"The decision came completely out of the response [at BEA], particularly the response of women booksellers."--Michael Pietsch, publisher of Little, Brown, explaining to the New York Times why the cover of The Diviners by Rick Moody, to be published September 12, has been changed to reflect more accurately the context of the "shirtless, Conan the Barbarian-type warrior" in the novel.

Sue Flynn, a Scholastic sales rep, has won the Helmuth Sales Rep of the Year Award from the New Atlantic Independent Booksellers Association. NAIBA will present the award to Flynn at the Breakfast of Champions on Monday, Oct. 17, during the association's trade show in Atlantic City, N.J.

What may be the most amusing and accurate of various NAIBA bookseller recommendations on her behalf came from Karen Beem of Newtown Bookshop in Newtown, Pa., who said, "Anyone who can keep going through six Harry Potter books deserves not only rep of the year but the Nobel Prize, the Legion of Honor and a long cruise to a quiet place with no wizards or witches." Oh, and she added that Flynn is "always prepared, knows her books, knocks herself out for her accounts."

For her part, Ellen Mager of Secret Garden Children's Bookstore and Gallery, Doylestown, Pa., said Flynn "is genuinely interested and concerned about the needs of individual independent bookstores and gets to know the owner and staff. . . . I can honestly say that in my 23 years of business, Sue rates as one of my favorite reps."

Before joining Scholastic six years ago, Flynn was a district field service manager and national chain buyer for Sher Distributing. Earlier she worked for a chain. She said she has always wanted to own a bookstore and called repping for Scholastic "the best of both worlds. Not only was I back in the bookstore but many bookstores and I was there to talk about the books I love and the books you love."

The Lansing State Journal has a Q&A with John David Hinkle, who opened John David's Lightly Used Books in Lansing, Mich., April 1, and markets it as a "no-hate zone for the LGBT community and their friends."

Asked about what gay and lesbian titles he stocks, he answered: "I try to stay away from the political stuff or the analytical. Fiction seems to go really well [rather] than commentary. And if it has a naked person on the cover, that doesn't hurt."

---

Ingram Publisher Services has added four more publishers to its roster:

• MQ Publications, with offices in London and New York, which Ingram calls "one of the U.K.'s fastest-growing and innovative publishers of illustrated nonfiction."
• Roli Books, based in India and founded in 1976, the leading art and illustrated book publisher of themes and subjects related to India.
• Michael O'Mara Books, a family-owned London publishing house now entering its 20th year. O'Mara Books offers bestselling biography, innovative humor and commercial children's books.
• Phoenix Books and Audio, Michael Viner's new venture that primarily publishes popular audiobooks by authors such as Danielle Steel and Bill Maher.

IPS, which launched in March, already distributes Bloomberg Press, Applewood Books, Champion Press, Integrity Publishers and Make Believe Ideas. On September 1, Ingram begins distributing O'Reilly Media.

---

Barnes & Noble will open a store in Frederick, Md., in August 2006. Located at 5500 Buckeystown Pike in the Francis Scott Key Mall, the store will stock close to 200,000 book, music, DVD and magazine titles and have a cafe serving Starbucks coffee.

In October, the Davis-Kidd Booksellers store in Nashville, Tenn., is moving three blocks to larger quarters in the Mall at Green Hills, where it was located for a time, but in different space, some 15 years ago.

The site, which is new construction, is nearly 30,000 square feet, almost 8,000 square feet larger than the current location. All parts of the store will have more space since "we've pretty much crammed everything we can into the building we have," marketing manager Ginger Knight told Shelf Awareness. "The added space will be most noticeable in the music department and kids' department." (Although music sales have been off key at most retailers, at Davis-Kidd music is "doing really well," Knight said. Among the reasons: it's Nashville, a music center; the store has an emphasis on local music; and there is no music store nearby.)

The new Davis-Kidd will also feature some touches common to the newer stores in Pittsburgh, Pa., and Charlotte, N.C., operated by parent company Joseph-Beth, including a fireplace and fountain.

The timing of the move has a striking symmetry. The current Nashville Davis-Kidd closes October 24, and the new store opens the 29th, exactly 25 years and a day after the store's founding.

---

In other Joseph-Beth news, the company has joined with AuthorHouse, which specializes in self-published authors, to create a program to help local writers become published. Called Fresh Voices in Print, the program will provide Joseph-Beth Publishing Packages that offer book design, advance copies, five copies displayed in the Joseph-Beth or Davis-Kidd closest to the author and in-store signings. Books will be displayed for at least eight weeks in the store.

Joseph-Beth has regularly offered seminars dealing with writing and getting published. AuthorHouse, Bloomington, Ind., offers aspiring authors a basic publishing plan for $899 that includes the Joseph-Beth program, design and printing services, distribution through Ingram, availability at Amazon and B&N.com and two advance copies of the book.

The renamed Midwest Booksellers Association (ne Upper Midwest Booksellers Association) meets Friday-Sunday, Sept. 23-25, at RiverCentre in downtown St. Paul, Minn., for its 25th annual trade show. Events will be held in the Roy Wilkins Auditorium; thanks to renovations and some new MBA features, the space should be very user-friendly, according to executive director Susan Walker.

Friday's Booksellers School educational sessions include the ABA's Len Vlahos on profitability; how to work effectively with publishers and vendors; e-newsletters; outside sales; building community connections; marketing the bookstore (led by Max Lenderman, author of Experience the Message); selling audio books; and selling travel books, conducted by the one and only Arthur Frommer.

The rep pick-of-the-list presentations will focus on children's, adult and university press/regional publishers and run for an ambitious six hours--up from just two hours last year. (Walker said that the increase came after "the enthusiastic response from both bookseller and participating publishers and reps last year.") The sessions end with a meeting of the Minnesota Crime Wave, four Minnesota mystery authors who, costumed, will talk about the genre, their work, promotion, writing and publishing--and aim to entertain.

The Friday welcome reception now includes a reception for the winners and honor mention recipients of the first Midwest Booksellers' Choice Awards. Two winners will speak: nonfiction winner Thomas Frank, author of What's the Matter with Kansas?, and children's literature winner Blue Balliett, author of Chasing Vermeer.

Author events include the Saturday book & author breakfast, the Saturday book & author dinner and Sunday's book & author breakfast. The Sunday moveable feast authors lunch features 26 writers; the keynote speaker is Faith Sullivan, author of Gardenias.

The trade show takes place Saturday from 10:30 a.m.-5 p.m. and Sunday 9 a.m.-1 p.m.

For more information, go to www.midwestbooksellers.org.

Tonight Charlie Rose hosts two screen legends with recent books and accompanying audios that they read: Lauren Bacall, whose By Myself and Then Some (HarperEntertainment, $26.95, 0060755350; HarperAudio CD, $29.95, 0060835303) updates her earlier memoir, By Myself, and Jane Fonda, author of My Life So Far (Random House, $26.95, 0375507108; Random Audio abridged CD, $34.95, 0739319841, abridged cassette, $34.95, 0739319833).

---

Tomorrow's Early Show glitters with Marne Davis Kellogg, whose Perfect (St. Martin's, $24.95, 0312337329) features Kick Keswick, the international jewel thief, fabulous dresser, gourmet cook and woman-about-town.

---

The lineup for tomorrow's Today Show includes Tom Oliphant, who cheers for his own new book, Praying for Gil Hodges: A Memoir of the 1955 World Series and One Family's Love of the Brooklyn Dodgers (St. Martin's/Thomas Dunne, $24.95, 0312317611).

---

Also on the Today Show tomorrow, Richard Lavoie talks about his It's So Much Work to Be Your Friend: Helping the Child with Learning Disabilities Find Social Success (Touchstone, $25, 0743254635).

---

Tomorrow Diane Rehm riffs with Stacy Schiff, whose new book is A Great Improvisation: Franklin, France and the Birth of America (Holt, $30.95, 0805066330).

---

Tomorrow on Leonard Lopate, the fictional or nonfictional Bret Easton Ellis, author of Lunar Park (Knopf, $24.95, 0375412913), may or may not appear.

---

Tomorrow's Bookworm features Umberto Eco, whose new book is The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana, translated by Geoffrey Brock (Harcourt, $27, 0151011400). As the show describes it: "The loss of memory is Umberto Eco's subject here. After a stroke, an antiquarian bookseller remembers every book he's read--but he remembers nothing about himself. In this conversation, Eco talks about the difference between memories 'made of paper' and vital memories--those transformed by the experience of love."

Book TV airs on C-Span 2 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 Web site.

Saturday, August 27

7 p.m. Encore Booknotes. The late Harold Stassen, former president of the University of Pennsylvania, governor of Minnesota and perennial presidential candidate, talked about his book Eisenhower: Turning the World Toward Peace.

8 p.m. History on Book TV. In an event hosted by the Atlanta History Center, Winston Groom talked about the first year of World World II for the U.S., as related in his new book, 1942: The Year That Tried Men's Souls (Atlantic Monthly Press, $27.50, 0871138891).

Sunday, August 28

6 p.m. After Words. Janet Langhart, a former model, journalist and TV personality, current president and CEO of Langhart Communications and  author of From Rage to Reason: My Life in Two Americas (Dafina Books, $15, 0758203942)--and wife of former Senator and Defense Secretary William S. Cohen--interviews Sheldon Hackney, former president of the University of Pennsylvania, former chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities and author of Magnolias Without Moonlight: The American South From Regional Confederacy to National Integration (Transaction Publishers, $29.95, 0765802937). In his book, Hackney discusses the political transformation of the American South and the "identity politics" that continue to shape it. (Re-airs at 9 p.m.)