Authors Max Booth III and Lori Michelle, who run the small press Ghoulish Books, will be opening a bookshop under the same name next month at 9330 Corporate Drive #702 in Selma, Tex. The San Antonio Current reported that the storefront will house both the publishing operation and a retail space primarily stocking indie horror titles along with a few gifts and used books. It also will provide a venue for events such as author readings and signings.
"It was something myself and my partner have discussed at great length and fantasized about for years," said horror author Booth. "But we never really had the opportunity or thought that it would be a realistic thing to do."
They had been looking to rent a space for their publishing office, and during the hunt, Booth visited a used bookstore in Selma that he and Michelle frequented. When they discovered the shop would soon be closing, they took advantage of the opportunity. "Since the storefront was already configured as a retail space, they decided to continue operating it as a bookshop under the name of their publishing brand," the Current noted.
Ghoulish Books is the recently renamed horror imprint of Perpetual Motion Machine Publishing, an indie press founded by Booth and Michelle in 2012. "We changed [the name] up because we discovered that we seem to be successful when leaning into this niche of spooky stuff," said Booth. "Perpetual Motion Machine Publishing, nobody knows what that means. But if you say, 'Ghoulish Books,' they go, 'Oh, OK, I got that.' So, we began publishing mostly with that name, with PMMP being the umbrella company of everything."
Although Ghoulish Books hasn't yet set an opening date for the retail store, the publishing company will hold its second annual Ghoulish Book Festival April 14-16 in San Antonio.
Booth said the foray into retail is a continuation of a successful business model: "If we were only relying on it as a retail space, I would probably be more afraid-sounding right now. But because we also just publish books, and those books can be bought by anyone on the planet, I'm real confident that it's not gonna be a disaster."