Cool Inaugural idea of the day: Beehive Books, Delaware, Ohio, is hosting 44 days of speeches by American presidents. According to the Delaware News, "Each day at noon, members of the community are invited to speak or listen to the words of each president, read by members of the community. The series began Sunday, Jan. 18, with George Washington and will lead up to Obama on March 2."
The News reported that Beehive Books co-owner Mel Corroto hasn't had a problem getting people to participate: "While some presidents such as Richard Nixon and John Tyler have been overlooked so far, multiple community members have signed up to speak for Lincoln, John F. Kennedy, James Buchanan and Dwight D. Eisenhower. Speakers are asked to select a passage to read from a letter or speech of the president and provide any other information they choose."
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The Occidental College Bookstore, Los Angeles, Calif., highlighted its connection to President Obama--who spent his first two years of college at Occidental--by creating a line of clothing and other products commemorating the new president, according to NACS's Campus Marketplace.
The line includes 11 T-shirt designs, a hoodie, a coffee mug, a key ring and Obama books and DVD of his days at Occidental. The most popular item: baby diaper covers in black and white with the logo "Change We Need" across the backside.
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To accommodate the many requests he receives for autographed copies of his books, particularly Marley & Me, John Grogan has agreed to make the Moravian Book Shop, Bethlehem, Pa., the exclusive carrier of autographed copies of his oeuvre, the Allentown Morning Call reported.
''It's a perfect marriage,'' Dana DeVito, the bookstore's general manager, told the paper. ''We do what we do best. He does what he does best. It's a great home for Marley.''
The store doesn't charge extra for the service, which is featured on the store's website.
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"It's a cultural haven of art and books, and [the way] it's set up, it's very warm" is how Gilda Rogers, owner of Frank Talk Art Bistro & Books, Red Bank, N.J.. described her new shop in a Hub profile. "The environment is comfortable and intimate, so it lends itself to people coming in and engaging in conversations, probably with strangers, which makes it different than going to a Barnes & Noble or a Borders because [they're] so massive."
Rogers added that although business has been "tepid" thus far because she opened quite recently, she is "very optimistic. I've started to have repeat customers. It gives me hope there's something in here they like if they're coming back again and again. Once people really know that it's here, things will get revved up."
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Life and business go on after the closing of B. Dalton Bookseller at Washington Square Mall, Indianapolis, Ind. The Star reported that "independent used-book dealers in the area say they aren't planning any immediate response to the loss of that competitor, but they are confident they're ready to help fill the gap."
The Star noted that Joanna Zaphiriou, co-owner of the Sleepy Hollow Store, Irvington, did not see the closing as unqualified good news: "New- and used-book stores often create a symbiotic relationship and that is not a bad thing because customers have a place where they can sell their books after they have read them," she said. "It's sad that B. Dalton is leaving, and it gives off a definite stigma that people on the Eastside don't read, and that is just not true."
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For those who resolved this year to read more books, the Sacramento Bee offered a guide to bookstores in the California capital. As the paper so nicely noted, "The bookstore is a meditative place full of wonders to discover, and it's a lot cheaper than therapy."
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The San Francisco Chronicle had an article and a video featuring kids reading their work from Thanks and Have Fun Running the Country, a new book that "has many contributions by local students who attend 826 Valencia [writing and tutoring center] after school."
The title of the book came from a letter by 13-year-old Yoselin Martinez of San Francisco, who wrote, "My neighbors think that I am just another Latino that is going to ruin her life. But they are so wrong. I want to go to great high schools. I want to graduate from college and show my mom that I worked my butt off."
Martinez said she hopes to be a writer when she grows up, but "I didn't think I'd be in a book so soon."
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Thomas Gladysz, longtime events coordinator at the Booksmith, San Francisco, Calif., is leaving the Haight-Ashbury store, effective next Tuesday, January 27.
Gladysz has worked at the Booksmith for more than 21 years, and during the past 10 years running the events program, he set up, promoted and hosted nearly 1,000 author events, including appearances by Allen Ginsberg, Czeslaw Milosz, Neil Young, Patti Smith and many more.
Gladysz has contributed to American Bookseller and Bookselling This Week and was a board member of the Northern California Independent Booksellers Association as well as a member of the Booksellers Advisory Board of the Paris Review.
He may be reached at thomasg@pandorasbox.com.
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Because of "the recent heavy economic downtown," Russ Marshalek's position as marketing and publicity director of Wordsmiths Books, Decatur, Ga., is being eliminated, effective in March. Marshalek plans to move to New York and is looking for freelance or full-time work. He is continuing as a freelance writer and publicist at RussCommunications and doing pubicity for Anointed by Zach Steele, a February Mercury Retrograde Press title. He may be reached at russ.marshalek@gmail.com.