"Independent bookstores are connectors. They connect people to many worlds, to discover people and places we'd never know otherwise. They also connect readers to other readers, and to writers and poets. They provide people with a peaceful place to browse, a place for conversation, a refuge offering comfort and inspiration. Indie bookstores are where we find community.... Bookstores build a more compassionate and aware citizenry. Books allow us the hope of living in a world of shared humanity, as we become closer to those unlike us who we meet in books. Plain and simple, indie bookstores are the heart of their neighborhoods."
--Linda Kass, owner of Gramercy Books in Bexley, Ohio, and an author whose second novel, A Ritchie Boy (She Writes Press) will be released September 1. (via Bookselling This Week)