Because of Independence Day, we are skipping tomorrow's issue and will see you again on Monday, July 7. Enjoy the holiday!

"Like libraries, indie bookstores are beacons of a decent, flourishing society. I was lucky enough to grow up surrounded by books, not just in school but at home. Every indie bookstore I've visited has its own personality and, most important, knowledgeable, book-loving owners and staff. People who own indie bookstores aren't in it for the money, they're in it because they know how amazing, and amazingly essential, books are for humans to thrive, individually, and in society. More indies = better world."

Strand owner Nancy Bass Wyden at the Lincoln Center store.

The Strand Book Store has officially opened its new location on New York City's Upper West Side. 

It is the second Strand location on the Upper West Side and resides at 2020 Broadway, near Lincoln Center, in a space that previously housed the last remaining Shakespeare & Co. store. The space spans 2,500 square feet and includes a cafe that hasn't reopened yet; the Strand is waiting on permits from the city. The store stocks books for all ages--the Strand's traditional mix of new, used, and rare books--along with a variety of gifts and merchandise, including Studio Strand items.

When the Strand announced the news in May, owner Nancy Bass Wyden said the Strand will continue to employ the current Shakespeare & Co. staff and baristas.

ILovetheUpperWestside offered a tour of the new store.

Page, Print & Pint, a new and used bookstore in Keokuk, Iowa, will open this Saturday, July 5, the Daily Gate reported. 

Owners Willow Carrington and Katarina Page have found a space at 401 Main St., Suite 1, and will carry titles for all ages with an emphasis on fantasy and romance. The store's nonbook offerings include tote bags, stickers, mugs, candles, and more. One of the bookstore's rooms also features a large, fantasy-inspired mural.

Both Page and Carrington are full-time healthcare workers and began selling blind dates with a book about a year ago. Their appearances at various vendor events met with good feedback, and they began saving up to open a bricks-and-mortar store. In April, Carrington learned that a space was available, and they decided to take the plunge. 

The owners are keeping their jobs in healthcare and initially the bookstore will be open only on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Fridays.

The grand opening festivities will feature visits from nine local authors as well as a raffle. Every 10th sale will also receive a free blind date with a book.

Copperfield's Books, which operates several locations in northern California, will be downsizing its Petaluma store and eliminating the used books department by the end of September, the Press Democrat reported. Copperfield's said the changes also include cutting about 60% of the new books section. 

A statement to the bookstore's union from "Copperfield's Books Petaluma Management" referred to the change as an "agonizing decision.... Despite years of effort to make the Copperfield's Books Petaluma used department, sustainable, the store has continued to experience diminished sales and annual losses, and those losses are accelerated, especially in the used department."

Copperfield's COO R.M. Horrell said the decision was made by the board of directors, and the company "is working with the union to ensure a smooth transition for employees and customers," the Press Democrat noted.

The bookstore will lose approximately 6,000 square feet of space by trimming its footprint to approximately 4,100 square feet. Horrell cited high operating costs and the price of rent for the decision, adding: "We've gone through a myriad challenges and changes. And I think being flexible to pivot in order to keep stores operating is just an important part to stay in operation over the years."

Robert Glover, the shop steward, said the union represents 18 staff members in the store, which is the only Copperfield's location with union representation, the Press Democrat noted, adding that the notice sent to the union said the changes will "require a reduction in our workforce" but it is unclear how many employees could be affected.

"The hope is to maintain as much of the store as possible, the hope is as much connection to the community as possible, the hope is to maintain as much as the staff as possible, the hope is to maintain as much of the spirit of the store as is possible," Horrell said. "And in that way, we are going to be able to maintain our presence in the community for as long as possible. And failing to pivot puts all of that at risk."

Roughly a week after the owners of Outside of a Dog Books & Games, Vermillion, S.Dak., announced that the store would close or be sold due to a new anti-trans state law, a trans couple has launched a GoFundMe campaign to help them buy the bookstore, KELO reported.

Elias and Nova Donstad are looking to raise $25,000 and have so far raised just over $8,400. The money will go toward making a competitive offer for the store and will be combined with loans and the Donstads' own money. 

Mike and Jennifer Phelan, owners of Outside of a Dog, have chosen to leave South Dakota for the sake of their children, one of whom is transgender. Nova Donstad told KELO that "we really respect what they're doing for their family because their job as parents of a trans child is to keep their child safe. They're doing that. We believe that our job as trans adults is to work to make South Dakota safe for the next generation of trans."

Elias Donstad, who is pursuing a doctorate in English, said, "I want to be able to keep the love of literature and the love of books alive in Vermillion, especially outside of the University."

Scrawl, Scribble & Smirch Bookshop will open in downtown Gustine, Calif., later this summer, WestsideConnect reported. 

Located at 536 5th St., Scrawl, Scribble & Smirch will sell a mix of new and used titles for all ages. Owner and author Marie Hall will also carry a selection of Spanish- and Portuguese-language books, and her event plans include storytime sessions and writing workshops. Alongside books, stationery, vinyl records, stickers, mugs, and gifts will be available. 

"I just want to create a space where people feel welcome and inspired," Hall told WestsideConnect. "It's a place to browse, connect, and maybe fall in love with a good story."

Hall is planning for a late July opening and will operate at a limited capacity. From there, she will expand hours, programming, and inventory based on community feedback.

Booksellers can apply for a Winter Institute 2026 scholarship but need to do so by July 24. The next Winter Institute will be held in Pittsburgh, Pa., next February 23-26.

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The ABA and Libro.fm have programs and promotional material to counter Amazon Prime "Day," which runs July 8-11. The efforts aim "to show readers that their choices matter" and "highlight the impact of supporting local businesses over Amazon and inspire readers to choose indie." Libro.fm will highlight the difference between it and Amazon's Audible as well as offer members three audiobook credits for the price of one when they start a membership with the code "SWITCH." Also thousands of audiobooks will be on sale.

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Booksellers are encouraged to complete the ABACUS survey by July 8. The free financial benchmarking survey allows booksellers to see how their stores compare to others in terms of profitability, productivity, financial management, and more.

Books & Books, Coral Gables, Fla., hosted Asha Elias, author of The Namaste Club (Morrow), in conversation with Andrew Ortazo. Pictured: (from left) bookseller Cortney Casey; Andrew Otanzo; Asha Elias; events manager Cristina Nosti; store owner Mitchell Kaplan; background: Bubba the alligator.

"Small biz reality check for you all...," courtesy of Betty's Books, Webster Groves, Mo., which shared a video depicting "how people think owners walk in" vs. "how they actually walk in."

"Bookshops are the best sun block. Come in and cool off with a good book!" That was a bit of summer season wisdom on the message board at First Chapter Bookshop, Seneca, S.C.

At Hachette Book Group Sales:

Tobias Madden has joined the company as senior manager, metadata strategy, leading Hachette's metadata team. Madden has an extensive background in digital marketing, both at Ingram and Bloomsbury.

Amanda Marks has joined the company as national account manager, overseeing Amazon sales for Hachette’s distributed clients. Marks was formerly at Barnes & Noble, where she was the frontlist manager responsible for managing inventory levels in stores and DCs across fiction categories.

Stephanie Liccardi is being promoted to associate national account manager, joining the Amazon sales team and focusing on the company's children's catalog.

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At Microcosm:

Leslie Davisson has joined the company as sales director. She has more than 20 years of sales and marketing experience, including at Chronicle Books and Lonely Planet.

Sara Balabanlilar has joined Microcosm as senior sales specialist and marketing manager for WorkingLit. She has been a bookseller, event organizer, and gallerist. Prior to joining Microcosm, she was the marketing and sales director at Deep Vellum Publishing and Dalkey Archive Press.

Little Red Barns: Hiding the Truth, from Farm to Fable by Will Potter (City Lights).

Today:
All Things Considered: Honorée Fanonne Jeffers, author of Misbehaving at the Crossroads: Essays & Writings (Harper, $30, 9780063246638).

Fresh Air: Tamara Yajia, author of Cry for Me, Argentina: My Life as a Failed Child Star (Bloomsbury, $26.99, 9781639733910).

Tomorrow:
CBS Mornings: James Delgado, author of The Great Museum of the Sea: A Human History of Shipwrecks (Oxford University Press, $29.99, 9780197780756).

The View repeat: Geri Halliwell-Horner, author of Rosie Frost: Ice on Fire (Philomel Books, $18.99, 9780593624005).

Book TV airs on C-Span 2 this weekend from 8 a.m. Saturday to 8 a.m. Monday and focuses on political and historical books as well as the book industry. The following are highlights for this coming weekend. For more information, go to Book TV's website.

Sunday, July 6
8 a.m. Mark Skousen, author of The Greatest American: Benjamin Franklin, History's Most Versatile Genius (Republic Book Publishers, $29.99, 9781645721000). (Re-airs Sunday at 9 p.m.)

9 a.m. Ron Chernow, author of Mark Twain (‎Penguin Press, $45, 9780525561729). (Re-airs Sunday at 9 p.m.)

2 p.m. Joan C. Williams, author of Outclassed: How the Left Lost the Working Class and How to Win Them Back (St. Martin's Press, $30, 9781250368966).

3:15 p.m. Adam Becker, author of More Everything Forever: AI Overlords, Space Empires, and Silicon Valley's Crusade to Control the Fate of Humanity (Basic Books, $32, 9781541619593).

4:25 p.m. Peniel E. Joseph, author of Freedom Season: How 1963 Transformed America's Civil Rights Revolution (‎Basic Books, $34, 9781541675896), at Politics and Prose in Washington, D.C.

5:40 p.m. Michael Walsh, author of A Rage to Conquer: Twelve Battles That Changed the Course of Western History (St. Martin's Press, $32, 9781250281364).

6:45 p.m. James Patterson and Bill Clinton, authors of The First Gentleman: A Thriller (Little, Brown, $32, 9780316565103).

Longlists have been selected for the "new-look" Wainwright Prizes, which honor "exceptional nature and conservation" and "spotlight writing and illustration that celebrate the natural world and inspire readers of all ages to protect it." The prizes have expanded to six categories: nature writing, conservation writing, illustrative books, children's fiction, children's nonfiction, and children's picture books. See the longlists here.

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Edinburgh, Scotland publisher Floris Books released the shortlists for this year's Kelpies Prize for Writing and Illustration. Entrants were asked to submit a selection of writing or illustration samples suitable for a children's book. The prize for illustration returns this year after a two-year hiatus. Check out the shortlisted titles here.

The winners will be named on September 5, and each receives a prize package that includes nine months of mentoring with the Floris editorial or design team, £500 (about $680), and consideration for a publishing deal with Floris Books.

Selected new titles appearing next Tuesday, July 8:

Hotel Ukraine by Martin Cruz Smith (Simon & Schuster, $27.99, 9781982188382) is the 11th and final Arkady Renko thriller.

Vera, or Faith: A Novel by Gary Shteyngart (Random House, $28, 9780593595091) follows a struggling family through the eyes of a precocious 10-year-old daughter.

The View From Lake Como: A Novel by Adriana Trigiani (Dutton, $29, 9780593183359) follows a divorced New Jersey woman returning to her roots in Italy.

The Woman in Suite 11 by Ruth Ware (Gallery/Scout Press, $29.99, 9781668025628) is a psychological thriller set at a luxury hotel on Lake Geneva.

All the Men I've Loved Again: A Novel by Christine Pride (Atria, $28.99, 9781668049532) is a romance about a woman faced with two suitors in college and again 20 years later.

The AI Incident by J.E. Thomas (Levine Querido, $18.99, 9781646145089) features a foster child fighting a rogue AI robot.

Love Spells Trouble by Nia Davenport (Bloomsbury, $19.99, 9781547612963) is a YA romcom in which a teen witch starts fake dating a boy from a gentrifying Coven to help save her parents' business.

Mailman: My Wild Ride Delivering the Mail in Appalachia and Finally Finding Home by Stephen Starring Grant (Simon & Schuster, $29.99, 9781668018040) is the memoir of a rural mail carrier.

A Marriage at Sea: A True Story of Love, Obsession, and Shipwreck by Sophie Elmhirst (Riverhead, $28, 9780593854280) chronicles a couple's months together in a life raft after being shipwrecked.

On Her Game: Caitlin Clark and the Revolution in Women's Sports by Christine Brennan (Scribner, $29.99, 9781668090190) looks at an ascendant women's basketball star.

Dinner with King Tut: How Rogue Archaeologists Are Re-creating the Sights, Sounds, Smells, and Tastes of Lost Civilizations by Sam Kean (Little, Brown, $32.50, 9780316496551) explores the discipline called experimental archaeology.

Paperbacks:
Totally and Completely Fine: A Novel by Elissa Sussman (Dell, $18, 9780593725177).

Human History on Drugs: An Utterly Scandalous but Entirely Truthful Look at History Under the Influence by Sam Kelly (Plume, $22, 9780593476048).

Daughters of Palestine: A Memoir in Five Generations by Leyla K. King (Eerdmans, $22.99, 9780802884992).

Climate by Whitney Hanson (Penguin Life, $19, 9780593994238).

From last week's Indie bestseller lists, available at IndieBound.org, here are the recommended titles, which are also Indie Next Great Reads:

Hardcover: An Indies Introduce Title
Great Black Hope: A Novel by Rob Franklin (S&S/Summit Books, $28.99, 9781668077436). "Great Black Hope is an immersive experience of the dilemmas faced by characters confronting a broken justice system and a society that still erects barriers to Black achievement. It is marvelous." --Shane Grebel, Watermark Books & Cafe, Wichita, Kan.

Hardcover
The Salt Stones: Seasons of a Shepherd's Life by Helen Whybrow (Milkweed Editions, $26, 9781571311627). "One of the great gifts of writers is so delicately, artfully, placing characters in our minds that we can fully experience them. Read this for a shepherd's life and the landscapes they inhabit. Beautiful, telling, and human." --John Evans, Camino Books, San Diego, Calif.

Paperback
Of Monsters and Mainframes by Barbara Truelove (Bindery Books, $18.95, 9781964721132). "A delightful found family romp through space! Think if Murderbot was a creature feature. I really can't get over how fantastic and charming this is!" --Athena Palmer, Shelf Life Bookstore, Richmond, Va.

Ages 4-8
There's Something Odd About the Babysitter by Elayne Crain, illus. by John Ledda (Feiwel & Friends, $18.99, 9781250345141). "An adorable and clever book. This is sure to be a story time favorite. Kids and their grownups will both get a kick out of seeing what happens when raccoons decide to go into the childcare business." --Lea Bickerton, The Tiny Bookstore, Pittsburgh, Pa.

Ages 8-12
On Guard!: A Marshall Middle School Graphic Novel by Cassidy Wasserman 
(Random House Graphic, $21.99, 9780593649985). "A story about a middle schooler who discovers fencing for the first time! It helps her make friends, gain confidence, and helps with her mental health while struggling with her parents' divorce. Kids navigating big feelings will feel seen in this." --Meghan Bousquet, Titcomb's Bookshop, East Sandwich, Mass.

Ages 12+
Best of All Worlds by Kenneth Oppel (Scholastic Press, $19.99, 9781546158202). "Best of All Worlds is the book that I didn't know I needed right now. I'm still not sure how I walked away from this mind-bending and dystopian thriller full of hope. You will be DYING to talk to someone about it when you're finished. Hit me up." --Andrea King, Left Bank Books, St. Louis, Mo.

[Many thanks to IndieBound and the ABA!]

"Jamie has never known what to say to her mother. And now--when it matters most of all, when she's on a rescue mission--she knows even less."

At the start of Charlie Jane Anders's Lessons in Magic and Disaster, Jamie's mother, Serena, is struggling. Since the death of her wife, Mae, six years ago, simultaneous with Serena's career imploding, Serena has been holed up with her grief in a one-room schoolhouse in the woods. Now Jamie, wrestling with her dissertation on 18th-century literature, has decided enough is enough. In the interest of pulling Serena out of her black hole, Jamie's finally going to tell her mom her big secret: Jamie is a witch.

But her attempt to teach Serena some nice, wholesome, positivity-based magic misfires, because Serena is prickly, powerful, and pissed at the world. Learning magic proves hazardous, to her and to Jamie. There are also ill effects on Jamie's partner, Ro, an endlessly patient and lovely person whom Jamie values above all--although she's yet to tell Ro about her magic. Meanwhile, the college where Jamie studies and teaches is once more threatening to cut her already pitiful stipend, she's at a sticking point on her dissertation, and her undergraduate students can be terrifying. But she's just discovered a previously unknown document that might decide the authorship of a novel at the heart of her research. And with Serena's frighteningly intense powers, it is both scary and tempting to consider what Jamie might do.

As the younger witch attempts to teach her mother the rules of magic (which self-taught Jamie has defined for herself), both women must confront relationships past and present, with each other and with their partners. In flashback sections, Serena's early years with Mae offer heartbreakingly sweet and thought-provoking reflections on love and childrearing. Jamie's present life with Ro, a Ph.D. candidate in economics, is nerdy and deeply loving, strongly rooted in intentional reinvention of traditional roles. Serena and Jamie are a prickly and troubled mother/daughter duo, but both are earnestly trying to come together. They will face challenges to their love as well as to their personal safety, as the stakes rise in a world of bigotry and social injustice, but they will also form stronger bonds with each other and other strong women.

Anders (Never Say You Can't Survive; All the Birds in the Sky) excels at dialogue and the portrayal of relationships both loving and thorny. Her characters face profoundly serious dangers, but there are frequent notes of levity, joy, fun, and intimacy throughout. Lessons in Magic and Disaster features the magic of spells and charms but also that of human connection, and readers will be richer for the experience. --Julia Kastner, blogger at pagesofjulia

Shelf Talker: Adult daughter and mother, both struggling and bickering, work to come together with magic spells, an impossible dissertation, and lots of love.

The bells ring; the cannon rouse the echoes along the river shore; the boys sally forth with shouts and little flags, and crackers enough to frighten all the people they meet from sunrise to sunset. The orator is conning for the last time the speech in which he has vainly attempted to season with some new spice the yearly panegyric upon our country; its happiness and glory; the audience is putting on its best bib and tucker, and its blandest expression to listen.

--Margaret Fuller, "Fourth of July" (New-York Daily Tribune, July 4, 1845)

At Petunia's Place Bookstore, Fresno, Calif.

I'm not really a Fourth of July Weekend kind of guy. I mean, I'll take the extra day off, but I don't like fireworks (we have two noise-sensitive cats), parades, and--big confession--picnics. I know, there's a deeper meaning to the Independence Day festivities, but for me it's more a day of reflection than celebration. 

Now obviously I love the word independent, as do you, I'm sure. We hold that truth to be self-evident. An independent bookstore or publisher is not just a concept or a blind hope; it's a statement. Okay, a declaration. Since entering the book trade in 1992, how many times have I said or written that word? Every day? According to my quick calculations, that would add up to more than 12,000 days of independent as mantra. 

If there is one aspect of Independence Day that does pop into my brain every year, it's remembering America's great bookseller Henry Knox. As far back as 2007, I wrote about him in a July 4 column. In his book 1776, David McCullough noted that Knox was Boston-born (1750) and self-educated. He "became a bookseller, eventually opening his own London Book Store on Cornhill Street, offering 'a large and very elegant assortment' of the latest books and magazines from London." Although the store was not especially prosperous, it became "a great resort for British officers and Tory ladies," along with troublemakers like John Adams and Nathanael Greene.

Henry Knox by Charles Willson Peale, about 1784

Knox went on to become a Revolutionary War hero in the Continental Army, playing an instrumental role when he conceived and executed the daring relocation of more than 50 mortars and cannons overland from Fort Ticonderoga on Lake Champlain to Boston, an arduous journey of nearly 300 miles that became a turning point in the war. His trip took place during winter months, so it's not a perfect fit with July 4 reflections, but he also passed by not far from where I live in upstate New York, so I feel some measure of kinship with the bookseller's heroic tale. 

While looking for that first Independence Day column, I realized that over the nearly 20 years I have been doing this, I've often ignored Fourth of July as a bookish topic. A quick search of the archives revealed only a few instances when the holiday weekend popped up like a historical marker on the highway. 

In 2008, I considered a couple of word cousins for indie bookstores: dependent and interdependent. Although we lean fiercely on independent, "we are also charter members of many diverse and ever-changing communities, as exemplified by our oddly complementary recent impulses toward social networking online and shopping local on-ground.

"For a long time I thought we should give equal weight to the word 'dependent' when talking about bookshops because we rely so heavily on the kindness, cooperation and generosity of, if not strangers, then certainly of all those equally independent consumers who choose to enter independent bookstores. That's such an amazing impulse, a declaration on their part that we matter to them; that we depend upon one another."

I didn't write about the Fourth again until 2020, when the Covid epidemic prompted a column headlined, "Celebrate Your Freedom to Wear a Face Mask," in which I asked: "How does an independent bookseller celebrate Independence Day during a global pandemic? By masking up and handselling great reads at the proper social distance, damn it!"

A year later, Independence Day prompted a return to the scene of the "don't make us sick" resistance movement with "The Last Word (Probably Not) on Face Masks" and this consideration: "Face mask rules keep changing, as do Covid-19 variants. People continue to be predictably unpredictable in their behavior patterns. Indie booksellers, as usual, must adapt to ever-changing circumstances."

This Fourth of July weekend I'll continue reading two books that are focused upon independence in all its variations: the new Library of America edition of Margaret Fuller's Collected Writings, and Megan Marshall's 2013 biography Margaret Fuller: A New American Life (Mariner Books). 

In "Fourth of July," Fuller wrote: "And yet, no heart, we think, can beat to-day with one pulse of genuine, noble joy. Those who have obtained their selfish objects will not take especial pleasure in thinking of them to-day, while to unbiassed minds must come sad thoughts of national honor soiled in the eyes of other nations, of a great inheritance risked, if not forfeited.

"Much has been achieved in this country since the Declaration of Independence. America is rich and strong; she has shown great talent and energy; vast prospects of aggrandizement open before her. But the noble sentiment which she expressed in her early youth is tarnished; she has shown that righteousness is not her chief desire, and her name is no longer a watchword for the highest hopes to the rest of the world. She knows this, but takes it very easily; she feels that she is growing richer and more powerful, and that seems to suffice her."

Food for thought on this Independence Day Weekend.