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| Solle's Bookshop (courtesy Omena Historical Society) |
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My first childhood memory of a bookstore is Solle's Bookshop, steps from Grand Traverse Bay in Omena, Mich., about a 15-minute drive from our family's summer cottage in Leland. I was with my sisters and my grandmother Bami, who bought us books every season. That July visit began my love for bookstores.
Decades later, I'd learn that Will Solle (whom I never met, as he died in 1949 and his store closed in 1959, a year after our visit) had founded his bookshop in the 1930s, shipped books via the local train stop to customers around the world, and used the words "Where all roads end" in his ads.
As an adult, I've found my way to many bookstores across the U.S. as well as in Europe. For six wonderful years, I was a part-owner (with three partners) of the Bookshelf in Cincinnati, Ohio, a store founded in 1975 that still continues today. I left this indie to pursue an equal passion--writing for young readers, which has led to travels, published books and speaking in hundreds of schools. But always, I carry the bookseller's life in my heart. And now, like Bami, I take my grandchildren to bookstores.
I recently spoke at a conference and told the audience, "As artists, writers, teachers and librarians, we are ALL booksellers." I should have used the magical word bouquinistes, those booksellers of Paris who open their green bookstalls by the Seine to the readers of the world.
My go-to genre for inspiration is books about bookstores--novels and nonfiction. Their bright covers lining our shelves at home, with the words bookstore or bookshop in each title, bring me such happiness.
I'll start with a favorite, The Yellow-Lighted Bookshop by Lewis Buzbee (Graywolf), which I purchased in 2008 at Powell's Books in Portland, Ore. (I tracked down Lewis by phone so I could exclaim what a wonderful book it is!) I have copies in hardcover and paperback in Cincinnati, and a copy on our cottage bookshelf in Michigan. Buzbee's book is an echo of how I feel each time I walk into a bookshop.
This May, while browsing in McNally Jackson Books in New York City, I found the new In Praise of Good Bookstores by Jeff Deutsch (Princeton University Press). And bought it, with its snappy paper-over-board cover, because the passion for books about bookstores never wanes.
I own three editions of Helene Hanff's 84, Charing Cross Road (Penguin).
And My Bookstore, edited by Ronald Rice (Black Dog & Levinthal) in hardcover and paper.
A Bookshop in Berlin by Francoise Frenkel (Atria) is a riveting read and, like The Seven Stairs by Stuart Brent (Touchstone), is an exceptional memoir of booksellers from an earlier era.
As is Sylvia Beach's famous Shakespeare and Company (Bison) with the follow-up history, Shakespeare and Company, Paris, edited by Krista Halverson (D.A.P. Artbook), so gorgeous you can feel the decades in its heft.
Each Christmas I treat myself to a book from Heywood Hill in London. Read The Bookshop at 10 Curzon Street: Letters Between Nancy Mitford and Heywood Hill, 1952-73 for its long history.
I like to think that Will Solle, if his store existed today, would stock a book by Louise Borden, who as a child loved his bookshop first.
In my own book The Greatest Skating Race (Margaret K. McElderry), illustrated by Niki Daly, the art shows a Belgian bookshop and later, the bookseller, who pulls a sledge over a frozen canal to deliver books as he helps a Dutch boy skate home safely.
Indeed, let's celebrate our first bookshop and all those that came after. #bookstoresforever
Louise Borden is a former bookseller and the author of 30 books for children. In addition to The Greatest Skating Race, she has also written The Little Ships: The Heroic Rescue at Dunkirk in World War II (Margaret K. McElderry), illustrated by Michael Foreman, and The Journey that Saved Curious George (Clarion), illustrated by Allan Drummond.