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| Milo Michels, Robert Sindelar, and Spencer Ruchti | |
At Third Place Books, Seattle, Wash., Spencer Ruchti is stepping down as author events manager on September 10 to go to graduate school, and Milo Michels, currently assistant events manager, is being promoted to author events manager. Michels was earlier a buyer and events coordinator at Seattle’s University Book Store and a bookseller at Boulder Book Store, Boulder, Colo.
In the fall, Ruchti will study policy and public administration at the University of Washington's Daniel J. Evans School. He joined the company in 2021 and has worked at bookstores for nearly a decade. During his time at Third Place Books, Ruchti guided the store's event series through the Covid-19 pandemic and navigated the return to in-person events after 19 months of virtual programming from 2020 to 2021. (He also wrote an excellent report for Shelf Awareness on his experience in 2024 as a Books Across Borders fellow at the Frankfurt Book Fair.)
Third Place Books co-owner and managing partner Robert Sindelar said, "Coming out of the pandemic, I could not have wished for a better partner in reimagining and rebuilding our author program than Spencer Ruchti. He has been a true literary steward to not only Third Place Books but the entire Seattle book community. Our author events program has never been more diverse, robust, and vibrant than it is today. We will all miss Spencer dearly but are thrilled that we have someone as immensely capable and infectiously enthusiastic as Milo Michels to continue building on the impressive foundation Spencer built."
In 2025, Third Place Books drew more than 21,000 attendees to author events, a 45% increase year-over-year. Third Place Books, which has three locations, hosts nearly 300 author events annually.