I think it’s just wonderful that Dawn has her “Spotlight on Bookstores” feature because it’s obvious to me that there are quite a few hidden treasures out there as far as bookstores go. A case in point: I recently discovered a wonderful bookstore called Aaron’s Books in historic downtown Lititz, PA. Even though Aaron’s Books is almost an hour from my home, I think it is so worth the trip!

Aaron’s Books has been around for over four years; however, it wasn’t until the past few months that I became familiar with the store and all of its offerings.  I first became aware of Aarons when they hosted an author reading and book signing for Susan Gregg Gilmore, author of LOOKING FOR SALVATION AT THE DAIRY QUEEN back in June. When I stepped into this quaint shop, I immediately fell in love! It is just chock full of new and used books; and it really epitomizes what a small-town bookstore should be. It even smells just like a bookstore! I could get lost in there for hours just walking around and checking out all of the books and other things in the store; and, of course, I love discussing book recommendations with the owners.

Susan Gregg Gilmore

Aaron’s is a family owned and operated business – how refreshing is that in today’s society of huge retailers? The owners, Sam and Todd Dickinson, are two of the nicest and most helpful people that you’d ever want to meet! And if you’re lucky, you just might see Aaron himself. Aaron is Sam and Todd’s young son who was only 2 1/2 years old when the store opened. “He’s really grown up in the store, and of course he loves reading,” said Sam. “People around Lititz don’t always know my name, but everyone seems to know me as Aaron’s mom.”

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One of my favorite things about Aaron’s (besides their great selection of new and used books) is their back room which is especially designed for kids. It is just too cute — from the blue sky walls to the white picket fence to the train table and rocking chair. The children’s books are organized by category and in low laying bins so even the youngest readers can check out the selection. In fact, one of Aaron’s Books visions is “to encourage reading and a love of books for children of all ages and levels.” My thoughts exactly!

Like many independent bookstores, Aaron’s Books is very active in their local community.  Sam and Todd helped to establish the popular even “Lovin’ Lititz Every 2^nd” where all of the downtown businesses are open late the second Friday of each month; and the downtown area is full of music, food shopping and people. The store also hosts many free community events such as author signings, book clubs meetings, and a pre-schoolers’ story time.  Aaron even started his own book group over the summer for young readers to discuss popular chapter books. In addition, Aaron’s hosts a “Family Fun Night” with live entertainment as well as crafts, games, snacks and discounts on purchases of children’s books.

Maryann McFadden

Of course, one thing that is near and dear to my heart is getting to meet authors; and Aaron’s has been giving me that opportunity on a regular basis. Over the past four years, Aaron’s Books has brought dozens of local, regional and national authors to Lititz. Besides Susan Gregg Gilmore’s visit in August, Aaron’s also hosted members of the Liar’s Club, a group of prominent Philadelphia-based writers that includes: Gregory Frost, Jonathan Maberry, William Lashner, Jon McGoran, Marie Lamba, and Kelly Simmons. And later that month, I attended an event with Mary Ann McFadden, author of THE RICHEST SEASON and SO HAPPY TOGETHER. The owners of Aaron’s Books intend to have more free community events and author signings in the coming months; and from November 13^th to the 15^th, Aaron’s will be hosting their very own First Annual Kid-Lit Festival. They are currently planning to have 15-20 authors and illustrators participate at different points during the weekend, with everyone together at a book signing on Saturday afternoon. Tentative authors include: Sandy Asher, Matt Phelan, A.S. King, Ken Munro, and Lisa Greenwald. My daughter and I can’t wait to attend!

I am so glad that Dawn allowed me to share my appreciation (and newfound love) for Aaron’s Books with her readers. I feel so fortunate to have found such a warm and inviting bookstore where I can spend time with others who share my love for books and reading. Aaron’s Books truly is a gem among bookstores in my local area!

Today’s Spotlight on Bookstores post is written by

“A story, after all, does not only belong to the one who is telling it. It belongs, in equal measure, to the one who is listening.” No One You Know

When NO ONE YOU KNOW was released last spring, I did a reading at The Depot, a small, wonderful bookstore in Mill Valley, California. Five minutes before the reading was scheduled to begin, there were only three people in the room, all of whom I knew. Then a gentleman wandered in, very tall and broad-chested, dressed in a motorcycle jacket. Because readings always breed in me a certain brand of desperation, I walked up to him and said, “Are you here for the reading?” He looked confused for a moment, then told me he wasn’t, at which point I sort of jokingly begged him to stay. One wants to fill the seats, of course, even at the price of one’s own dignity.

By the time we began we were up to ten or eleven. Much to my surprise, the stranger in the motorcycle jacket was among them. Because of the small group I decided to forgo the formality of the podium and sound system and do the reading sitting down. It happened that the motorcycle man was sitting very close to me, and I quickly realized how awkward it is to read to another grown-up face to face, so close one’s knees could almost touch. It’s very intimate, uncomfortably so, more like a date than a reading. In this case it felt like a firstdate, the kind where you’re hoping you don’t say the wrong thing, and I could feel myself blushing as I read the scene in which the main character, a coffee buyer named Ellie Enderlin, encounters someone in a café in a foreign place and realizes that she knows him, or has known him, although she can’t place the context: “The thought crossed my mind that I might have slept with him,” she says. “There had been a period following my sister’s death when I slept with many men.”

I worried for the gentleman in the motorcycle jacket, whom I had accosted, and to whom now I felt I had exposed myself completely. After all, there is always some element of truth in the fiction. I wanted to tell him that he should feel free to leave at any moment. Because, along with desperation, readings always make me feel apologetic. Baptist guilt and all that, you know, lingering from my childhood in Alabama…there are so many other things the audience could be doing, I feel I ought to offer them something more than a story. Which is why, on many occasions, I have baked brownies for readings, and handed out small gifts: bags of fresh-roasted coffee, Krispy Kreme gift certificates, movie passes to my favorite neighborhood theater. Where I come from, it’s called lagniappe (visit my lagniappe page for book clubs )

At The Depot that night, the small coterie grew in numbers, the reading came to an end, I took some questions, signed some books. And then, after everyone was gone, I noticed that the man in the motorcycle jacket was still standing there. He’d been waiting around the corner. He approached me shyly with a copy of my book. “I wish I hadn’t told you I wasn’t here for the reading,” he said. “I didn’t even know this was a bookstore, I just wandered in, but it was so nice to have someone tell me a story.”

He recounted details of the excerpt I had read, confessed that he doesn’t read much, and said that he’d be back to The Depot to hear another reading—it was a nice change of pace, he said. For a moment the awkwardness fell away, and for once I didn’t feel apologetic. I was relieved to realize that it had been a fair exchange—the stranger made the room a little less empty, I made his evening a little more interesting. It wasn’t about the book—it was about the act of gathering around a story—and allowing the intimacy to happen, despite all our best efforts to avoid it.

Kepler’s Booksdoesn’t look quite the same as it did when peace activist Roy Kepler first opened its doors in 1955 – or so folks who’ve been around Palo Alto and Menlo Park since then tell me – but those are its roots. It was a serious store where serious readers and thinkers gathered.

But then, as now, it was a fun place to hang out, too: The Grateful Dead gave live shows at the store back in the day. And they, along with Joan Baez, often shared ideas with local community leaders surrounded by books.

Those roots are still apparent in the booksellers who make Kepler’s the store it is today: they know books. I can’t tell you the number of times bookseller Nancy S. has put a novel in my hands and said, “Read this.” I’m sometimes reluctant, but she’s rarely wrong about what I will like, or what is worth reading. And that culture runs deep – a fact the store recognizes by giving booksellers their own bookshelves, like this one by Aggie Z., who runs the Kepler’s Writing Group and hosts the Kepler’s blog, The Well Read Donkey.

Does Kepler’s host book groups? When I first moved to Palo Alto – knowing no one – I set off in search of fellow book lovers. It didn’t take me long to find my way to Molly McCall’s Fiction Book Group. Through Molly, I came to Laurie Colwin’s Happy All the Time and L.P. Hartley’s The Go-Between, among others. The store hosts speculative fiction and Spanish literature groups, too, keeps a wonderful display of the books neighborhood book groups are reading, and hosts book club mixers where writers and people in publishing discuss good book club reads. The next one is just around the corner, on Sunday, May 17.

Kepler’s also hosts terrific readings, and I can tell you as an author that it is a great place to read. Not every author gets the special friends-in-Wednesday-Sisters-Shirts type treatment that local authors like me get, but they do get interested readers (often including prominent bay area authors) asking questions from the seats. Great setting, great books, great company. What more could a reader want?

Do you know Iliana from Bookgirl’s Nightstand ?  Her blog has archives going back to June of 2004 – yes, she’s been keeping a book blog for almost five years!  Aside from her prolific writing of book reviews, book lists, and thoughtful comments, she manages Bookgirl’s Studio an Esty shop where she showcases her handmade books and journals; as Iliana says, “when I’m not reading books, I’m making them.”  This week, she offers a peek inside BookPeople in Austin. 

Austin, Texas may well be known as “The Live Music Capital of the World,” or for its motto ‘Keep Austin Weird’ but for bookworms it’s also home to several independent bookstores. The most well known, which has won Reader’s Choice awards for 10 years in a row, is BookPeople.

Located in downtown Austin, BookPeople is locally owned and has been in business since 1970. Since it opened its doors it’s been bringing more than the bestsellers to Austin readers. The well lit and laid out bookstore has lots of sections so whether you are looking for new arrivals, mysteries, graphic novels, new age, poetry, or historical fiction you are sure to find it. There’s even a section just for Penguin Book editions.

Numerous staff selection cards line the shelves and book displays throughout the store are there to help the reader get out of their comfort zone. They don’t just focus on brand new books but on diversity so they’ll feature books from different publishing houses and lesser-known titles.

Book, or books in hand, you can settle down in one of the number of vintage, comfy chairs throughout the bookstore or you can take your books over to the cafe. The cafe, it should be noted, has free wi-fi, features art from local artists and of course the yummy treats are from local bakeries. Next to it is also the magazine section, which also has a nice variety of literary journals.

BookPeople has a full event calendar each month as it hosts several book groups and children events. Plus, any author reading/signing in Austin is bound to take place at BookPeople.

Before you leave BookPeople, you’ll also have to stop in their gift section, which has a lot of quirky and unique gifts. You’ll find cards (not of the Hallmark variety), jewelry made by local designers, journals, home decorations and apparel.

The bookstore opens from 9 a.m. to 11 p.m. so plenty of time to get lost amidst the stacks in the two-story building. So next time you are in Austin, sure see the Capitol building and have some fun on Sixth Street, but don’t forget to stop in at BookPeople.

Today’s Spotlight on Bookstores comes to us from Serena Agusto-Cox at Savvy Verse and Wit.  Her blog, a regular stop on my daily reading, is ”dedicated to all literary and poetic works” and offers “critiques, reviews, editorial hints, and insights.”  She is co-hosting the War Through the Generations reading challenge.  Serena is a published poet whose work has appeared in Beginnings Magazine, Muse Apprentice Guild, and Pedestal Magazine, among others.  She lives near Washington, DC.

When friends and family come to visit, especially those that have been here numerous times, I’m tasked with locating activities and places to visit that they haven’t been.  In the case of Terrie, who has been coming to D.C. off and on for a number of years, it gets more difficult with each year to play her tour guide.  Although this presents a hefty challenge for me, she’s pretty open, which makes it easier.

Having no notion that Terrie was taking a class on music, I selected Politics & Prose; 5015 Connecticut Ave, NW, Washington, D.C.).  This independent bookstore has been the talk of the town for many years with a number of author signings and events, and I had been eager to check it out myself.  Terrie and my brother, Aaron, were going to be my unsuspecting guinea pigs.  Politics & Prose is supposed to be off of Van Ness Metro stop, but really there is quite a long walk from the metro to the bookstore.  The cold air and whipping wind hit our faces all the way to the bookstore, freezing out noses and fingers, especially for those of us who did not bring gloves or hats.

Don’t let the strip mall storefront fool you.  Politics & Prose is quite cozy inside, with rows and rows of books on tabletops, bookshelves lining each wall, and books lining the sides of the stairwell that leads into the children’s section and the small café downstairs.  My hands grazed a number of book covers and flipped through a number of pages.  This store reminded me so much of Olsson’s Bookstore, which is a now-defunct independent bookseller I frequented many afternoons on lunch break in Bethesda, Md., from its hotel-style, yet comfortable chairs, to its shelf placards with staff recommendations.  The store is even the same size the Olsson’s store was in Bethesda; it felt like returning home.

The best attributes of this store is not the location, the postage-stamp sized parking lot, or the small poetry and music sections, but the at-home atmosphere, the helpful staff, and the variety of books in the clearance section.  This short visit left me wanting to spend more time in this store, just browsing, sitting, and reading, like many of the patrons we saw.  Terrie had a great time checking out the paltry music book section for a good half hour, though she didn’t find what she wanted, Aaron had a great time shadowing us around and searching for Washington, D.C., magnets for our mom.  Aaron even found a great book in the children’s section for himself to read; I only hope he takes the time to practice and read it.  I selected How to Read Novels Like a Professor by Thomas Foster from the shelves after much debate with myself about three or four different books.

My second trip the Politics & Prose with my husband, Cris, was not as fruitful.  We couldn’t get ourselves in gear and missed Christopher Moore’s signing for the Fool.  There was no parking by the time we got to the bookstore, but it looked like a great event from the windows as we drove by.  The place was quickly filling up.  When the weather turns warmer, you can bet I’ll be popping back in this store.  And if you’re ever in the neighborhood and need a down moment, this would be the best place to stop in and check out the latest books.

When my husband and I decided that retirement for us would mean selling the house, buying an RV and traveling North America, we knew there would be one big problem: books. We both love to read and we were not going to give that up. The question was how to find the books we love in places where we’ve never been.  As it turns out, it’s actually easy, fun and part of the great adventure. And occasionally we run into a little serendipity.

Many of our fellow RV-ers are also book-a-holics so trading books with them is as easy as going to the laundry room at most campgrounds.  But there comes a time when you need a good cozy bookstore. Usually we just ask a “local” to give us a recommendation.  Or we go online and check out Map Muse or Indie Bound.

This has led us to some wonderful bookshops.  The last few months we have been in Northern California. If you ask a local reader here, they will tell you – Copperfield’s Books in Sebastopol.  Located about 50 miles north of San Francisco, this charming small town is an eclectic mix of California cultures.  And that is also what we found at Copperfield’s Books.

The bookstore is actually divided into two stores.  First we went in what I will call the new-books store. When we walked in it was immediately welcoming with a light airy feeling with colorful books everywhere and mellow music playing quietly. The big table right inside the door had a wide assortment of local tastes – everything from wine books to Tao to organic gardening to poetry and more.  Past that table we found an excellent section of new and classic literature, all sorts of non-fiction, a nice nook with travel literature and a small selection of magazines and journals.

What really excited me at this store was a superb section in the back devoted to children’s books. It was extensive for a small sized store and organized beautifully.  I usually don’t have trouble finding something for our preschool granddaughter. But when it comes to the fourth-grade granddaughter, I find most stores only carry the minimum number of books.  Here in the small town of Sebastopol I found all sorts of options divided by pre-readers, lower and upper elementary and even middle school.  To me this is good.  It says there are enough book buyers in the Sepastopol area who believe in raising children surrounded by good books and a bookstore owner willing to lend the space.

While I buried myself in the children’s section my husband was checking out the rest of the street.  He found a nice place two stores away to eat lunch. It’s called the East West Cafe and has a very diverse menu. I won’t do a restaurant review here but just let me suggest, if you stop in, that you try the garlic fries.  Mmmm. Coincidently, we met the owner at a dinner party a few weeks later and discovered he was born in Damascus and has devoted his life to good food and travel.  It shows in his cafe.

After lunch we walked up the street to the other Copperfield’s Books.  This one is devoted to rare and used books.  Right inside the door we found the oldie-but-goodies, some locked in glass cases.  Beyond that are thousands and thousands of used books, most of them fiction.  My husband found some very good home design and landscaping books for our son’s new fixer-upper.  There was a nice section on history (California and other) as well as poetry, philosophy, gardening and so on.

In this store we found lots of mysteries and thrillers and other genres that weren’t available at the new-books store.  Here there were also lots of chairs.  The other store only had two or three.  I could have used one in the children’s section.  The rare and used store also had that same nice mix of music as the other store.  I asked one of the staff where the music came from and she said, “Oh, it’s just our personal cd’s.”  The staff has nice, mellow taste.

You will find Copperfield’s Books in nearby Santa Rosa, Petaluma, Healdsburg, Napa and Calistoga.  These are also nice, charming towns north of San Francisco.  We visited the Calistoga store and found the drive getting there as beautiful as the little two-block downtown area.  The store was very nice, although you could tell they stocked it to appeal to the Napa Valley Wine Country tourists that frequent the area.  All of the stores sponsor additional events: author book readings, literary luncheons, speaker series, etc.

For us the stores in Sebastopol made for a nice destination experience.  Not your pop-in-and-buy-a-book kind of place.  It’s one you can just take your time and enjoy.  If you buy something to take home, your enjoyment can last even longer.