NFI Research listed the "top independent bookstores on Twitter" in the U.S., ranking them according to bookshops that "1) regularly update their page and communicate with their followers 2) use Twitter to advance/promote communication with their community 3) have a proportionate number of followers to following and 4) are active on Twitter as of October 19, 2009."
The top 10 indie tweeters:
- Powell’s Books, Portland, Ore. @Powells
- Tattered Cover, Denver, Colo. @tatteredcover
- Harvard Bookstore, Cambridge, Mass. @HarvardBooks
- Skylight Books, Los Angeles, Calif. @skylightbooks
- Vroman's Bookstore, Pasadena, Calif. @vromans
- Book Soup, West Hollywood, Calif. @BookSoup
- WORD bookstore, Brooklyn, N.Y. @wordbrooklyn
- Book Culture, New York, N.Y. @bookculture
- BookPeople, Austin, Tex. @BookPeople
- Metropolis Books, Los Angeles, Calif. @Metropolisbooks
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Piling on. Sears entered the book price fray through a side door yesterday, saying it will offer customers "a credit toward a future purchase" if they buy select books on the Sears.com website or those of Target, Amazon and Wal-Mart. "After emailing Sears the receipt, shoppers will then receive an online credit of up to $9 to use toward a purchase of $45 or more on Sears.com," according to Reuters.
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Award for notable--if ill-timed, given the current book price wars--comment from the Wall Street Journal's "Live From the Nook Launch (Don't Call It a Kindle)" blog post yesterday: "4:26:
'Hopefully you would all agree that Barnes & Noble has led some of
the most important innovations in the industry,' [B&N CEO Steve
Riggio] says. We were the first bookseller to discount books. 'Remember
that?' he jokes. 'I am that old.'"
The New York Times also blogged live from the scene at Pier 60, Chelsea Piers in Manhattan.
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The Camden County, Ga., Chamber of Commerce, which has "urged residents to shop locally for more than two years with their Keep It In Camden Campaign," launched the Pick 3 project, in which "residents are asked to select their three favorite businesses and make a commitment to shop there at least one time a month for the next three months," according to the Florida Times-Union.
Louise Mancill, owner of Once Upon a Bookseller, St. Marys, told the Times-Union "some residents have already told her they have chosen her St. Marys business as one of the three they plan to support. . . . While business has been slow, Mancill said it has improved over the last month. The program gives her hope things will improve for all the merchants in Camden County."
"I think a community without a book store is a sad thing," she said. "It could happen to us."
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At the Oregon State Library last week, 988 boxes of surplus books--donated by libraries, churches, stores and individuals--were loaded into an ocean-transport container and will be shipped to Oregon's sister province, Fujian, China.
The Statesman Journal reported that a "committee was formed in January to plan the Books for China Project. All types of books were accepted, and donations continued until about two weeks ago. The original goal was to collect 1,000 boxes. Each box holds on average 30 books."
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It's a real-life plot twist that may feature more legal suspense and alleged double-dealing than even Patricia Cornwell could imagine. The Daily Beast reported that the bestselling suspense author, "after suffering estimated losses of $40 million due to the alleged negligence of her accountants and business advisers," is suing "Anchin, Block & Anchin LLP--a blue-chip New York financial-management firm," claiming that they "mishandled not only her own money, but that of her spouse of two years, Harvard neuroscientist Staci Gruber."
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The Philip Roth bus tour. Weequahic High School's class of 1960 had an unanticipated but welcome guest during its 50th reunion last weekend. The Newark Star-Ledger reported that the class had signed up for a tour called "Philip Roth’s Newark," but when the author himself "stepped on to the bus, the murmurs turned into buzz, the cell phones and digital cameras flashed. America's greatest living author is also Weequahic High's most famous graduate."
"Omigod, are we excited!" said Marsha Weinstein. "If I had known, I would have brought my books for him to sign. I have all his books."
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Maurice Sendak offered some short but direct advice for parents concerned that the film version of Where the Wild Things Are is too frightening for children. In answer to a Newsweek question ("What do you say to parents who think the Wild Things film may be too scary?") he replied: "I would tell them to go to hell. That's a question I will not tolerate."
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Artist Steve Wolfe "has taken his bibliophilia to unrivaled extremes" in his current exhibition at the Whitney Museum of American Art in New York City. Wolfe "creates copies of used books that are so true to their subjects that it's hard to believe that they're not the real thing," the New York Times observed, adding that "some of the 30 paintings and drawings from 1988 to 2005 in 'Steve Wolfe on Paper' represent the well-worn covers of modern classics like On the Road, A Streetcar Named Desire and Waiting for Godot, almost all from his own library."