"While their numbers certainly aren't what they once were, independent bookstores continue to defend their peculiar niche against slim profit margins, large chain bookstores, and the rising tide of e-book vendors.... Observers say a special blend of local flavor, dedication to physical books, accessibility to author tours, and a business model that includes other revenue streams has helped to keep the lights on for many independent bookstores."

Joe Mayes and Diane Boeglin Mayes

Husband and wife team Joe Mayes and Diane Boeglin Mayes plan to open a new and used independent bookstore in Leander, Tex., later this month called Patchouli Joe's Books & Indulgences, Community Impact reported.

In addition to fiction, nonfiction and a variety of children's books, Patchouli Joe's will sell nonbook items including coffee, soaps and candles. The store's grand opening celebration, set for Labor Day weekend, will feature drawings and giveaways as well as visits from local artists and artisans.

"We are dedicated to creating not only a place to purchase books (and indulgences)," Joe and Diane Mayes wrote. "Rather, we want to create a space that engages and reaches all the senses. And not only the five physical senses. We also want your spirit engaged too."

Covered Treasures Bookstore in Monument, Colo., is back on its feet and celebrating its 26th anniversary a year after suffering extensive water damage and undergoing months of renovations, the Tribune reported.

On the morning of July 6, 2018, Covered Treasures owner Tommie Plank and several employees discovered that a toilet intake valve on the floor above the bookstore had ruptured sometime overnight. When Plank opened the bookstore, there were waterlogged ceiling panels all over the floor, wiring hanging from the ceiling and water still coming down from the floor above.

Despite the severity of the damage, most of it was concentrated in the bookstore's front room, and Plank and her colleagues were able to reopen on a limited basis only five weeks later by operating out of the undamaged parts of the building.

Since the flooding, the historic building has undergone significant repairs and renovations. The bookstore has all new flooring and lighting. Large sections of the building's original stucco walls had to be removed, and the entire building has new electrical wiring.

The bookstore's layout has changed, but that was planned even before the flooding and subsequent renovation work. Covered Treasures is next door to a pharmacy that is owned and managed by the building's owners, Lee and Rob Frisbie. Prior to last summer, Plank and the Frisbies had agreed to essentially trade rooms, with Covered Treasures giving up its former children's room in exchange for two other rooms. Now the bookstore uses those new rooms as a children's area, book club meeting space and some office space.

Plank and her staff reported being very happy with the renovations and the store's new layout. Pam Sparks, one of Covered Treasures' booksellers, told the Tribune: "I like the way it turned out but I wouldn't recommend this reason for a remodel."

The store was able to move back into the main part of the building last November, and renovations were officially completed in December. On July 18, Covered Treasures held a party celebrating its 26th anniversary. And while the repair work has been finished for a while, Plank continues to rebuild the store's inventory and there are still boxes to be unpacked.

Plank said she was grateful for her customers' support over the past year. "We did have a couple of customers donate some money, and some customers donate some time to do some work in the shop," she recalled. "People helped us move books and bookcases a number of times while work was being done. A couple came and painted the ugly subfloors so they wouldn't look so bad. It's been so heartwarming. They made a really devastating situation something we could put hope in."

Café Éclair, a coffee shop and bookstore, has opened in Montreal, Canada, Eater Montreal reported.

The cafe side of the business sells coffee from Bows and Arrows, Victoria, British Columbia, and The Barn, Berlin, Germany, along with a variety of pastries. The bookstore side, meanwhile, sells a small but highly curated selection of new books in both French and English.

Chantale Potié and Éléonore Schreiber are responsible for the bookstore half of the business, which grew out of a pop-up shop, or "micro-library," that they ran at several other Montreal cafes.

Russell Perreault

Russell Perreault, v-p, executive director of publicity and social media at Vintage Anchor, died on Saturday, July 27. He was 52. He began his career in 1990 as a publicist with Doubleday and then held publicity jobs at Vintage, Scribner and Oxford University Press before joining Vintage Anchor in 2000.

In a memorial, Vintage Anchor publisher Anne Messitte called Perreault "a beloved colleague--exuberant, funny, precocious, smart, and in possession of an infectious enthusiasm for books and authors. He was a well-rounded, discerning, and passionate reader, and these attributes made him one of the very best at his job. He worked with hundreds of authors throughout his 25-year career at Vintage Anchor--including Robert Caro, Joan Didion, Maxine Hong Kingston, Sandra Cisneros, Michael Ondaatje, Jhumpa Lahiri, Sister Helen Prejean, Julie Otsuka, Erik Larson, E.L. James, Cheryl Strayed, Chris Bohjalian, and Alexander McCall Smith. Russell always brought a frontlist mentality to backlist publishing; he was quick to both act on and develop opportunities in the market, as he did recently with James Baldwin's I Am Not Your Negro, putting together a bestselling book in connection with the release of the award-winning film.

"Russell had a great instinct for social media in its nascent stages. Creating and managing more than 300 Facebook pages for authors and literary estates, he was a pioneer in recognizing the value of social media as a resource for readers and writers. With his team at Vintage, Russell established and continued to run the verified Facebook accounts for many of the world's greatest writers, including William Shakespeare, Charles Dickens, Jane Austen, Plato, Socrates, Charlotte Brontë, Leo Tolstoy, Victor Hugo, Mark Twain, Edgar Allan Poe, Arthur Conan Doyle, Emily Dickinson, and Ben Franklin. Under his auspices, the Vintage Anchor and Everyman's Library social footprint for authors and their work blossomed to a reach of more than 200 million, and his personally curated Vintage Anchor Facebook page became one of the largest social platforms in adult publishing. Russell also liaised with motion picture studios and television production companies on our movie tie-in program, making it one of the most robust in the industry. He was trusted by agents, booksellers, and media colleagues and that trust, earned over decades, served our authors and their books well. In short, Russell was a unique, dynamic, and multitalented publishing executive, and at Vintage Anchor, one of our very favorite people to work with and be around.

"On a personal note, Russell's devotion to family, friends, and life in New Milford, Conn., was legendary: the beautiful, historic home that he restored with his beloved husband, Reed Maroc, the gentleman's farm they both worked alongside their dog, Cassie, and the farm chickens who came to enjoy a certain fame on Instagram, the regular Saturday dinners they shared with their neighbor and dear friend Brooke Hayward, and Russell's weekly gifts to colleagues of eggs laid by his hens, garlic grown in his garden, and movie screeners. During his work weeks in New York, Russell pursued his passions for theater and film, and, without fail, his commitment to workouts in the pool and at the gym--his preternatural fitness shamed us all. So did his wry wit and command of industry gossip. Time spent in Russell's company was always great fun, and it's hard to imagine our publishing group and the industry he loved without him."

E.L. James wrote: "Russell was a dear and trusted friend. Loyal, articulate, and cultured, with a wicked sense of humour. I adored him, and I am heartbroken that he's no longer with us."

Sloane Crosley, who worked with Perreault for nine years, wrote: "He was the most generous, warm, curious, quick, and darkly funny person I've ever met. He was exacting in his tastes--his delight over a book or film was as contagious as his exasperation. He also had a horror of compliments and refused to acknowledge the impact he had on so many writers, both the ones he worked for and the ones he worked with. I felt spoiled to be his friend. He was, in short, my favorite person."

Congratulations to Main Street Books in Orleans, Mass., which is celebrating 15 years in business this summer.

Throughout the month of August, the store will host weekly raffles of gift certificates and other merchandise. The store is also one of the 21 independent bookstores across Cape Cod, Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket taking part in the Cape & Islands Bookstore Trail this summer. Similar to the ever-popular Independent Bookstore Day passports, readers can earn rewards for visiting participating bookstores.

Located in an historic building in Orleans Village Center, Main Street Books carries literary fiction, nonfiction and children's and YA books, along with an ample offering of books about Cape Cod.

Len Riggio

Len Riggio, executive chairman of Barnes & Noble, which will soon be sold to private equity company Elliott Management, recently showed a great deal of generosity to a group of students who are mostly from poor and working-class families: he has donated $1 million to the "100 Strong Scholarship Fund," which will provide full tuition for 100 recent high school graduates who are beginning studies this fall at Kingsborough Community College in Brooklyn, N.Y., according to the Brooklyn Paper. Riggio announced the donation after giving the keynote address at the college's commencement ceremony on June 13.

Claudia V. Schader, president of Kingsborough Community College, the only community college in Brooklyn, said the scholarships would help students focus on education and not worry about finances. "Many of our students are the first in their families to go to college," she continued. "Many work full- and part-time jobs, and care for their children and parents. Mr. Riggio's very generous gift will allow these students the opportunity to focus on their academic success and lifelong learning, without concerns of how they will fund their education."

Claire Fallon has joined Coffee House Press as the marketing and communications assistant.

The Warehouse: A Novel by Rob Hart (Crown).

Tomorrow:
Dr. Phil: Mike Bayer, author of Best Self: Be You, Only Better (Dey Street, $26.99, 9780062911735).

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.

Saturday, August 3
7:45 p.m. Ganesh Sitaraman, co-author of The Public Option: How to Expand Freedom, Increase Opportunity, and Promote Equality (Harvard University Press, $25.95, 9780674987333), at Politics and Prose in Washington, D.C.

8:40 p.m. Jennifer Grossman, co-author of Anthem: The Graphic Novel (Atlas Society, $12.95, 9781732603707). (Re-airs Sunday at 7:35 a.m.)

9 p.m. Ryan Grim, author of We've Got People: From Jesse Jackson to AOC, the End of Big Money and the Rise of a Movement (Strong Arm Press, $17.76, 9781947492387), at Politics and Prose.

10 p.m. Michael Malice, author of The New Right: A Journey to the Fringe of American Politics (All Points Books, $28.99, 9781250154668). (Re-airs Sunday at 9 p.m. and Monday at 12 a.m. and 3 a.m.)

11 p.m. Kevin Williamson, author of The Smallest Minority: Independent Thinking in the Age of Mob Politics (Gateway Editions, $28.99, 9781621579687). (Re-airs Sunday at 5:30 p.m.)

11:45 p.m. Christopher Ketcham, author of This Land: How Cowboys, Capitalism, and Corruption are Ruining the American West (Viking, $29, 9780735220980), at Old Firehouse Books in Fort Collins, Colo.

Sunday, August 4
12 p.m. Live In-Depth q&a with Lee Edwards, author of William F. Buckley Jr.: The Maker of a Movement (Intercollegiate Studies Institute, $16.95, 9781610171557). (Re-airs Sunday at 10 p.m.)

The finalists for the 2019 Ngaio Marsh Awards, honoring the best in New Zealand crime writing, are:

Novel:
This Mortal Boy by Fiona Kidman
Money in the Morgue by Ngaio Marsh & Stella Duffy
The Quaker by Liam McIlvanney
Call Me Evie by JP Pomare
The Vanishing Act by Jen Shieff

First Novel:
One for Another by Andrea Jacka
Crystal Reign by Kelly Lyndon
Call Me Evie by JP Pomare

Nonfiction:
The Great New Zealand Robbery by Scott Bainbridge
The Short Life and Mysterious Death of Jane Furlong by Kelly Dennett
Behind Bars by Anna Leask
The Cause of Death by Cynric Temple-Camp

Winners will be announced September 14.

Selected new titles appearing next Tuesday, August 6:

Travel Light, Move Fast by Alexandra Fuller (Penguin Press, $27, 9781594206740) is a biography about the author's late South African farmer father.

The Ghosts of Eden Park: The Bootleg King, the Women Who Pursued Him, and the Murder That Shocked Jazz-Age America by Karen Abbott (Crown, $28, 9780451498625) tells the story of a Prohibition-era kingpin and the female prosecutor who went after him.

A Dangerous Man by Robert Crais (Putnam, $28, 9780525535683) is the 18th Elvis Cole and Joe Pike mystery.

The Turn of the Key by Ruth Ware (Gallery/Scout Press, $27.99, 9781501188770) is a psychological thriller about a dream nanny job gone wrong.

The Perfect Wife: A Novel by JP Delaney (Ballantine, $27, 9781524796747) follows a woman with memory loss supposedly revived five years after a bad accident.

The Wolf Wants In: A Novel by Laura McHugh (Spiegel & Grau, $26, 9780399590283) is a thriller set in a rural Kansas town with a high overdose rate and child bones in the woods.

Lost You by Haylen Beck (Crown, $26, 9781524759582) is psychological thriller about two women fighting over a child each believes is hers.

I'm Not Dying With You Tonight (Sourcebooks Fire, $17.99, 9781492678892) is duo Gilly Segal and Kimberly Jones' debut YA novel about two teenage girls--one black, one white--helping each other navigate a race riot.

Bringing Down a President: The Watergate Scandal by Andrea Balis and Elizabeth Levy, illustrated by Tim Foley (Roaring Brook, $19.99, 9781250176790) is a middle-grade nonfiction account of the Watergate scandal.

Paperbacks:
Watching You: A Novel by Lisa Jewell (Atria, $16.99, 9781501190087).

Life and Other Inconveniences by Kristan Higgins (Berkley, $16, 9780451489425).

Fight Like a Girl, Second Edition: How to Be a Fearless Feminist by Megan Seely (NYU Press, $28, 9781479810109).

Movies:
Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark, based on the children's horror anthology by Alvin Schwartz and illustrated by Stephen Gammell, opens August 9. A movie tie-in edition (HarperCollins, $7.99, 9780062961280) is available.

The Art of Racing in the Rain, based on the novel by Garth Stein, opens August 9. Kevin Costner, Milo Ventimiglia and Amanda Seyfried star in this story about a golden retriever and an aspiring Formula One driver. A movie tie-in edition (Harper, $9.99, 9780062370945) is available.

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

Hardcover
Stay and Fight: A Novel by Madeline ffitch (Farrar, Straus and Giroux, $27, 9780374268121). "From the first page of this debut novel set deep in Appalachia, we know that Stay and Fight is aptly named, for the way it explores the constant struggle of its characters to stay where they are while fighting for a better existence. ffitch expertly shows us the romantic, albeit brutally raw, reality of living off the grid (on one's own terms, most importantly), a feat she somehow accomplishes in the most modestly ambitious way. Stay and Fight is fantastic." --Caridad Cole, Community Bookstore, Brooklyn, N.Y.

Hardcover: An Indies Introduce Title
Late Migrations: A Natural History of Love and Loss by Margaret Renkl (Milkweed Editions, $24, 9781571313782). "Margaret Renkl feels the lives and struggles of each creature that enters her yard as keenly as she feels the paths followed by her mother, grandmother, her people. Learning to accept the sometimes harsh, always lush natural world may crack open a window to acceptance of our own losses. In Late Migrations, we welcome new life, mourn its passing, and honor it along the way." --Kat Baird, The Book Bin, Corvallis, Ore.

Paperback
The Bookish Life of Nina Hill: A Novel by Abbi Waxman (Berkley, $16, 9780451491879). "What a joyous, charming, funny, and beautiful celebration of books and the people who love them. There is so much detail in both the wonderful, wide-ranging cast of characters and in the setting. Quirky in the very best sense of the word. I will certainly return to the world of Nina Hill again and again." --Leah Koch, The Ripped Bodice, Culver City, Calif.

For Ages 4 to 8
If I Was the Sunshine by Julie Fogliano, illustrated by Loren Long (Atheneum, $17.99, 9781481472432). "I am in love with this new picture book! Fogliano's sweet text about love paired with Loren Long's gorgeous, color-bursting illustrations is perfection. (Spoiler: the very best one is of enormous waves with text that reads, 'If I was the ocean and you were a boat, you'd call me wild.'). If a customer is in need of a perfect story, I'll hand them this one in a heartbeat." --Jen Wills Geraedts, Beagle and Wolf Books & Bindery, Park Rapids, Minn.

For Ages 9 to 12
The Girl Who Sailed the Stars by Matilda Woods, illustrated by Anuska Allepuz (Philomel, $16.99, 9780525515241). "You can't lose with text by Matilda Woods and illustrations by Anuska Allepuz. It's impossible not to love whatever magical thing they create, and The Girl Who Sailed the Stars is no exception. This book was whimsical and imaginative from page one, and I loved discovering new things alongside the curious and bold Oona--the sea cats are also a delightful part of this universe. Pick this one up as soon as you can!" --Melissa Music, The Story Shop, Monroe, Ga.

For Teen Readers
Teen Titans: Raven by Kami Garcia, illustrated by Gabriel Picolo (DC Ink, $16.99, 9781401286231). "Kami Garcia has taken an iconic Teen Titans character and turned her into a beautiful warrior in her latest graphic novel. After Raven's foster mother is killed in a car accident, she relocates to New Orleans with no memory of her previous life, moving in with her foster mother's sister and her daughter, Max. Through Max and her new high school friends, Raven discovers a whole new life that includes hearing others' thoughts and influencing their actions. At turns frightened and joyful at these powers, Raven struggles to find a balance to her powers. Garcia has brought wonderful depth to this Teen Titans powerhouse." --Annie Carl, The Neverending Bookshop, Edmonds, Wash.

[Many thanks to IndieBound and the ABA!]

Dana Thomas thinks it's time for clotheshorses to take a page from locavores, who have made it their business, for reasons of health and ecology, to know where their food is coming from. In the thoroughgoing and invigorating Fashionopolis: The Price of Fast Fashion--and the Future of Clothes, she suggests that being fashion-forward means knowing the origin story of our favorite pair of jeans.

Fashionopolis begins with a historical overview of the textile industry, which clings to two ideas from manufacturing's enduring 250-year-old, mass-production model: products must exist before they can be sold, and the more that's made, the cheaper the per-unit cost. In times of "fast fashion" and even faster machines, that's a recipe for a throwaway-clothes culture. Unfortunately, some apparent antidotes to the problem--Thomas devotes chapters to Sewbots, 3-D printing and other environmentally friendly modern breakthroughs--come with other costs. She acknowledges that industry people have foretold that at a certain point, direct-to-consumer sales, while a move in the green direction, will mean the end of department stores. And, of course, robots, which promise efficiency that can keep down expenses for a conscientious company, kill jobs.

Thomas pins her hopes on the examples set by a batch of forward-thinking companies ranging in size from petite to extra-large. Most readers of Fashionopolis will already know that Stella McCartney has long been a proponent of sustainability in the fashion industry: her company has been cruelty-free from the start, and in 2010 she banned known carcinogen PVC from her products. Among those also fighting the good fight, albeit more quietly, is Tennessee's Sarah Bellos, whose Stony Creek Colors produces indigo, which, until she founded her company in 2012, hadn't been commercially farmed in the United States for more than a century. Why not? Because synthetic indigo, used in 99.99% of the denim we wear, is much cheaper to make. It's also made with toxic chemicals. Was that not the origin story of your favorite jeans that you were hoping for?

Thomas, the author of Deluxe: How Luxury Lost Its Luster and Gods and Kings: The Rise and Fall of Alexander McQueen and John Galliano, approaches Fashionopolis as both an intrepid investigative reporter and an aesthete. One of her many interviewees tidily fuses Thomas's two main concerns--the environment and good design--when she says, "If people still had seamstresses in their families, they wouldn't be chucking things away like they do." --Nell Beram, author and freelance writer

Shelf Talker: This trenchant look at how clothes are produced today is both an environmentalist cri de coeur and an homage to good design.