Lights, camera, bookstore.
Yesterday and today, Next Chapter Bookstore & Bistro, Northville, Mich., is serving as the set for Scream 4, the latest in the horror series directed by Wes Craven.
The store opened only this May, and location scouts for the movie came by as owners Dan and Kathy Comaianna were still setting up, the Detroit Free Press reported. The deal to rent out the shop to Scream 4 became especially welcome after June 4 rains flooded the shop. Rather than cancel the shoot, Scream 4 producers saw it as an opportunity to rebuild the store.
According to the blog OnLocationVacations, the scene in the store involves a booksigning. Weirdly, the crew apparently bought some books to be used in the scene from a nearby Barnes & Noble.
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Nebraska Book Company has bought Jayhawk Bookstore, Lawrence, Kan., and will take over operations July 15, according to the Lawrence Journal-World & News. Store owner Bill Muggy had run the store, which is near the University of Kansas, for 33 years.
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Rebecca's Books, Berkeley, Calif., "the homey little community-oriented poetry bookshop," as the Berkeley Daily Planet described it, is closing. The store was founded in 2007 by Mary Ann Braithwaite, who said. "Everything's for sale--books, artwork, fixtures and furniture. I'm here until I'm gone."
But she vowed to return, adding, "Berkeley hasn't seen the last of Rebecca's Books!"
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The Webster's Bookstore Cafe on S. Allen St. in State College, Pa., which is closing, as noted here yesterday, has been behind on its rent, the Centre Daily Times reported. Owner Elaine Meder-Wilgus told the paper that she was starting to refinance to be able to catch up on the rent, but that the landlord terminated the lease. She still plans to reopen eventually in another location. Her other store will stay open.
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Owner Becky Anderson commented: "We offer a personalized service, and our ability to build community around us continues to keep us going. We also have the most incredible booksellers--people that are amazing readers who can recommend from personal experience the perfect book or gift for someone."
Publicity coordinator Candy Purdom added, "There are hundreds of customers that are very loyal to us, and we feel that the community and the store work well together. We have popular author events, and we partner with the schools. We've now added a gift shop in the past year, and the network is strong."
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I'm reading as fast as I can! PC World reported that a recent study by Dr.
Jakob Nielsen, of the Nielsen Norman Group, "compared the reading times
of 24 users on the Kindle 2, an iPad using the iBooks application, a PC
monitor and good old fashioned paper. The study found that reading on
an electronic tablet was up to 10.7% slower than reading a printed book.
Despite the slower reading times, Nielsen found that users preferred
reading books on a tablet device compared to the paper book. The PC
monitor, meanwhile, was universally hated as a reading platform among
all test subjects."
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"What classics will the children
of 2050 be reading when their future parents are incapable of skimming
through anything longer than 140 characters? The world's great stories,
then, will amount to nothing but low-tech interruption," observed
Milisuthando Bongela of South Africa in the Mail & Guardian after an inspirational
visit to a "a bookshop, a dusty little island of treasures owned by an
aged European man."
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Effective September 3, Jenn Northington joins WORD, Brooklyn, N.Y., as event manager. She is currently manager of breathe books, Baltimore, Md., and earlier was marketing and event manager at the King's English Bookshop, Salt Lake City, Utah. She can be reached at jenn@wordbrooklyn.com.
In this week's breathe books newsletter, owner Susan L. Weis bid gracious adieu, writing in part: "Please join me in wishing [Jenn] lots of luck and success in her new job. She will be missed but I also know this is a great opportunity for her to be in New York at the center of the literary world." The newsletter also has information about openings at breathe books.
Northington continues as a regular columnist for Shelf Awareness and will be working with another Shelf Awareness columnist, Stephanie Anderson, manager of WORD, which may well become the best-covered bookstore in the country!