Following its April debut, the Raven Book Lounge in Brentwood, Tenn., held a ribbon cutting ceremony on May 6, the Williamson Herald reported.

Located at 330 Franklin Rd., #250B, the Raven Book Lounge is a bookstore, bar, and community hub. Owner Danniele Reeves carries new titles representing a range of genres, with a particular emphasis on local authors. The bar, meanwhile, serves cocktails, wine, and beer, along with a variety of non-alcoholic drinks. There is also a food menu focusing on small items like charcuterie boards. The store's event offerings include book launches and author signings, trivia nights, bouquet classes, mystery theater nights, and more.

The store officially opened on April 18, with a grand opening celebration that included visits by local authors, prizes, giveaways, and pop-up vendor appearances. At the time, Reeves told the Herald: "I just really want it to be a place where you can kind of be comfortable by yourself, you could come on a date, you could come with your group, you could meet people or just come hang out and connect."

Initially, the bookstore did not yet have a liquor license, but acquired one on May 2. The ribbon cutting and the start of "Chapter 2" for the bookstore occurred a few days later.

Earlier this year, Reeves told FranklinIs that she had the idea to open the Raven Book Lounge after her husband passed away suddenly in January 2025. While contemplating what she would do in the next phase of her life, she saw an Instagram post featuring a bookstore's book and wine pairings. The idea struck a chord, and the resurgence in independent bookstores helped convince her it was worth a shot.

"I think people really want to go analog again," Reeves said. "They want something tangible and a place where they can connect."

Nuts & Shells Bookshop, a children's bookstore, has opened in Toronto, Ont., Canada. Located at 1596 Dundas St. W. in Toronto's Little Portugal neighborhood, Nuts & Shells carries a range of children's books, from longtime classics to more recent works from local authors and illustrators. The store's event plans include book clubs for parents as well as after-school programming for students, TorontoToday reported.

Store owner Nadia Alam is a children's book illustrator whose books include The House Without Lights (written by Reem Faruqi) and The Wishing Machine (written by Jonathan Hillman). The bookstore's name is based on her parents' nicknames, and she told TorontoToday she is opening the store in honor of her father, who died about a year ago.

Toronto Life described the store as looking "like a reading nook built by IKEA-savvy woodland creatures. A bright-yellow front display highlights recommended reads, and wooden shelves stretch toward a whimsical ceiling, where a tableau of fake pigeons and chickadees sit curled in nests, reading the classics. 'I went for maximum cozy in the shop,' says Alam. 'I wanted a touch of whimsy but ultimately a relaxing third space for kids to hang out in after school.' "

Tsunami Books in Eugene, Ore., is fundraising, including a $200,000 GoFundMe campaign, to buy its building at 2585 Willamette St. Lookout Eugene-Springfield reported that the bookshop "aims to protect its idiosyncratic home from rising property values and ensure it remains a haven for the arts in perpetuity.... The store isn't in danger of closing; there's no impending deadline that's prompting the push to buy. But Tsunami's worker-owners think the wave can build to safeguard its future, which they're coining a '$10 movement' to collect small donations toward a cash purchase."

"We've had a million people come through here," general manager and worker-owner Scott Landfield said. "If we had 50,000 ten-dollar bills, either come through GoFundMe or through our tip box, we're going to have the building. And it's only going to cost 10 bucks." 

The 4,600-square foot building is "prime real estate," with a valuation of $747,218, per county records, Lookout noted. Raising $1 million would allow the bookstore to make an outright cash offer, said Landfield, who is the general manager and largest shareholder in Tsunami. "I hold the record for old white guys in America. I have worked longer, harder, more honestly, for less than minimum wage than any other old white guy in America. Still making less than minimum wage." 

For Landfield, buying the building is a matter of securing his life's work after three decades of paying rent. "There's a lot of things I've done that I'm pleased with, but I never really planned on doing them," he said. "Some things that I planned on doing, like writing a lot of books, finishing them, I just assumed that's what I was going to do with my life. But trying to make it and pay the rent with your muscle, and your line of bullshit to the next customer, and that's everything you got? It takes everything you got." 

"For 30 years, we've been paying rent on time, and we've paid over a million and a half in rent," he added. "When you're poor and you got to pay that much rent, you can't ever not be poor."

Robert (Bob) C. Baron, founder of Fulcrum Publishing, died on April 24 at age 92.

After an early career in computers that included being program manager for the Mariner II (Venus) and the Mariner IV (Mars) on-board computers, in 1984 Baron founded Fulcrum, which focuses on history, Native American writing, conservation, civics, education, and Southwest America. He wrote or edited more than 30 books, including 20th Century: 100 Influential People, Hudson: Story of a River, and The Light Shines from the West, and 150 papers and articles on history, nature, and science.

In a Denver Post interview from 2007, Baron commented on the impetus for founding Fulcrum, "I wanted to spend the next period of my life on helping to present meaning. Books always have been the way to communicate meaning--and even more so now."

Baron also served as vice-chairman for the American Antiquarian Society, the International Wilderness Leadership Foundation, and the Massachusetts Audubon Society. He was a director of the Rocky Mountain Women's Institute and the Thoreau Society. In 2009, he organized the John Adams and Thomas Jefferson Conference. He was also a fellow of the Massachusetts Historical Society and the Explorers Club. In Colorado, Bob was a member of the Cactus Club, Literary Club, Presidents Club, and the Denver Press Club.

A Celebration of Life will be held on June 5 at the Old 121 Brewhouse, 2010 S. Oak St., Lakewood, Colo. 80227 from 5-7 p.m. on the patio. In lieu of flowers or gifts, Baron requested that donations could be made to the American Antiquarian Society, the Denver Public Library Friends Association, or a favorite charity in his memory.

Last Thursday the Book Stall, Winnetka, Ill., hosted an event for Roberta Rubin and her memoir, Turning Pages: The Life and Times of a Bookseller. One of our favorite booksellers ever, Rubin owned and ran the Book Stall at Chestnut Court for more than 30 years.

To promote his debut title, The League of Dangerous Young Ladies, to be published by Sourcebooks' Stonefruit Studio on June 2, J.A. Morgenstein, long a competitive ballroom dancer and instructor and now an author, too, has figured out a way to make his two artforms work together. At the suggestion of Jennifer Kandarian, manager of Books on the Square, Providence, R.I., when visiting bookstores, Morgenstein will find a volunteer from the staff and teach them to dance--around the store--for five minutes. The video of the lesson is called Dancing with the Stores, and aims to promote the stores and convey the message that anyone can learn to dance. One of the first episodes of Dancing with the Stars features Cristina Iannarino of Books on the Square.

Incidentally the YA fantasy adventure The League of Dangerous Young Ladies stars the daughters of some of the most famous villains of Victorian literature, such as Rose Moriarty, daughter of Sherlock Holmes's nemesis, Professor James Moriarty.

Congratulations to Huxley & Hiro Booksellers, Wilmington, Del., which has won a $100,000 EDGE Grant from the Delaware Division of Small Business and Delaware Governor Matt Meyer to renovate its event space, the Prose Parlor. The EDGE Grant is a competitive program ending in a Shark Tank-style final competition. Awards are given to business which are less than seven years old and have fewer than 15 employees. The grant aims to foster and encourage innovative ideas.

Huxley & Hiro, which moved recently, will use the money to renovate its unfinished, second-floor event space and outfit it with modern AV, recording, and projection equipment, as well as to create a large advertising budget for the coming years, and establish a salaried event manager position, which will be filled by Timothy Nichols. With the renovation, the Prose Parlor will be 100-seat literary and cultural venue with integrated broadcasting capability.

Huxley & Hiro owner Claire van den Broek has also been selected as Most Influential in Business in Delaware for 2026, an honor that she shared with co-owner Ryan Eanes in 2024.

Forty Love by Jane Costello (Zibby Publishing).

Today:
Good Morning America: James Comey, author of Red Verdict (The Mysterious Press,  $30, 9781613167830).

CBS Mornings: Hayden Panettiere, author of This Is Me: A Reckoning (Grand Central, $30, 9781538773420) She will also appear on the View.

Today: Clint Black, author of Killin' Time: My Life and Music (Harper Influence, $32, 9780063429673).

Fresh Air: Zayd Ayers Dohrn, author of Dangerous, Dirty, Violent, and Young: A Fugitive Family in the Revolutionary Underground (W.W. Norton, $32.99, 9781324089315).

Kelly Clarkson Show: Morgan Radford, author of Now Then: A Novel (Amistad, $27.99, 9780063457836).

Tomorrow:
CBS Mornings: Bruce Feiler, author of A Time to Gather: How Ritual Created the World--and How It Can Save Us (Penguin Press, $30, 9780593656433).

Good Morning America: Kennedy Ryan, author of Score (Forever, $30, 9781538769669). 

Today: José Andrés, co-author of Spain My Way: Eat, Drink, and Cook Like a Spaniard (Ecco, $45, 9780063328068).

Also on Today: Emily Henry, author of Great Big Beautiful Life (Berkley, $29, 9780593441299), and Dr. Elisa Port, author of The Breast Advice: All You Need to Know About Breast Health, Screening, and Treatment (HarperOne, $29.99, 9780063492547).

Jennifer Hudson Show: Laura Dave, author of The First Time I Saw Him (Scribner, $29, 9781668002964).

Gary Dauberman's Coin Operated has acquired the rights to Nat Cassidy's horror novella Rest Stop, "with an eye toward developing a feature adaptation," Deadline reported. Cassidy will adapt the screenplay, with Dauberman and Mia Maniscalco producing.

Rest Stop "follows a young musician who finds himself locked inside a gas station bathroom in the middle of the night by an unseen assailant, caught between the horrors on the other side of the door and the horrors rapidly skittering down the walls inside," Deadline noted. The story is part of Cassidy's recently published collection, I Know a Place: Rest Stop and Other Dark Detours.

"I like to describe this novella as Green Room meets Gerald's Game," Cassidy said. "It's the closest thing I've yet written to 'extreme' horror--though, I wouldn't say it goes nearly as hard or gets nearly as bleak as the most extreme 'extreme' horror stories I've read. Regardless, I'm hoping it makes your next visit to a gas station bathroom even scarier than it would otherwise be."

Dauberman added: "Like the junk food aisle at any sketchy gas station on the side of the road, Rest Stop has a little bit of everything (that may or may not kill you). Its relentless pace, psychological torment, heartfelt character moments, and many squirm-inducing sequences make it the rare horror story that has all the ingredients for a perfectly terrifying experience on the big screen."

Cannon by Lee Lai (published in North America by Drawn and Quarterly) has won the A$60,000 (about US$42,900) 2026 Stella Prize, honoring "the most excellent, original and outstanding book written by an Australian woman or non-binary writer." Cannon is the first graphic novel to win the Stella Prize and is Lai's second book, after Stone Fruit. 

The judges wrote: "Reliable and dutiful Cannon (real name: Lucy; nickname Luce; ironically--or perhaps not--Luce Cannon) has myriad responsibilities. During the day, she helps her avoidant mother by taking care of her elderly gung-gung (maternal grandfather). At night, she works in the pressure-cooker kitchen of a fine dining restaurant. In her off-hours, she's a confidante and troubleshooter for best friend Trish. However, Cannon is about to crack--something we see in a dizzying flashforward in the first pages.

"Cannon is a compelling depiction of a fracturing friendship between two queer, second-generation Chinese women. It is also a bruising examination of the lifelong weight that people--often women--carry, the profound toll it takes to be the 'responsible one,' and what can happen when you are being taken advantage of repeatedly. (Bonus: it is also, somehow, very funny.) Lai's elegant artistry evokes horror and poignancy, shock and delight, and Cannon is an incontestable reminder that--in the hands of a masterful artist and storyteller--the very best graphic novels can do what prose alone cannot. And Cannon is absolutely one of the best."

John Searles's frothy, fizzy fifth novel, Single Girls, charts the unlikely success story of self-professed "mouseburger" Helen Gurley Brown and the crackerjack team of female writers and editors she assembled to transform Cosmopolitan magazine in the mid-1960s. Searles (himself a former Cosmopolitan editor) dives into Helen's personal life, her complicated relationship with her mother and sister, and the inner lives of the half-dozen women who took a chance on Cosmopolitan--and on Helen.

Searles (Her Last Affair) begins with the 1932 elevator accident that killed Helen's father, Ira. As with much of the book, the incident is true and the details around it are imagined. Searles returns repeatedly to that pivotal moment in Helen's childhood as he explores Helen's fraught bond with her sister, Mary Eloine (who eventually contracted polio), and their difficult mother, Cleo. After Ira's death, Cleo and Mary Eloine are focused on gaining stability and security, while Helen wants more from life. Searles takes readers through Helen's early years working as a secretary and copywriter in Los Angeles, her marriage to film producer David Brown, and their move to Manhattan in the wake of her smash hit book Sex and the Single Girl. When Helen gets the chance to turn around Cosmo's fortunes, she recruits a half-dozen writers and editors, some of them unlikely: a department-store window dresser, a bartender with a secret, a typist besotted with a married man. Together, the women fill the pages of the magazine with sharp, well-written, slightly edgy stories aimed at single female readers, trying to keep the (male) higher-ups happy while pushing the envelope.

Searles gives readers a glimpse into each woman's story, exploring the writers' balancing acts as they build careers, support themselves financially, and (in some cases) try to find love. Meanwhile, each woman receives at least one magazine assignment that stretches her skills and confidence. Relationships editor Myrna takes a trip to test out the world's first champagne-glass-shaped hot tub, with surprising results, while entertainment editor Liz Smith interviews a Park Avenue call girl and makes some discoveries of her own. As Helen guides (and sometimes pushes) her team of women toward making their magazine the hottest item on newsstands, she continues to wrestle with complex feelings about her father's death.

Witty, buzzy, and full of magazine-worthy descriptions of midcentury fashion, Single Girls offers an entertaining look into the world of publishing and a tribute to the unassuming editor who revolutionized women's magazines. --Katie Noah Gibson, blogger at Cakes, Tea and Dreams

Shelf Talker: John Searles's frothy, fizzy novel traces Helen Gurley Brown's transformation of Cosmopolitan magazine, gathering an all-female team to write smart, edgy stories that made single women feel seen.