King Live: Joy Behar, author of When You Need a Lift: But Don't Want to Eat Chocolate, Pay a Shrink, or Drink a Bottle of Gin (Crown, $19.95, 9780307351715/0307351718).
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Sunday on Larry King Live: Jenny McCarthy, author of Louder Than Words: A Mother's Journey in Healing Autism (Dutton, $23.95, 9780525950110/0525950117).
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On CBS's Sunday Morning: Lynne Cheney, author of Blue Skies, No Fences: A Memoir of Childhood and Family (Pocket, $26, 9781416532880/1416532889).
Michael Clayton, starring George Clooney as a "fixer" at a New York City law firm, opens today. Michael Clayton: The Shooting Script (Newmarket Press, $19.95, 9781557047953) includes the complete screenplay by writer and director Tony Gilroy, a foreword by William Goldman, a Q&A with Gilroy, 39 color photographs and more.
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Lust, Caution, Ang Lee's new movie that opens today, is based on a short story by Eileen Chang. A tie in version is available (Anchor, $9, 9780307387448/0307387445). In addition, Pantheon offers Lust, Caution: The Story, the Screenplay, and the Making of the Film ($22.95, 9780375425240/0375425241). The screenplay is by Wang Hui Ling and James Schmaus.
Service Included: Four-Star Secrets of an Eavesdropping Waiter by Phoebe Damrosch (William Morrow & Company, $24.95 Hardcover, 9780061228148, October 2007)
The following report is from Ed Southern, v-p of sales and marketing at John F. Blair, Publisher, who happily notes that at least one example of his esoteric vocabulary used here rivals and perhaps surpasses Chris Kerr's, as noted in his NEIBA report (Shelf Awareness, October 2, 2007). Thank you, Ed!
The 2007 Southern Independent Booksellers Alliance trade show and
convention, held at the Hilton Towers in downtown Atlanta, Ga., drew
better numbers than in the last few years, along with a goodly amount
of pre-show hand-wringing over the new, unconventional trade show hours.
More than 200 bookstores sent more than 500 of their finest, smartest,
sexiest booksellers. Some 199 exhibiting companies competed for their
attention. Fox's cameras should have been rolling.
To avoid a conflict between seminars and exhibit hours and to help
attendees cut down on travel costs, SIBA scrapped the traditional
daytime exhibit hours, instead filling that time with additional
programming for booksellers. The trade show began at 5 p.m. Saturday.
Exhibits were open until 10 p.m., and reopened at 8 a.m. Sunday.
Although the new show hours didn't compete with panels and other
action-packed SIBA programs, most exhibitors worried beforehand that
the new hours would compete--and lose--to action-packed dinners and
early bedtimes. (They lost sight of the fact that the new hours allowed
greater college-football-watching time, which is really what's
important on a fall Saturday. This is the South, after all.)
Some booksellers worried that following the 7:30 a.m. author breakfast
on Saturday, the later hours and open bar on the show floor would
leave them in no mood for conducting business.
Were their worries justified? No, not at all. Well, maybe. Kind of.
Yes, absolutely. It depends on whom you ask, and it depends on how
carefully you phrase the question.
At 5 p.m. on Saturday, the trade show was active, either because of or in spite of a less cavernous, more
circuitous exhibit hall layout that made conversation easier but
strained almost everyone's lenticular* capabilities to find particular
booths. On Saturday evening, there were substantial lines for authors
at the many booth signings, which replaced the signing area from
previous years, and orders flew left and right . . . until about
8:30. At that point, apparently someone saw a werewolf drinking a pina
colada at Trader Vic's (in the Hilton's lower level, and, yes, his hair
was perfect), because show-floor traffic after that was left to a few
brave bookselling souls.
Similarly Sunday's first hour or so provided exhibitors with an
excellent opportunity to raid each other's booths and carbo-load on the
free doughnuts, although traffic picked up as the morning went on.
"We will definitely tweak the trade show hours" before next year, SIBA
executive director Wanda Jewell said. "I'm still hoping to lay out the show so
that exhibitors and front line booksellers can come in for only one
hotel night if they'd like."
Another new feature was the Saturday morning Reps' Picks sessions, in
which reps had the opportunity to stand before God and booksellers and
push what they felt to be their strongest fall titles.
Again, opinions on this addition ranged from "fantastic" to "a waste of time."
In fact, the 2007 SIBA could easily have turned into a cauldron of
controversy, but most everyone--booksellers and exhibitors
alike--seemed to stay in good spirits throughout the show. This could
be because us folks down South are just so doggone nice, or it could be
because the one nearly unanimous opinion is that this fall is shaping
up to be a healthy season for "long tail" book sales in the South.
"It was rare that I would look at an exhibitor's display and not find
two or three titles that had me thinking 'Oh could I sell that',"
former Bristol Books manager and SIBA webmistress Nicki Leone said.
* Pay up, Chris.