The second full day of Winter Institute featured a wonderful breakfast keynote panel, plenty of educational programming and meetings, as well as the jammed evening author reception. Today is the last day of Winter Institute, which features the community forum and the closing keynote with Brian Selznick.

Black booksellers celebrated following Tuesday's breakfast keynote on "The Legacy and Future of Black-Owned Bookstores" (see article below).

At last evening's author reception: Shelf Awareness's Kristianne Huntsberger; Calvin Crosby and Will Eakland, The King's English, Salt Lake City, Utah; Whitney Berger and Alison Sheridan, Cleary's Bookstore, Mount Holly, N.C.

V.E. Schwab, whose novel Bury Our Bones in the Midnight Soil will be released by Tor on June 10, with Deborah Lefebvre from Buffalo Books and Coffee, Buffalo, Minn.

Andrew Firment, Jackson Hole Book Trader, Jackson, Wyo.; Mandy Martin, novel, Memphis, Tenn.; with Randy Chan, marketing director at HTP Books.

David Litt, author of It's Only Drowning: A True Story of Learning to Surf and the Pursuit of Common Ground (to be published by Gallery Books on June 24) with Emma Pattee, author of Tilt (Marysue Rucci Books), reviewed in Shelf Awareness yesterday.

Monday's programming included a lively conversation about generating pre-orders for stores, led by (from left) veteran booksellers Suzanna Hermans (Oblong Books, Millerton, N.Y.); Jessica Stockton-Bagnulo (Greenlight Bookstore, Brooklyn, N.Y.); Shane Mullen (Left Bank Books, St. Louis, Mo.); and Michael Chin (Skylight Books, Los Angeles, Calif). The session offered tips on best practices and ideas, such as working with your landlord to get space to manage shipping of special orders; coordinating with local authors; and using social media. (If your store has an e-mail list, Shelf Awareness's turnkey Pre-Order eBlast and Kids' & YA Pre-Order eBlast can be a simple solution for helping your customers place pre-orders with your store. Contact bookstores@shelf-awareness.com for information.)

"Literacy, literature, and literary life have always been at the base of movements," said Janet Webster Jones, owner of Source Booksellers in Detroit, Mich., during a keynote panel at Winter Institute 2025 in Denver, Colo., Tuesday morning.

Jones was on the panel with Jake Cumsky-Whitlock, co-owner of Solid State Books in Washington, D.C., Maura Cheeks, owner of Liz's Book Bar in Brooklyn, N.Y., and DJ Johnson, owner of Baldwin & Co. in New Orleans, La., for a rousing and celebratory discussion of the legacy and future of Black-owned bookstores. Char Adams, journalist and author of the forthcoming Black-Owned: The Revolutionary Life of the Black Bookstore (Tiny Reparations Books), moderated the discussion.

"The movement is always undergirded by literacy and literary works," continued Jones, with booksellers and librarians being "the frontline people" who do the work to "keep the revolution going."

Panelists (from l.) Jake Cumsky-Whitlock, Maura Cheeks, Janet Webster Jones, DJ Johnson, moderator Char Adams, and Donya Craddock of the Dock Bookshop, Fort Worth, Tex., who introduced the panel.

Asked about the other Black-owned bookstores and Black booksellers that have been inspirations, Johnson remarked that he "copied everything Janet does," while also praising the work done by "so many wonderful Black bookstores" like Mahogany Books in Washington, D.C., the Lit Bar in the Bronx, and Semicolon Books in Chicago, Ill. He called them "guiding lights," and said they exemplify the idea that "we have to be more than just retail spaces. We are centers of cultural and social revolution."

Johnson pointed to a "massive war of ideas" going on during the present moment and said booksellers are "on the front lines of preserving our democracy. We are on the front lines of fighting for equality and fighting against oppression." He added that people don't necessarily have to ban or burn books to stop a revolution--they only have to convince people to stop reading.

He further explained that most of Baldwin & Co.'s books are by BIPOC authors because those books "speak to the truth about American history." Black books and Black bookstores, he continued, show the reality behind "who and what America is." The history of America cannot be told, he said, "without Black people's contributions."

Cumsky-Whitlock identified a distinction between a Black-owned bookstore and a Black bookstore--while both are Black-owned, the former might have a more general mission while the latter has a very specific one. Cumsky-Whitlock called his own store "Black forward," meaning that it is a general-interest store with "many more Black books, many more diverse books than the average general-interest store would."

He explained that the store was founded out of a desire to create a community hub and third space, with early childhood literacy being a major and longstanding emphasis. The pandemic "threw a wrench" into the business as it did so many others, and he noted that  he and the Solid State team are "still reacting to everything that has occurred since." Being in D.C., a major looming question now, he said, is "what happens to all these federal workers who suddenly no longer have jobs?"

Cumsky-Whitlock also touched on the great community of bookstores and the way booksellers pay it forward. Though booksellers spend a lot of time at conferences like Winter Institute talking about antitrust and technically being competitors, "we all have to have each others' backs. A rising tide lifts all boats."

Cheeks said for her store, which is in a predominantly white neighborhood, she has worked to create a space where Black people are comfortable but where books are available for everyone. Given the neighborhood, she said, the store "wouldn't survive if we didn't," but she is very intentional about working with Black authors for events.

Specifically, she tries to form long-term partnerships with authors. For example, she hosts a monthly crossword event with Juliana Pache, author of Black Crossword, and if an author has a book about finance, she would rather host a series of finance workshops in-store than simply host the author for a one-and-done event. Her store also hosts a variety of panels and workshops for authors designed to help them navigate the industry.

Cheeks emphasized the importance of one-on-one help, saying she tries to help "one person at a time, one author at a time."

On the subject of Source Booksellers' longevity, Jones recalled that "we said yes until we had to say no." When she has had to turn down an opportunity, she has tried to make sure that another bookseller finds it, and she has always tried to "reach for the community" and "go to where they are."

"I had opportunity, and I used courage to move forward," Jones said. "Opportunities show up and you sort of take yourself by the hand and go."

Responding to a question about their most memorable and affirming moments, Johnson remembered a time when a man in a pick-up truck stopped him while he was walking down the street and demanded to know if he was the owner of "that bookstore." At first, Johnson seriously feared for his safety and wondered, "Did I wrong someone? What did I do?" But when the man got out of the car, he told Johnson how much his son liked the bookstore and admired Johnson, and the man gave Johnson a hug. --Alex Mutter

Kreig and Amanda Durham, who opened Quill & Quest bookstore in December at 218 W. Main St. in downtown Farmington, N.Mex., are planning to host a grand opening and ribbon-cutting celebration this spring with the Farmington Chamber of Commerce, the Tri-City Record reported.

"We want to make a bit of a party out of it," said Kreig Durham.

The Durhams decided to launch Quill & Quest because the town lacked a bookstore that sold new books. "We got tired of having to go up to Durango or down to Albuquerque to find one," Kreig Durham noted, adding that a focus on new books will set their shop apart from other stores in the area. "Amy's is a used bookstore, and they've spent years collecting thousands of used books, which is awesome. We're really focused more on new books, so that's a pretty big distinction between us."

The bookstore's name is inspired by the owners love for fantasy literature, with "Quill" representing the art of writing and "Quest" the adventure that comes with reading. "Their hope is that customers feel the same sense of adventure when they step into their store, making Quill & Quest a place to explore new worlds through books," the Tri-City Record wrote.

The bookstore will also feature a coffee area and a bakery, which was inspired by Amanda Durham's need for gluten-free and dairy-free options. "Amanda has put together a collection of recipes for gluten-free baked goods that actually taste good, and we wanted to bring that to the community," Kreig Durham said.

Community response thus far has been positive, he added: "People come in and say, 'Oh, it smells really good in here,' and I thought it was just the candles. But they actually mean the smell of books. It's been one of the most enjoyable parts--seeing people love what we've put our hearts into."

The Durhams hope Quill & Quest will become a community gathering space. "We want people to feel like this isn't just our thing; it's the community's thing," Kreig Durham noted. "We want to create a space for people to meet, enjoy good books, coffee, and art, and feel excited about reading.... Every book is a new adventure. We hope people walk in and feel that excitement."

Slow Burn Books, a romance bookstore selling new and used titles, will open in Garrett, Ind., in early March, WPTA reported. 

Owner Hannah Ziko has found a space at 1308 S. Randolph St. and has a grand opening slated for Saturday, March 8. Ziko plans to host book clubs, author readings, and other events, and the grand opening festivities will include free gifts for the first 20 customers as well as a gift certificate raffle.

"I am from Fort Wayne," Ziko told WPTA. "I love the small-town vibes. I brought my entrepreneurship to the small town. I wanted to bring that crowd here where it is needed."

Inkwell Booksellers Company hosted its grand opening celebration last weekend at 426 Hennepin Ave E in Minneapolis, Minn., featuring Girl Scout cookies, an Alchemy Permanent Jewelry pop-up, giveaways and author talks. The Minnesota Daily reported that "after a decade of thinking about owning a bookstore and two years of planning, Elizabeth Foster finally showed Inkwell Booksellers Company to the public."

"We want people to feel welcome," she said. "We want to have those interactions with people on a daily basis and not just be someplace that you walk in and out of." 

Foster noted that she chose the location in Northeast neighborhood because it is walkable and there are a lot of small shops, grocery stores, restaurants, great bike lanes and lots of foot traffic, but no bookstore. She added that having a coffee shop with a seating area inside the bookstore was crucial to enhancing the customer experience. 

"It's been hard to get the words to explain what things would look and feel like," Foster said. "Being able to show everyone the physical space and having experienced what I have had in my brain for so long is really exciting." 

"The one where we host our first wedding!!" Little Professor Bookshop, Homewood, Ala., shared photos from recent nuptials in the store, noting: "If you drove by the shop last Sunday, you likely saw this gorgeous occasion for @anniehight.art and @jacksupertoast. To have the honor of holding this memory for someone goes beyond any humble words. What a JOY!! Cheers to the Brimroses! (stay tuned for the full gallery from the incredible @ohhoneyphotos)."

"Bookshop dog Luna has some thoughts on books maybe you want to buy? Luna is available for treat eating and scritches on most Fridays. Come by, she'll show you where the treats are," Chaucer's Books, Santa Barbara, Calif., posted on Instagram.

Mitch Thorpe has joined Abrams Children's Books as associate director of publicity. He was previously at Simon & Schuster.

Anna Merz has been promoted to senior publicist at Abrams Children's Books.

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At Ballantine Bantam Dell, part of the Random House Publishing Group:

Executive publicist Sarah Breivogel will become the Bantam publicity lead, emphasizing her expertise in mystery, thriller, and suspense.

Senior publicist Melissa Folds will become the Dell publicity lead, emphasizing her expertise in romance, rom-com, and romantasy.

Omniviolence by Jones Worthington (Vesuvian Books).

Tomorrow:
Good Morning America: Eric Adjepong, co-author of Ghana to the World: Recipes and Stories That Look Forward While Honoring the Past (Clarkson Potter, $40, 9780593234778).

Drew Barrymore Show: Chelsea Handler, author of I'll Have What She's Having (The Dial Press, $32, 9780593596579).

Late Night with Seth Meyers repeat: Gov. Gretchen Whitmer, author of True Gretch--Young Adult Edition: Lessons for Anyone Who Wants to Make a Difference (Atheneum, $18.99, 9781665983761).

Drew Starkey (Queer, Outer Banks) has joined the cast of Apple TV+'s limited series Lucky, adapted by Jonathan Tropper from Marissa Stapley's bestselling novel and a Reese's Book Club pick, Deadline reported. The cast also includes Annette Bening, Aunjanue Ellis-Taylor, and Timothy Olyphant.

Lucky stars and is exec produced by Anya Taylor-Joy (The Queen's Gambit). Co-showrunners are Tropper through his Tropper Ink company and Cassie Pappas. Executive producers also include Tropper as well as Witherspoon and Lauren Neustadter for Hello Sunshine. Jonathan Van Tulleken will direct several episodes, including the pilot, and serve as executive producer.

Winners of the 2025 Golden Kite Awards and honor books, presented to children's book authors and artists by their peers and sponsored by the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators, have been named. Golden Kite recipients receive a cash prize of $2,500. Golden Kite Honor recipients receive $500. This year's winning titles are:

Golden Kite winners
Picture book text: The Man Who Didn't Like Animals by Deborah Underwood, illustrated by LeUyen Pham (Clarion Books)
Picture book illustration: The One and Only Googoosh by Azadeh Westergaard (Viking Books for Young Readers)
Nonfiction text for younger readers: Ida B. Wells Marches for the Vote by Dinah Johnson, illustrated by Jeremy Jordan (Christy Ottaviano Books--Little Brown and Hachette)
Nonfiction text for older readers: Rising From the Ashes: Los Angeles 1992. Edward Jae Song Lee, Latasha Harlins, Rodney King, and a City On Fire by Paula Yoo (Norton Young Readers)
Middle grade fiction: The Other Side of Tomorrow by Tina Cho, art by Deb JJ Lee (Harper/Alley)
Illustrated book for older readers: Uprooted: A Memoir About What Happens When Your Family Moves Back by Ruth Chan (Roaring Brook Press)
YA fiction: Girls Like Her by Melanie Sumrow (Balzer + Bray)
Sid Fleischman award for humor: Harriet Tells the Truth by Elana K. Arnold (Walden Pond Press)

Honor books
Picture book text: The Night Market by Seina Wedlick, illustrated by Briana Mukodiri Uchendu (Random House Studio)
Picture book illustration: Eloisa's Magical Window, illustrated by John Parra, written by Margarita Engle (Atheneum Books for Young Readers) 
Nonfiction text for younger readers: Comet Chaser: The True Cinderella Story of Caroline Herschel, The First Professional Woman Astronomer by Pamela S. Turner, illustrated by Vivien Mildenberger (Chronicle Books)
Nonfiction text for older readers: Uprooted: A Memoir About What Happens When Your Family Moves Back by Ruth Chan (Roaring Brook Press)
Middle grade fiction: The Bletchley Riddle by Ruta Sepetys and Steve Sheinkin (Viking Books for Young Readers)
Illustrated book for older readers: Meet Me on Mercer Street by Bookie Vivat (Scholastic Press)
YA fiction: Kill Her Twice by Stacey Lee (G.P. Putnam's Sons Books for Young Readers)
Sid Fleischman award for humor: On a Wing and a Tear by Cynthia Leitich Smith (Heartdrum)

photo: Teresa Dalsager

Wayne Scott's essay "Two Open Marriages in One Small Room" appeared in the New York Times and was featured on the Modern Love podcast. His writing has appeared in the Sun, Huffington Post, and Poets and Writers and he contributes regularly to the Psychotherapy Networker. A writer and psychotherapist, he teaches, works with people in unconventional relationships, and lives with his partner in Portland, Ore. The Maps They Gave Us: One Marriage Reimagined (Black Lawrence Press, February 22, 2025) is a memoir that celebrates the creative possibilities of intimate relationships, a Will and Grace with kids, cats, and a mortgage.

Handsell readers your book in 25 words or less:

A quirky marital therapist casually mentions "open marriage" to a couple on the verge of divorce, post-infidelity, and they fall in love again.

On your nightstand now:

Map: Collected and Last Poems by Wisława Szymborska. Big book, small nightstand. "Four A.M." is my favorite poem to read at, well, 4 a.m.: "The hour of cool drafts from extinguished stars."

Favorite book when you were a child:

As a pre-teen I read Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House books. As soon as my grandmother saw I was finishing one, she bought me the next. Later, as an adult, I read the eye-opening "real" story, Pioneer Girl: The Annotated Autobiography, edited by Pamela Smith Hill, based on Wilder's rough drafts, which includes the backstory of violent Indigenous erasure. Sadly, I would not give the series to my kids because of the degree of historical falseness--so much sentimental brainwashing.

Your top five authors:

Nikita Gill, Melissa Febos, Garth Greenwell, Ocean Vuong, Lidia Yuknavitch.

Book you've faked reading:

I mean, I mostly read, or looked like I was reading, or stared at, James Joyce's Ulysses. The parts I understood helped me appreciate his destabilizing impact on Modernists like Virginia Woolf and D.H. Lawrence, whom I adore.

Book you're an evangelist for:

One book I always recommend to psychotherapists just learning the job is Joy Harjo's Poet Warrior. A transformational book on healing and spiritual growth, it explores healing from an intuitive indigenous perspective that's forgotten in contemporary white-centered research-driven literature.

Book you've bought for the cover:

Well, I didn't buy it just for the cover, because I love his writing, but I was enraptured by the cover of Paul Lisicky's Song So Wild and Blue: A Life with the Music of Joni Mitchell. I've been to concerts in the Gorge Amphitheatre, and I worship Joni and cannot believe how much loveliness the book designer captured in one balanced image.

Book you hid from your parents:

My parents would have confiscated Flora Rheta Schreiber's Sybil if they knew I had it at 13. Not only did I read about graphically sadistic child abuse--in comparison, my parents with their loud ways seemed so tame--but I resolved that I wanted to become a psychotherapist like Dr. Wilbur and work with people with multiple personalities (and play Scrabble with them in my downtime, like she did). In the '90s, I worked as a social worker on a psychiatric unit for folks with dissociative identity disorder.

Of course, in Sybil Exposed, Debbie Nathan said it was all a lie. She had access to Dr. Wilbur's files and discovered that the diagnosis had been fabricated to bolster the doctor's reputation. All the cool psychiatrists had a client like Sybil. I had to revise everything I thought when I was a teenager.

Book that changed your life:

When the girlfriend-who-became-my-spouse and I met, we bonded over a shared love of Adrienne Rich. We exchanged quotes and books, traded volumes of poetry, even used one poem in our wedding. "The Dream of a Common Language," about the beginning of Rich's relationship with Michelle Cliff, gave us new language for thinking about what it means to be in love with someone in a dangerous world.

Favorite line from a book:

"The heaventree of stars hung with humid nightblue fruit." --from James Joyce's Ulysses. See.

Five books you'll never part with:

I'm never parting with any of my books. Seriously. Just look at my office.

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

I've read James Baldwin's Giovanni's Room many times. An almost perfect novel, with breathtaking, revelatory sex. Its fearlessness in its exploration of sexual identity under oppressive conditions continues to astound me, and he was writing in the 1950s. I wish I could re-experience the heart-pounding inspiration from reading it for the first time.

Book that explained another person to you:

My dad abandoned us when I was 14 without any explanation, even when later he returned to our lives. When I read the dog-eared paperback on his nightstand, Jack Schaefer's cowboy western Shane (which was also a film and mandatory viewing when I was a boy), I felt like I was reading the blueprint for his mysterious life. Shane's secrecy is celebrated, he pridefully doesn't ever explain who he is or where he comes from, and he deserts a boy who worships him without apology. "A man is what he is... and there's no breaking the mold. I tried that and I've lost." That was the role model. It was sobering but also eye-opening. Also, I'm pretty sure Shane was gay, if you track the subtext.

Book that saved your life:

In 1987, during a horrific pandemic, when I was waiting two weeks for my HIV test results, when I also happened to have a terrible cold that didn't respond to medication, I pored over Audre Lorde's The Cancer Journals, an intimate journal of her battle with breast cancer and the politics of disease. Put a sensitive poet in an impossibly painful predicament, where she doubted she would live, and out comes a survival genius. "If I can look directly at my life and my death without flinching, I know there is nothing they can ever do to me again." Her words blazed during a dark, scary waiting period. It was a stab of adrenalized brilliance that made me think I could keep going.

Book that helped you understand the current global mess:

I read Leo Tolstoy's War and Peace as part of an online book group, hosted by Yiyun Li and A Public Space, during the quarantine phase of the pandemic. It was sustaining to immerse myself in this vividly rendered long-gone world that was turning topsy-turvy like mine. There were so many parallels between the shock of Napoleon's invasion of Russia in 1812 and what was going on in the United States in 2020, and now.

Deadstream by Mar Romasco-Moore (I Am the Ghost in Your House) is an addictive, anxiety-provoking YA thriller in which livestreamers mysteriously die after an entity that is visible only on-screen shows up in their videos.

Seventeen-year-old Teresa suffers severe agoraphobia after surviving the car wreck that killed her best friend, Becks--a death for which she feels responsible. Now, she locks herself in her bedroom for days at a time, going live online as Replay, an "entirely genderless" gamer ("the way she'd like to be") for a small cadre of followers. It is perhaps her ongoing grief that compels her to investigate when her fellow livestreamers start falling prey to a frightening phenomenon. The incidents begin with a command in chat: "open the door." Freaked-out viewers type warnings ("omg don't go in there") that go unheeded, and a mysterious being appears behind the livestreamer--not physically, but on the screen. Brick, one such victim, subsequently goes catatonic on a marathon stream while his massive fan-base wonders if he's acting. Teresa attempts to help Brick by effectively doxxing him, leading to her channel being banned midstream. Then, a trans friend who best understands and supports Teresa, Ozma, succumbs to the same sinister syndrome. To stop the shadow entity and save Ozma, Teresa will have to act outside the safe confines of her home.

This unsettling third-person narrative includes mixed media (livestream transcripts, text messages, online forums, DMs, and social media posts), creating a fully immersive, incessantly creepy experience that allows for startling jump scares. Chat feeds especially amp up the pacing as the "seething mass of hungry eyes egg[s] streamers on," and the sleuthing captured in online spaces demands compulsive reading. Romasco-Moore convincingly portrays a teen whose persistent trauma warps her perception of reality: "She just needs to take the splinter out. It's fine. It's such a small thing. But a small thing can kill you." This anxiety, "a faint but persistent hum," rings true, as does her connection with Ozma, "her one shining star" who can soothe her panic attacks. That Teresa must overcome paralyzing fear to save Ozma ("Why couldn't this be someone else's responsibility? Someone brave, someone sane") is an important and practical depiction by the author. Teresa's love of streaming is beautifully rendered (it "feels almost like the viewers are there with her, like they are all one big organism"). Other teen worries, small and large, like view counts and online death threats, also feature in this frightening, queer-centric tale. --Samantha Zaboski, freelance editor and reviewer

Shelf Talker: This pulse-pounding supernatural thriller follows a teen streamer who must face her agoraphobia to stop an invisible entity from killing her online friends.