Books are selling in categories across the board at Rakestraw Books in
Danville, Calif. No single title is a standout so far this season, and
that's just fine with owner Mike Barnard.
"Sometimes there is one big book, but I prefer it when there's not," said Barnard. "It's more interesting and easier to keep up with stock levels, and recommendations carry a little more weight than when customers are coming in and asking for The Da Vinci Code."
Cookbooks and wine books are strong sellers for Rakestraw, noted Barnard, who increased the number of food events this past year and is launching a food and wine book club at the store in January. In the last several days, he said, The Gourmet Cookbook edited by Ruth Reichl "has taken off." Another customer favorite is The PlumpJack Cookbook: Great Meals for Good Living by Jeff Morgan. PlumpJack is a San Francisco company that owns several restaurants and cafés as well as a Napa Valley winery.
Wine maven and local celebrity Leslie Sbrocco helped Rakestraw celebrate the holidays during an in-store soiree this past Friday. Sbrocco is the host of the PBS show Check Please!, a wine columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle and author of The Simple & Savvy Wine Guide: Buying, Pairing & Sharing for All. "Our final event of the year is typically a wine tasting," said Barnard. For $12 per person, customers sampled food and four different wines. A portion of the proceeds is going to the charity Project Open Hand.
Books that trigger the taste buds aren't the only ones selling at Rakestraw. "The things we've done well with all year pick up at the holidays," said Barnard. "People buy their favorites for gifts." Some of the steady sellers now picking up steam are Bill Bryson's The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid and the fiction tomes A Spot of Bother by Mark Haddon, The Lay of the Land by Richard Ford and Thirteen Moons by Charles Frazier.
A children's book proving popular for gift-giving is Kate DiCamillo's The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane. Two pictorial local interest titles selling well are San Ramon Valley: Alamo, Danville, and San Ramon by photographer Ralph Cozine and Beverly Lane, curator of the Museum of the San Ramon Valley, and Galen Rowell: A Retrospective, a compendium of photographs taken by the late photographer Galen Rowell that includes a foreword by Tom Brokaw.
As for surprise sellers, "I've been impressed that the classic reissues from Penguin and Harper are doing very well," said Barnard. A table display features The Bell Jar, Gravity's Rainbow, On the Road, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and other titles in the two series. The audio version of To Kill a Mockingbird is also proving popular.
"Customers seem cheerful and are certainly spending," Barnard said. "It was a good fall, so I'm hopeful it will be a good holiday season."--Shannon McKenna
"Sometimes there is one big book, but I prefer it when there's not," said Barnard. "It's more interesting and easier to keep up with stock levels, and recommendations carry a little more weight than when customers are coming in and asking for The Da Vinci Code."
Cookbooks and wine books are strong sellers for Rakestraw, noted Barnard, who increased the number of food events this past year and is launching a food and wine book club at the store in January. In the last several days, he said, The Gourmet Cookbook edited by Ruth Reichl "has taken off." Another customer favorite is The PlumpJack Cookbook: Great Meals for Good Living by Jeff Morgan. PlumpJack is a San Francisco company that owns several restaurants and cafés as well as a Napa Valley winery.
Wine maven and local celebrity Leslie Sbrocco helped Rakestraw celebrate the holidays during an in-store soiree this past Friday. Sbrocco is the host of the PBS show Check Please!, a wine columnist for the San Francisco Chronicle and author of The Simple & Savvy Wine Guide: Buying, Pairing & Sharing for All. "Our final event of the year is typically a wine tasting," said Barnard. For $12 per person, customers sampled food and four different wines. A portion of the proceeds is going to the charity Project Open Hand.
Books that trigger the taste buds aren't the only ones selling at Rakestraw. "The things we've done well with all year pick up at the holidays," said Barnard. "People buy their favorites for gifts." Some of the steady sellers now picking up steam are Bill Bryson's The Life and Times of the Thunderbolt Kid and the fiction tomes A Spot of Bother by Mark Haddon, The Lay of the Land by Richard Ford and Thirteen Moons by Charles Frazier.
A children's book proving popular for gift-giving is Kate DiCamillo's The Miraculous Journey of Edward Tulane. Two pictorial local interest titles selling well are San Ramon Valley: Alamo, Danville, and San Ramon by photographer Ralph Cozine and Beverly Lane, curator of the Museum of the San Ramon Valley, and Galen Rowell: A Retrospective, a compendium of photographs taken by the late photographer Galen Rowell that includes a foreword by Tom Brokaw.
As for surprise sellers, "I've been impressed that the classic reissues from Penguin and Harper are doing very well," said Barnard. A table display features The Bell Jar, Gravity's Rainbow, On the Road, A Tree Grows in Brooklyn and other titles in the two series. The audio version of To Kill a Mockingbird is also proving popular.
"Customers seem cheerful and are certainly spending," Barnard said. "It was a good fall, so I'm hopeful it will be a good holiday season."--Shannon McKenna