Reagan Arthur (photo: Michael Lionstar)

Reagan Arthur, who was abruptly let go as executive v-p and publisher of Knopf on May 20, is returning to Hachette Book Group as senior v-p, publisher, effective September 23. She will launch and head a boutique imprint within the Grand Central Publishing Group and edit key authors throughout Hachette. The new imprint will publish four to six titles per year by literary and commercial authors.

Arthur will also collaborate with Hachette UK sister imprint Sceptre and co-publish select titles with Sceptre executive publisher Federico Andornino. In addition, Arthur will head up HBG and HUK's Bridges program, Hachette's World English Language efforts, and work closely with David Shelley, CEO of Hachette Book Group and Hachette UK, to continue strengthening international publishing collaboration.

Arthur joined Little, Brown in 2001 as senior editor, founded the Reagan Arthur Books imprint in 2010, and became senior v-p and publisher in 2013. She edited and published dozens of bestsellers, major debuts, and award winners, including titles by Tina Fey, Elin Hilderbrand, Michael Connelly, Malcolm Gladwell, Dr. Mark Hyman, James Patterson, Kate Atkinson, Joshua Ferris, Eleanor Catton, George Pelecanos, and David Sedaris.

In February 2020, Arthur became senior v-p and publisher of Knopf, Pantheon, and Schocken, succeeding Sonny Mehta, who died in December 2019 and had identified her as his first choice for the role. While at Knopf, she oversaw the publication of Tess Gunty's National Book Award-winning novel Rabbit Hutch, Gabrielle Zevin's Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Jayne Anne Phillips's Pulitzer Prize winner, Night Watch. She also worked with Ian McEwan, Nathan Hill, Clemence Michallon, and Bono.

Shelley called Arthur "one of the legendary editors and publishers, as well as one of the most fun and collegial people to work with. I know that she will add tremendous value to the company in the years to come in terms of publishing some of our most well-loved authors; introducing new bestsellers to the company at her GCP imprint; and fostering even greater collaboration between Hachette US and UK in her role leading our Bridges program."

Arthur commented: "I couldn't be happier to come back to the Hachette colleagues and authors I admire so deeply. And I'm honored to have the opportunity to launch a new imprint at GCP, where Ben Sevier is such an impressive publisher, and in collaboration with Fede Andornino, whose books have provided me with enormous pleasure."

Following its debut as a pop-up store, All the Tropes Bookstore will open a bricks-and-mortar storefront in Atlanta, Ga., later this summer, What Now Atlanta reported.

All the Tropes will open a storefront next month.

The store, which specializes in romance books, will open in Atlanta's Kirkwood neighborhood, on the city's east side. The shop will have a "dark Victorian vibe, with lots of black, gold, and deep green and purple" noted What Now, and the inventory will consist of a wide range of romance titles. When it's up and running, the bookstore will also host signings, workshops, and other events.

Owner Kate McNeil hopes to have the store open in time for Bookstore Romance Day on August 17, though construction may end up taking a bit longer. In the meantime, she has been making pop-up appearances at events like the Kirkwood Spring Fling festival and selling books online. One of the store's next pop-up appearances will be at the Kirkwood Wine Stroll on September 20.

McNeil told What Now that prior to the Covid-19 pandemic, she wasn't much of a romance reader. While stuck at home with a lot of downtime, she found herself browsing BookTok, where she saw tons of recommendations for romance titles. She decided to try one out, and was soon "obsessed." Her new passion for romance then led her to finding communities with other romance readers online.

"They're the greatest human beings I've ever met," McNeil said. "I thought, 'I want to have a romance bookstore, I want to connect with people, I want to share my love and theories and all the things with these people.' Honestly, it's the best group."

It took some time, but eventually McNeil found a suitable spot in Kirkwood. "I love my neighborhood. I'm so glad I have a space here."

Road Less Traveled Books opened earlier this month at 33300 Thomas St. in downtown Farmington, Mich. Hometown Life reported that the new bookshop "has shelves stocked with books for every kind of reader alongside classic games, toys, puzzles and other novelties."

"I really want this to be a place where people feel like they can sit down and stay for a while," said owner Chuck Allore. "I love books, and I love keeping busy. My plan has always been to retire in a nice place that didn't have a bookstore. Farmington was perfect."

Allore and his team have been renovating the space, located in a former office building, for about two years. He said he hopes the store becomes a "third place," and it will have plenty of space to sit and read, as well as enjoy cups of Ground Control Coffee Roasters coffee.

He also noted that he especially thinks his stock of puzzles and classic games will give people an excuse to spend time with loved ones. "The games are nostalgic," he said. "It was important to me to get those classic games like Scrabble and Monopoly. I hope people get off their screens and use these for family game night."

Allore previously owned a bookstore in Brighton that closed in 2004. Entering retirement, he expects revisiting the reading industry will be a fun way to stay busy, adding that Farmington is the perfect place for an independent bookseller. 

Macmillan is creating a new imprint, 23rd Street Books, which will publish graphic novels for adults that "span styles and genres, from the hilarious to the serious, from the escapist to the realest, from high-octane fiction in every genre to groundbreaking nonfiction--with a trademark commitment to aesthetics and editorial excellence."

23rd Street Books will be headed by Mark Siegel, who founded First Second in 2006, and is now v-p, executive editorial & creative director for both First Second and 23rd Street Books. Editorial director Calista Brill, who joined First Second in 2008, will work closely with Siegel on both imprints. Creative director Kirk Benshoff will oversee both art departments. Tess Banta has joined 23rd Street Books as editor, and additional staff will be hired. First Second will continue to publish and acquire graphic novels for children and teens.

23rd Street Books is launching next year with publications from First Second creators Gene Luen Yang and Ben Hatke; actor/comedian Damon Wayans, Jr., and poet/performer Saul Williams; and new talents, including Jesse Lonergan, Anna Meyer, and Laurel and Mia Boulton. In addition, First Second's graphic novels for adults, including the Adventure Zone series, will join the 23rd Street list.

Siegel said, "First Second is growing... It's now :01 + 23! This new line will wow you, thrill you, entertain, provoke, inform, and excite you. Whether you're a reader, a creator, a librarian, or a bookseller, I hope that you will join us in the next chapter of this exploding comics renaissance!"

Allison Verost, senior v-p and publisher of Roaring Brook Press, Farrar, Straus & Giroux Books for Young Readers, First Second, and now 23rd Street Books, commented: "Far more than a publishing catalog, this new imprint is a creative lab, an incubator for the future of the medium. Beyond capitalizing on an existing market, 23rd Street aims to lead it, shape it, and champion its most visionary minds. I'm incredibly excited to launch 23rd Street as a place for creators to take risks and to build upon Macmillan and First Second's history of publishing groundbreaking and bestselling graphic novels."

Journalist and author William E. Burrows, who explored the promise and perils posed by outer space including the proliferation of weapons and spy satellites and the threat of potentially earth-shattering asteroids, died June 29, the New York Times reported. He was 87. Burrows covered air travel, space technology, government secrecy and other subjects for the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal.

He also wrote 14 books and established a graduate program in science writing at New York University, where he taught journalism. "Given the growing militarization of space and the challenges posed by environmental hazards and by weapons of mass destruction, Mr. Burrows believed that investing in space exploration was crucial, if for no other reason than to potentially save the human race one day by colonizing other planets," the Times noted.

His book This New Ocean: The Story of the First Space Age (1998) was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in history. Other works include By Any Means Necessary: America's Secret Air War in the Cold War (2001) and Deep Black: Space Espionage and National Security (1986).

Burrows embarked on a career in journalism after receiving a master's degree in international relations from Columbia University in 1962. Later that year, he was hired as a news assistant at the Times, but left two years later for the Richmond Times-Dispatch in Virginia before joining the Washington Post.

He was rehired by the Times in 1967 to cover aviation, and the following year expanded an article he wrote for the Times Magazine about World War I German ace Manfred von Richthofen into his first book, Richthofen: A True History of the Red Baron.

Burrows then joined the Journal as a feature writer but left after about two years, unhappy about being assigned to cover financial news. He and his family subsequently moved to Spain, where he supported himself as a travel writer while completing three unpublished novels.

New York University recruited Burrows in 1974 to be an assistant professor of journalism. He was later named chairman of its journalism department (now the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute) and established a master's program in science, health and environmental reporting.

In 2001, the International Astronomical Union named asteroid No. 99330 in his honor, calling it Billburrows. Its projected orbit, he was quick to point out, did not put it on a collision course with Earth, according to the Times.

Shelf Awareness for Readers, our weekly consumer-facing publication featuring adult and children's book reviews, author interviews, backlist recommendations, and fun news items, is being published today. Starred review highlights include Die Hot with a Vengeance, a "charmingly subversive and often hilarious debut" by Sable Yong, who pulls back the curtain on beauty culture in her essay collection about vanity; and Margo's Got Money Troubles by Rufi Thorpe, a "wickedly smart story" about a college student faced with an unplanned pregnancy that's "going to make some serious noise." With Kindred Spirits: Shilombish Ittibachvffa, Leslie Stall Widener creates a "moving, uplifting picture book about the power of empathy"; and Millie Fleur's Poison Garden is Christy Mandin's "dare-to-be-different picture book" that takes "a spirited swipe at lazy-brained conformity." Plus, rediscover singer, songwriter, humorist, and detective novel author Kinky Friedman.

Today's issue of Shelf Awareness for Readers is going to more than 690,000 customers of 251 independent bookstores. Stores interested in learning more can contact our partnership program team via e-mail. To see today's issue, click here.

"Our first in store proposal!!! Best wishes," Virginia Highland Books, Atlanta, Ga., posted on Instagram along with a pic of the happy couple.

Barnes & Noble has chosen The God of the Woods by Liz Moore (‎Riverhead) as its July national book club pick. In a live virtual event, on Tuesday, August 6, at 3 p.m. Eastern, Moore will be in conversation with Lexie Smyth, category manager for fiction at B&N, and Kiley Reid, author of Such a Fun Age and Come & Get It.

Smyth commented: "Weaving together a Succession style family drama with the mysterious disappearance of two children from an Adirondacks summer camp in the 1970s, Moore had me absolutely spellbound. I'm not sure what our Book Club readers will want to discuss first: the similarities between the missing children, the intriguing dynamic between the summer camp employees and the wealthy family whose grounds they work on, or the survival stories layered within. This is the perfect book for the dog days of summer, and I can't wait to dissect every little twist and turn with our readers."

For more information, click here.

"Are you having a bad day?" Rainy Day Books, Fairway, Kan., offered a bookish solution with its recent sidewalk chalkboard message in front of the shop, noting: "Our team read In Memoriam for our Lit Happens Book Club and have become engaged with Alice Winn through our love of her book which has been illustrated through a song a staff member wrote/sang advertising the book club and Winn's book, as well as passionate handselling of her title, which per our rep has pushed us to #2 in the country in indie sales this year of the title!"

"It may be thirty million degrees outside, but it's a lovely 72 at Hyperbole if you're looking for a spot to escape the heat this weekend!" Hyperbole Bookstore, College Station, Tex., posted on Instagram.

Homecoming Queen: A Small Town Political Thriller by Chad Boudreaux (Morgan James Fiction).

Netflix has released a trailer for The Perfect Couple, a limited series based on the Elin Hilderbrand novel, Deadline reported. The project stars Nicole Kidman, Liev Schreiber, Meghann Fahy, Eve Hewson, Dakota Fanning, Ishaan Khatter, Billy Howle, and Jack Reynor. It premieres September 5 on the streamer.

Susanne Bier (Bird Box) will direct all six episodes and executive produce alongside showrunner Jenna Lamia (Good Girls). Shawn Levy also executive produces for 21 Laps Entertainment along with Gail Berman and Hend Baghdady for the Jackal Group, Kidman and Per Saari for Blossom Films, and Josh Barry.

James McBride will receive the 2024 Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction, which honors "an American literary writer whose body of work is distinguished not only for its mastery of the art but also for its originality of thought and imagination.... The award seeks to commend strong, unique, enduring voices that--throughout consistently accomplished careers--have told us something essential about the American experience." McBride will be presented with the award at the National Book Festival on August 24 before a conversation about his body of work.

"I'm honored to bestow the Library of Congress Prize for American Fiction on a writer as imaginative and knowing as James McBride," said Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden. "McBride knows the American soul deeply, reflecting our struggles and triumphs in his fiction, which so many readers have intimately connected with. I, also, am one of his enthusiastic readers."

McBride is the author of the The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store; Deacon King Kong; The Good Lord Bird, winner of the 2013 National Book Award for Fiction; The Color of Water; Song Yet Sung; the story collection Five-Carat Soul; and the James Brown biography Kill 'Em and Leave. His debut novel, Miracle at St. Anna, was adapted into a 2008 film. In 2016, McBride was awarded the National Humanities Medal. 

"I wish my mom were still alive to know about this," he said. "I'm delighted and honored. Does it mean I can use the Library? If so, I'm double thrilled."

photo: Ball & Albanese

Iris Mwanza is a Zambian-American author and gender equality advocate. Born and raised in Zambia, Mwanza has law degrees from Cornell University and the University of Zambia, and an M.A. and Ph.D. in International Relations from Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies. Her day job is deputy director of the Women in Leadership team in the Gender Equality Division of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, and she's a member of the World Wildlife Foundation U.S. board of directors. Her debut novel, The Lions' Den (Graydon House, June 25, 2025), took her nine years of nights and weekends to finish, and is a moving portrait of Zambian life and politics at a moment of great transformation.

Handsell readers your book in 25 words or less:

A legal thriller that will grab you and take you for a twisty ride across time and place, only to release you on the last page.

On your nightstand now:

Fi: A Memoir of My Son by Alexandra Fuller. I knew and loved Fi, this beautiful ancestor, and Alexandra's book is the ultimate roadmap for surviving grief.

The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder by David Grann. I grew up in a landlocked country so I have an inexplicable love for maritime stories. The title seems to give it away, but it still holds many surprises and is so rich in detail that you'll feel the dangers of sea storms, scurvy, and murderous seamen.  

Favorite book when you were a child:

The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S. Lewis. This book so captured my imagination that I would obsessively look in the back of wardrobes for a passage to Narnia. I was so sure that if there was one portal in the English countryside, there had to be another in the Zambian capital.  

Your top five authors:

Toni Morrison, Zora Neale Hurston, Chinua Achebe, Alice Walker, Alexandra Fuller.

Book you've faked reading:

The Harry Potter series. I haven't seen the movies either, so I nod and smile, and exclaim, "That Harry! How wizardly!" It helps that my audience is usually under 10 years old.

Book you're an evangelist for:

Beloved by Toni Morrison. I come back to this book every few years to reexamine the issues which take time, experience, and maturity to fully understand.

Book you've bought for the cover:

I wouldn't buy a book for its cover, but I do like the visually powerful silhouettes and contrasting colors of The Handmaid's Tale by Margaret Atwood.

Book you hid from your parents:

None. Books were and are a big luxury so we rarely had our own children's books, but we could read whatever was in my parents' library. They were academics and very permissive, so we never, ever thought to hide what we were reading.

Book that changed your life:

Zora Neale Hurston's Their Eyes Were Watching God. I read it as a teen and had never read anything like it before, or since.

Favorite line from a book:

"The storytellers begin by calling upon those who come before who passed the stories down to us, for we are only messengers." --from Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer

Five books you'll never part with:

Beloved, Toni Morrison
Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston
Don't Let's Go to the Dogs Tonight, Alexandra Fuller
The Old Drift, Namwali Serpell
Braiding Sweetgrass, Robin Wall Kimmerer

Book you most want to read again for the first time:

So Long a Letter by Mariama Bâ, an early African feminist writer whose writing, I have no doubt, will still resonate today.

Novelist and poet Jesse Ball's The Repeat Room is a Kafkaesque descent into a legal system based on an experimental program that allows one juror to have an immersive experience of the defendant's life. Abel, a low-class worker in a near-future society with a strict caste system, has been selected to be the juror to experience the life of a man charged with murder. As he is shuffled through a cold, bureaucratic selection process, he also shares a few glimpses into his own alienated life.

Once in the repeat room, however, he is plunged into the suffocating abuse his defendant suffered, and the obsessive sexual relationship that resulted. While Abel was told that the decision would be simple once he spent time in the repeat room, the reader is left to endure the defendant's twisted and horrifying life alongside Abel, only to wonder what kind of "judgment" could possibly come from such a mess and its shocking conclusion.

The contrast between the first and second halves of Ball's mesmerizing novel is stark and effective. In part one, Abel's journey is a labyrinthine yet precise one, carried out with bewildering and often darkly funny exactitude. Ball perfectly captures this uneasy balance with his arresting and yet slightly off-kilter prose. For example, upon seeing the defendant for the first time through a one-way glass, the narrator notes how "The man in the room was apologizing for being tired. Somehow this was the wrong thing to say, and the tenor of things got worse. They asked him to go and face the wall and he did so. He went to the mirror and stood. His face was very close to Abel's, but the man could only see himself." The somewhat procedural nature of this opening section underlines the absurdity of its supposedly perfected system, as well as any individual's inability to correctly perform the roles it expects.

While the novel's second half takes up this same idea, it does so in a startlingly different fashion, sweeping readers up in a dizzying internal monologue that is as horrifyingly inescapable as it is propulsive. As the narrative zooms in on one actor within this world's uncannily familiar structure, it becomes hard to distinguish between the horrors of one man's family and the sins of a larger society. But it also becomes blindingly clear that no one is innocent in a system where a man like this can be found guilty. --Alice Martin, freelance writer and editor

Shelf Talker: Jesse Ball's The Repeat Room is a fast-paced tilt-a-whirl of a social commentary absurdist novel, with insights that will leave readers feeling complicit.

There is a tradition of shopkeeping, a tradition of codes, etiquette, and customs. For the most part, it is an oral history, passed along person to person. You learn to be a retailer not by going to college, but by going to work. You learn from people who have learned how to run a shop.

--from Shopkeeping: Stories, Advice, and Observations by Peter Miller (Princeton Architectural Press) 

Shopkeepers have not traditionally garnered high praise. Henry David Thoreau, for example, wasn't impressed: "When sometimes I am reminded that the mechanics and shopkeepers stay in their shops not only all the forenoon, but all the afternoon too, sitting with crossed legs, so many of them--as if the legs were made to sit upon, and not to stand or walk upon--I think that they deserve some credit for not having all committed suicide long ago."

On the other hand, a 1922 New York Times article headlined "Shopkeeper of Shakespeare and Company" described legendary Parisian bookseller Sylvia Beach as "efficient and determined, but with her efficiency and determination there was understanding besides." 

I spent much of my early working life in supermarkets, and a significant portion of my middle-aged working life in a bookstore. I didn't own those shops, but I took possession of them in my own way, as any dedicated frontline bookseller will understand. And I considered it a compliment when people thought I was the owner, the "shopkeeper." Sometimes I didn't even correct them.

So I when I read Shopkeeping recently, I did not feel diminished by the fact that Miller's definition of a shopkeeper is someone who owns the business. It makes sense. On the other hand, my longtime experience as a "clerk" with attitude allowed me to suspend the reality of my job description and inhabit Miller's wonderful book as a fellow shopkeeper, partly because this is not really a how-to manifesto; it's a love letter to a profession. 

"You never get to hear from a shopkeeper," he writes. "Here are some thoughts, and notions, and what I have learned in forty-five years of shopkeeping."

Miller is the owner of Peter Miller Books in Seattle, Wash. In a 2023 Seattle Times profile of the bookseller, Paul Constant noted that "his monklike commitment to elegant design and his impeccable curation eventually attracted a committed fan base.... And now design aficionados from all over the world flock to Peter Miller Books to meet the man who devoted his legendary bookselling talents to Seattle design before there was a coherent Seattle design to speak of."

In the introduction to Shopkeeping, architect Steven Hall observes: "His space has always been much more than an architectural bookstore--it's a cultural space of education, meeting, and interaction. It's a space radiating the joys of life via Peter's contagious enthusiasm."

Dan Brewster, owner of Prologue Bookshop in Columbus, Ohio, celebrated the book's release in an Instagram post: "As a bookstore owner, the design and atmosphere of my store is a top priority. Shopkeeping by Peter Miller, owner of a wonderful architecture bookstore in Seattle, is one of the first books to focus on these key elements. The book carefully prescribes Miller's vision for bookselling, retail, and the art of shopkeeping. It's full of great ideas and inspiration for what we do. I can't wait to share it with colleagues and friends alike and dive into its fascinating insights." 

"I never tell anyone to be a retailer," Miller writes. "It is a fragile occupation and hard on your heart. You put on the same show, each day, and hope that you have chosen well, that it is what people might want. You worry and you wonder and, for much of the time, you are alone with your decisions."

Miller elevates the image of being a shopkeeper, which is no easy task. The term itself can seem like a pejorative, though my impression may come from watching too many westerns where shopkeepers are traditionally portrayed as obsequious, sleeve garter-wearing cowards who run inside and pull down the shades when the shootin' starts.

The HBO series Deadwood rescued the term briefly with Timothy Olyphant's fierce portrayal of Seth Bullock, a man who wants to trade his gunslinging past for a new life as a hardware store shopkeeper, though choosing a lawless South Dakota settlement for his nascent retail venture complicates things a bit. Imagine an armed Bernard Black.

Customers do not witness the behind-the-scenes complexity of a shopkeeper's day. Many bookstore patrons, for example, see only an ideal job that involves bookish conversations in a soothing environment, and good booksellers sustain the illusion by remaining calm and cordial, even when their work day--an endless cycle of shelving, ordering, straightening, cash register duty and other responsibilities--devolves into an angst-inducing blur. 

"Books are shy," Miller writes in Shopkeeping. "They take longer than everyone else. They spend most of their lives vertically on a shelf, spine side out, with only a title and author and a publisher's icon to announce them. They open, and open up, only if you open them. They cannot take any sun or liquid at all. Even a copy of King Lear can be outshouted by a rubber duck. Books are shy."

Shopkeepers, however, are their perpetual advocates. That 1922 Times profile of Sylvia Beach noted that she "surrounded herself with the books and the background and the atmosphere she wanted, and it was just that quality of individuality Sylvia expressed that other book-lovers wanted. She understood what she was doing, and her goal was something more than mere business efficiency."