"Oh gosh, independent bookstores have been at the very core of things for me!... Right now, when I finish this interview, I'm walking to go meet a friend for dinner in my neighborhood, Echo Park. I will stop in at Stories, a wonderful local bookstore, sceney in a cool and vibrant and not an obnoxious way, with a very hand-picked selection of new titles by the front.
"And if I can get up the courage, I'll also stop at Des Pair, which was started by some young people in Echo Park and is the absolute center of a certain poetry scene but I've been too intimidated to go inside! The kids, you see, are into books and bookstores! Indie bookstores are hip! They are cool! And they are also the soul of the world I want to live in, and, luckily, do."
--Rachel Kushner, whose novel Creation Lake (Scribner) is the #1 September Indie Next List pick, in a q&a with Bookselling This Week